Page:The Influence of University Degrees on the Education of Women.djvu/12

 physicians of their own sex. It cannot be denied that a large number of women find very great satisfaction in some kind or other of doctoring, and do actually practise it, whether they know anything about it or not; yet this is so grave a matter that it has been thought necessary, quite recently, to bring the practice of medicine more completely under legal control. The want of skill or care may so easily and quickly produce fatal mischief, and even murder itself may be so easily hidden under the disguise of the unskilfulness of a physician, that it has been thought necessary to require the surest guarantees of competency from all those to whose professional attention, the health and lives of their patients are so often entrusted. Here, however, as in Arts, what has been asked on the part of women is, not a lower standard of medical skill, not easier examinations, but that they should be allowed, in medical schools of their own, to acquire such knowledge as would enable them to pass the examinations and acquire the skill which are now thought necessary and sufficient in the case of men.

The holding of degrees by women is not without precedent. In the Italian Universities and in that of Göttingen, women have held high positions. Towards the end of the last century a female physician graduated at Montpelier. In 1861, the degree of Bachilier ès-Lettres was conferred on Mdlle. Daubié, by the Academy of Lyons, and within the last few months, another French lady, Mdlle. Chenu, passed her examination for the degree of Bachilier ès-Sciences at the University of the Sorbonne. It appears not unreasonable to hope that before many years have elapsed, Englishwomen will be placed in a not less favourable position than their continental neighbours, and that whatever advantages may belong to University examinations and degrees, will be thrown freely open to them.