Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 17.djvu/300

294 administered by such persons, in whom our company justly repose the greatest confidence: and provided they tend to the encouragement of trade, and the consumption of the woollen manufacture of this kingdom.

We beg leave to observe, that there has been no complaint from any of the nobility, gentry, and citizens whom we have attended. Our practice, which consists chiefly in outward applications, having been always so effectual, that none of our patients have been obliged to undergo a second operation, excepting one gentlewoman; who, after her first burial, having burdened her husband with a new brood of posthumous children, her second funeral was by us performed without any farther charges to the said husband of the deceased. And we humbly hope, that one single instance of this kind, a misfortune owing merely to the avarice of a sexton, in cutting off a ring, will not be imputed to any want of skill, or care, in our company.

We humbly conceive, that the power by this bill lodged in the censors of the college of physicians to restrain any of his majesty's subjects from dispensing, and well-disposed persons from taking, what medicines they please, is a manifest encroachment on the liberty and property of the subject.

As the company, exercising the trade and mystery of upholders, have an undisputed right in and upon the bodies of all and every the subjects of the kingdom; we conceive the passing of this bill, though not absolutely depriving them of their said right, might keep them out of possession by unreasonable delays, to the great detriment of our company, and their numerous families. We