Page:Whalley 1822 A vindication of the University of Edinburgh .djvu/1



THESE remarks owe their origin to a paper published in the "Pamphleteer," for May, 1814, under the title of "Observations on Medical Reform, by a Member of the University of Oxford," and which has just fallen under the observation of the Author.

The Oxonian commences by saying, "it might naturally have been expected that the morbid tendency of the present generation to reform, would have received such a check from the dreadful examples that have exhibited themselves in many situations, as at least to deter the prudent from dangerous attempts. Those examples, it is true, have been chiefly displayed by political reformers, they have run their course, their day is past, and most of them have experienced the lot they deserved. There is, however, a sign of the times, a portentous contempt of the greater B