Page:Whalley 1822 A vindication of the University of Edinburgh .djvu/48

48, that the Royal College would oppose the Act, in its progress through Parliament, with the whole of their authority and inﬂuence, if the company of Apothecaries refused its insertion,) are almost entirely prevented from transgressing; as not one prescription in ten, is written by either a Fellow or Licentiate of the College of Physicians. So much for the positive enactment of this clause, and negatively, it incapacitates any Physician, not of Oxford or Cambridge, or not licensed by the College of Physicians, from prosecuting to conviction, any Apothecary or his assistant, offending in the manner above specified; consequently, it leaves Apothecaries and their assistants at perfect liberty to compound the prescriptions of Physicians, who have been educated at actual schools of medicine, but who are not Members of the College of Physicians, fraudulently or negligently, without fear of punishment. This is indeed carrying illiberality and injustice as far as they can be carried, for it is well known, that a Doctor of physic, being a British subject, of any University in Scotland, of that in Ireland, or in any kingdom or country upon the Continent, has an equal right to practise physic in England, except in London, or seven miles round it, as