An inaugural address delivered before the Medical Society of the State of New York : at the Capitol in the city of Albany, on the 8th day of February, 1826 / by James R. Manley.

  • Manley, James R., 1781-1851.
Date:
1826
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An inaugural address delivered before the Medical Society of the State of New York : at the Capitol in the city of Albany, on the 8th day of February, 1826 / by James R. Manley. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

    15/30
    they might: but they are exceptions to all known rules ; their number, too, is comparatively small, and if ten times multi- plied, our profession would have no exclusive right to claim them as its members. However much we, as individuals, may regret the injury done to medical degrees by the indiscreet or interested dis- tribution of them, it is only as they affect the character of the license, and as they are calculated to defeat the intentions of the law of the State, that they interest us in our corporate capacity. But while I feel constrained to charge upo. them so large a share of the abuse of medical privileges, 1 should do injustice to my subject were 1 to permit the evasions of the law in respect to the licenses themselves, as they are occasion- ally issued by the county societies, to pass unnoticed : those infractions it is true are not numerous, and they appear to have arisen more from the latitude of construction given to its provisions, than from a contempt of its restraints ; still, as it is of the first importance that the law should not only be ri- gidly but impartially executed, they are proper subjects for the cognizance of the Society. At a previous session they claimed your attention, and it is presumed that, as they have lost none of their interest, they will continue to be objects of solicitude till corrected by statute. It is not a matter of indifference whether or not the physi- cian merits those privileges which the law of license permits him to exercise, because those privileges invest him with the power to do incalculable good or infinite mischief; and whe- ther it shall be the one or the other, must depend entirely on his medical education, while those who must be the subjects of his skill are utterly incompetent to judge of its amount. In all other practical sciences, the intelligence of the commu- nity is sufficient to estimate the desert to which every indivi- dual is entitled, who makes a claim upon their confidence ; the exhibition of their talents is a public exhibition, and the success of their labours is measured without reference to that stupid doctrine of fatality which is prone to confound all dis- tinctions, whether of morals, intellect, or acquirement. In one essential respect our profession differs from every other ;