The provisions of the Act of the 3d Hen. 8. could produce no permanent benefit, and we therefore find within seven years, that the continuance of the abuses which it was intended to remedy, was made the foundation of granting its powers to a Corporation better calculated to exercise them; what these powers are we must now investigate somewhat minutely, for it is an essential branch of Medical Jurisprudence to regulate and define the privileges and office of those who are best able to give effect to its institutions.
It may be necessary to premise that though several subsequent Charters[[72]] have been prepared for or offered to the acceptance of the College of Physicians (as 15 James and 15 Charles 2. for which see Sir Wm. Brown’s Vindication, Dr. Chas. Goodall’s Collection, and other works, most of which are enumerated in Gough’s Topography of London), yet the Charter and Statute of Henry the 8th is still the subsisting ground of the rights, privileges, and powers of the Corporation. By their Charter recited in, and confirmed by the 14th and 15th Hen. 8. (see Appendix, p. 7) John Chambre, Thomas Linacre, Ferdinando de Victoria,[[73]] physicians to the king, and Nicholas Halsewel, John Francis, and Robert Yaxley, physicians, and the rest of the faculty in and of London, are constituted a perpetual college or community, with power annually to choose a President, who is to govern and superintend the College, and all men of the faculty and their practice (omnes homines ejusdem facultatis et negotia eorundem,) they are to have perpetual succession and a common seal, with power to hold lands to an amount therein limited (but which has since been enlarged by other Charters) notwithstanding the statute of Mortmain. They may sue and be sued by the name of the President and College or Community of the Faculty of Physic in London (per nomina Presidentis et collegii seu communitatis facultatis medicinæ Lond’); they may hold meetings (congregationes licitas et honestas) and make bye-laws (stat’ et ordinationes) for the good government, superintendance, and correction (pro salubri gubernatione, supervisu, et correctione) not only of the College but of all persons exercising the faculty in the city, or within seven miles thereof, (omnium hominum eandem facultatem in dicta civitate seu per septem miliaria in circuitu ejusdem civitatis exercen’). And it was granted to the College that none should exercise the faculty of physic within the city, or seven miles thereof, unless they had been admitted by the President and College by letters under their common seal, under the penalty of five pounds (centum solidorum) for every month during which such unlicenced person (non admissus) should practice; one half of the said penalty to the King, and one half to the President and College. The Charter further directs that the President and College should every year elect four (censors) who should have the superintendance, correction, and government of all persons exercising the faculty of medicine in any manner (aliquo modo frequentantium et utentium) in the city, or within seven miles thereof; with powers to punish for mal-practice (ac punitionem eorund’ pro delictis suis in non bene exequendo, faciendo, et utendo illa) and with power of superintendance and scrutiny of all medicines and their administration, provided that the punishment should be by fines, amercements, imprisonment, and other reasonable modes (per fines, amerciamenta, & imprisonamenta, corpor’ suor’ et per alias vias rationab’ et congruas.) The Charter then directs (quantum in nobis est) that the president and fellows of the College, and their successors, should be exempt from and should not be summoned to Assizes, Juries, Inquests, Attaints, et aliis recognitionibus, by the Mayor, Sheriffs, or Coroners of the City, even by the king’s writ. It was provided however by the concluding clause that nothing contained in the Charter should prejudice the City of London.
After the recital of the Charter the Statute proceeds to confirm the same “in as ample and large manner as may be taken, thought, and construed,” and directs the election of eight elects, from among whom the president is to be annually chosen.
The concluding section of this act is important, as it evidently repeals so much of the 3 H. 8. as refers to physicians, enacting, “that no person from henceforth be suffered to exercise or practise in physic through England[[74]] until such time as he be examined at London, by the said President and Three of the said Elects; and to have from the said President or Elects Letters Testimonials of their approving and examination, except he be a Graduate of Oxford or Cambridge, which hath accomplished all Things for his Form without any Grace.”[[75]]
The next Act which concerns the College is the 32d Hen. 8. c. 40. (see Appendix, p. 14) by which it is enacted that the President, Fellows, and Commons of the College, should be discharged from keeping Watch and Ward in the City or its Suburbs, and that they shall not be chosen to the office of Constable, or to any other office in the City or Suburbs, any Order, Custom, or Law, to the contrary notwithstanding; By the second section of this Act the power and office of the Censors, which had been left somewhat undefined by the 14 & 15 Hen. 8. is more accurately and fully determined. They are empowered to enter the houses of all Apothecaries in the City, for the purpose only of searching and viewing their wares, drugs, and stuffs, and if any be found defective or corrupted, they may cause them to be burnt, or otherwise destroyed, and a penalty of five pounds,[[76]] to be recovered by any that will sue for it, is inflicted on apothecaries who obstinately or willingly refuse or deny the four Censors to enter into their houses; a penalty of forty shillings is also inflicted on any Censor, who being elected, shall refuse the oath directed to be taken, or neglect the execution of his office. The oath of the censor, is by this act, directed to be administered by the President of the College. The censors are also obliged to take the oaths of allegiance, supremacy, and abjuration in the Court of Exchequer at Westminster, hence the impropriety, if not illegality, of any Papist or Recusant being elected a Fellow of the College.
By the third and concluding section it is declared, that “forasmuch as the Science of Physick, doth comprehend and contain the knowledge of Surgery,” “any of the said Company or Fellowship of Physicians, being able, chosen, and admitted, by the said President and Fellowship of Physicians,” may practice the Science of Physic in all its members, both in London and elsewhere.
The Statute 34 and 35 Hen. 8. c. 8, entitled “A Bill that Persons being no common Surgeons, may minister medicines, notwithstanding the Statute,” refers to the 3d H. 8. c. 11. omitting all mention of the subsequent acts of the 14th, 15th and 32d, which were for the regulation of the Physicians of London, and as this Statute appears to have been directed against the then Surgeons of London, and for the relief of charitable persons, who had ministered to poor people, not taking any thing for their pains and cunning in certain diseases,[[77]] principally outward, and therefore (in its limited sense) objects of surgery rather than medicine; we shall treat of this act more at large when we enter upon the Charters and Statutes relating to the College of Surgeons. By this act, however, inward medicines are permitted to be administered by persons having knowledge and experience of the nature of herbs, roots and waters, for the stone, strangury or agues.[[78]] The latter clearly do not come within the description of what would now be called Surgical cases, and therefore so far the exclusive privileges of the physicians are affected by this Statute, yet it appears by the context and interpretation of the act, (See Butler v. Coll. of Phys.) that such administration must be of herbs, roots or waters only, to poor persons, (R. Litt. 351,) and without fee or reward.
The acts of Henry the 8th having been found insufficient in their provisions for the search of apothecaries wares, and other matters, the Statute 1st Mary, sess. 2. c. 9, (See Appx. p. 25,) was enacted, whereby the 14th and 15th Hen. 8. c. 5, is confirmed and declared to be in full force, any Act, Statute, Law, Custom, or other thing made to the contrary notwithstanding; it was further enacted, that whensoever the President of the College, or such (the Censors) as the President and College shall yearly authorise to search, examine, correct, and punish, all offenders and transgressors in the said faculty, within the said city and precinct, shall commit any such offender to prison, (the Tower of London excepted), the warden or gaoler of such prison is to receive and keep such person or persons at the charges of such person or persons, till discharged by the President and such persons as by the said College shall be authorised; under penalty of double the fine[[79]] such offender be assessed to pay, so that the same fine do not exceed twenty pounds. By the fifth section, it is provided, that it shall be lawful for the wardens of the grocers (now apothecaries) company, or one of them, to go with the Physicians in their search and view of apothecaries wares; but if the wardens refuse or delay to come, the Physicians may proceed without them; and the penalty of resisting such search is raised to ten pounds; By the concluding section, all Justices, Mayors, Sheriffs, Bailiffs, Constables, and other ministers and officers, shall assist the execution of the said acts, upon pain of running in contempt of her majesty.[[80]]
By these acts of Parliament, the College of Physicians is regulated to the present day; we have before stated that several Charters, some for limited and some for general purposes, have been granted to the College. In 1520, Queen Elizabeth granted by letters patent the bodies of four malefactors who had been executed for felony, to be taken by the College every year for dissection.[[81]] Charles the second granted six more “provided they be afterwards buried.” Charter 15 Char. 2. Goodall’s Coll. p. 62. This privilege we believe has not lately been claimed, though the present scarcity of bodies for the purposes of instruction would fully justify its revival: nor is there any doubt but that the judges in the exercise of their sound discretion might select some of the more atrocious criminals as proper objects for this additional severity.
In 1562 King James, by letters patent, granted to the College, for the sum of six pounds a year, that moiety of the fines to be inflicted by them to which the crown was entitled according to the several acts which we have before cited. Charter 15 Ja. Goodall’s Coll. p. 37.