If any person would be more fully informed about the particulars of so pious a work, I refer him to a treatise, set forth by the authority of the president and censors, in the year 97. It is called, A short Account of the Proceedings of the College of Physicians, London, in Relation to the sick Poor. The reader may there not only be informed of the rise and progress of this so public an undertaking, but also of the concurrence and encouragement it met with from the best, as well as the most ancient members of the society, notwithstanding the vigorous opposition of a few men, who thought it their interest to defeat so laudable a design. The intention of this preface is not to persuade mankind to enter into our quarrels, but to vindicate the author from being censured for taking any indecent liberty with a faculty he has the honour to be a member of. If the satire may appear directed at any particular person, it is at such only as are presumed to be engaged in dishonourable confederacies for mean and mercenary ends, against the dignity of their own profession. But if there be no such, then these characters are but imaginary, and by consequence ought to give nobody offence. The description of the battle is grounded upon a feud that happened in the Dispensary, betwixt a member of the college with his retinue, and some of the servants that attended there to dispense the medicines; and is so far real, though the poetical relation be fictitious. I hope nobody will think the author too undecently reflecting through the whole, who, being too liable to faults himself, ought to be less severe upon the miscarriages of others. There is a character in this trivial performance, which the town, I find, applies to a particular person: it is a reflection which I should be sorry should give offence; being no more than what may be said of any physician remarkable for much practice. The killing of numbers of patients is so trite a piece of raillery, that it ought not to make the least impres sion, either upon the reader, or the person it is applied to; being one that I think in my conscience a very able physician, as well as a gentleman of extraordinary learning. If I am hard upon any one, it is my reader: but some worthy gentlemen, as remarkable for their humanity as their extraordinary parts, have taken care to make him amends for it, by prefixing something of their own. I confess, those ingenious gentlemen have done me a great honour; but while they design an imaginary panegyric upon me, they have made a real one upon themselves; and by saying how much this small performance exceeds some others, they couvince the world how far it falls short of theirs. THE COPY OF AN INSTRUMENT SUBSCRIBED BY THE PRESIDENT, CENSOR, MOST OF THE ELECTS, SENIOR FELLOWS, CANDIDATES, &c. of the college oF PHYSICIANS, IN RELATION TO THE SICK POOR. WHEREAS the several orders of the College of Physicians, London, for prescribing medicines gratis to the poor sick of the cities of London and Westminster, and parts adjacent; as also proposals made by the said college to the lord mayor, court of aldermen, and common council, of London, in pursuance thereof; have hitherto been ineffectual, for that no method hath been taken to furnish the poor with medicines for their cure at low and reasonable rates; we therefore, whose names are here underwritten, fellows and members of the said college, being willing effectually to promote so great a charity, by the counsel and good-liking of the president and college declared in their comitia, hereby (to wit, each of us severally and apart, and not the one for the other of us) do oblige ourselves to pay to Dr. Thomas Burwell, fellow and elect of the said college, the sum of ten pounds apiece of lawful money of England, by such proportions, and at such times, as to the major part of the subscribers here shall seem most convenient; which money, when received by the said Dr. Thomas Burwell, is to be by him expended in preparing and delivering medicines to the poor at their intrinsic value, in such manner, and at such times, and by such orders and directions, as by the major part of the subscribers hereto shall in writing be hereafter appointed and directed for that purpose. In witness whereof we have hereunto set our hands and seals, this twenty-second day of December, 1696. E Tho. Gill, censor. Will. Dawes, censor. Jo. Hutton. Rob. Brady. Rich, Morton. John Hawys. David Hamilton, Walter Harris. W. Cockburn, J. le Feure. P. Sylvestre. Ch. Morton, Edm. King. Sam. Garth. Barnh. Soame. Denton Nicholas. Joseph Gaylard. John Woollaston. Steph. Hunt. Oliver Horseman, Rich. Morton, jun. Tho. Alvery, Sam. Morris. John Woodward. Norris. George Colebrook, Gideon Harvey. Rich. Robinson, The design of printing the subscribers names, is to show, that the late undertaking has the sanction of a college act; and that it is not a project carried on by five or six members, as those that oppose it would unjustly insinuate. VERSES TO DR. GARTH. TO DR. GARTH, UPON THE DISPENSARY. On that some genius, whose poetic vein C. BOYLE. TO MY FRIEND THE AUTHOR, Not by her hair, her hand, her nose, her eye; If with resistless fires my soul she warms, And yet 'tis thought, some critics in this town, So near ally'd in learning, wit, and skill, friend. CHR. CODRINGTON. TO MY FRIEND DR. GARTH, THE AUTHOR OF THE DISPENSARY. To praise your healing art would be in vain; The town, which long has swallow'd foolish verse, Which poetasters every where rehearse, The satire of vile scribblers shall appear Dr. Gibbons. TO MY FRIEND, UPON THE DISPENSARY. As when the people of the northern zone Thus we, who lately, as of summer's heat, Others proceed to art by slow degrees, Whilst yours, like Pallas, from the head of Jove, Now let your Muse rise with expanded wings, |