The Sun.
London, England, 1839-03-26 00:00:00

LORD MAYOR'S COALS.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE Stay;
Sin,—On the 15th instant you did me the favour to
insert a letter on the above subject, and on Saturday
last with your usual impartiality you gave the reply cf
one of the parties to whom it referred ; but as it is
much easier to deny than disprove alleged facts, I would
suggest to Messrs. Pope, Brothers, and Co., a mode
by which the truth may be fairly, properly, and pub-
licly elicited.
_ _

Let a public meeting be called (for the public are
most vitally interested in the matter) say at the Lon-
don or Crown and Anchor Tavern, or some other p'ace
sufficiently large to prevent the meeting being packed,
and I wilt attend, and not only prove the truth of my
former statement, but I will also personally and publicly
endeavour to sustain the following :

Ist. That the Coal exhibited at the Mansion-house,
and so highly eulogised by the Lord Mayor as " An!i,
Combination Coals," were in reality a mixture of an
inferior with a best quality.
2d. Titat the vendors of the said " Anti-Combination
Coals" have not kept faith with the public, far when
written to for a supply they have charged or attempted
to charge an extra sum for the delivery of the same.
3d. That the system adopted by the parties styling,
themselves with such pomposity, " The Lord Mayor's
Coal Merchants," so far 03 regards their " Anti. Con.
bination Coals,". is altogether a system of sheer humbug.
I am, Sir, your obedient servant,
THOMAS MORRIS.
Sun Wharf, Ratcliff, March 25, 1839.

THE QUACKERY OF REGULAR

PRACTITIONERS.

We copy the following paragraph from the Medical
Gazette, as an amusing specimen of a gentleman recom-
mending the most errant quackery in law inaking,, in
order to put down quackery in medicine :
The first of Dr. Cowan's propositions is " that all
quack advertisements, either through the medium of the
newspapers, placards, ipamphlets, or other printed chan-
nels, to declared illegal, and that both the printer and the
author be liable for each °ff.:dee, to tine and mxison-
ment."

We fear that while public opinion remains What it is en
this point, it would be vain to hope for the enactment of
such a law:and still valuer to expect that it Could be
cuted. Dr. Cowan observes that some of the great, the noble,
and the learned, are among the blinded abettors of quackery ;
and we have no doubt many of these would resist nay
measure tending to check the dinsion of nos`. urns, as i
it were an attack upon their estates. Nostrums arc the
foster-children of despair; and when art can do no more,
artifice stops in awhile to amuse the patient v.,hem it can-
not cure. Moreover, to hope that quack advertisements
u-ill be prohibited because they are false and fradulent,
to presuppose a vast ia,provemenz in the tone of public
morality.

Perhaps a day may come when the nature of our al
shall be so generally understood, tiJat the educated and tl
sensible of all parties will join in throwing the shield of ii
law over their weaker brethren, and endeavour to prate,
them from quacks, as they now do from thimble-riggers
but before this happy era can arrive, the great and learn-,
must themselves understand the broal distinction betwcc
giving nostrum; and prescribing regularly. It is simpi
this--The practitioner of physic prescribes, not for
single symptom, as a cough, for example, but for a coca:;
raoiiiiied by twenty accessory circumstances ; the
latan gives his drugs for the cough alone, the acce;sor
symptoms being disregarded.
Quackery then is prescribing for a single symptom
the regular practice considers all the symp'o:
This gentleman, however, wiLltout considering-the it
terests of Newspapers, the dirfieulty of suppressin
publications, the inquisition, the law which al lite nee.,
sary the interference it would cause with private cm
urns, the hated informers it would nourish into existcr.Q,
the impossibility even of executing the law, seizes LoI

~
i
of the one symptom of quack mcutvne, and presci
a law that would involve the Press in immense tro
if not ruin. How shall we distinguish the ache:

ment of a qu,ek salver, from the advertisement of a
regular bred physician? There is mere quackei y in
law making, than in medicine, and this Dr. Cowan, and
the Editor of the "G,zette," appears quite. Prinus
amongst lcgi3lative quacks.