and especially to the protestant interest of this kingdom, has met with so much encouragement from several great patriots in England, that they have engaged to procure an act to secure the sole benefit of informing, on this swearing act, to the agents and servants of this new bank. Several of my friends pretend to demonstrate, that this bank will in time vie with the South Sea company: they insist, that the army dispend as many oaths yearly as will produce one hundred thousand pounds nett.

There are computed to be one hundred pretty fellows in this town, that swear fifty oaths a-head daily; some of them would think it hard to be stinted to a hundred: this very branch would produce a vast sum yearly.

The FAIRS of this kingdom will bring in a vast revenue; the oaths of a little Connaught one, as well as they could be numbered by two persons, amounted to three thousand. It is true, that it would be impossible to turn all of them into ready money; for a shilling is so great a duty on swearing, that if it was carefully exacted, the common people might as well pretend to drink wine as to swear; and an oath would be as rare among them as a clean shirt.

A servant, that I employed to accompany the militia their last muster day, had scored down, in the compass of eight hours, three hundred oaths; but, as the putting of the act in execution on those days would only fill the stocks with porters, and pawn-shops with muskets and swords; and as it would be matter of great joy to papists, and disaffected persons, to see our militia swear

themselves out of their guns and swords; it is resolved that no advantage shall be taken of any militiaman's swearing while he is under arms; nor shall any advantage be taken of any man's swearing in the four courts, provided he is at hearing in the exchequer, or has just paid off an attorney's bill.

The medicinal use of oaths is what the undertaker' would by no means discourage, especially where it is necessary to help the lungs to throw off any distilling humour. On certificate of a course of swearing prescribed by any physician, a permit will be given to the patient, by the proper officer of the bank, paying no more than sixpence. It is expected that a scheme of so much advantage to the public will meet with more encouragement than their chimerical banks; and the undertaker hopes, that as he has spent a considerable fortune in bringing this scheme to bear, he may have the satisfaction to see it take place, for the public good, though he should have the fate of most projectors, to be undone.

It is resolved, that no compositions shall be made, nor licenses granted, for swearing, under a notion of applying the money to pious uses; a practice so scandalous as is fit only for the see of Rome, where the money arising from whoring licenses is applied ad propagandam fidem: and, to the shame of Smock-alley and of all protestant whores (especially those who live under the light of the Gospel ministry) be it spoken, a whore in Rome never lies down, but she hopes it will be the means of converting some poor heathen or heretic.

The swearing revenues of the town of Cork will be given for ever, by the bank, to the support of poor clergymen's widows; and those of Ringsend will be allowed to the maintenance of sailors' bastards.

The undertaker designs, in a few days, to appoint time and place for taking subscriptions; the subscribers must come prepared to pay down one fourth on subscribing.

P. S. The Jews of Rotterdam have offered to farm the revenues of Dublin at twenty thousand pounds per annum. Several eminent Quakers are also willing to take them at that rent; but the undertaker has rejected their proposals, being resolved to deal with none but Christians.

Application may be made to him about them, any day, at Pat's coffee-house, where attendance will be given.

481

RIGHT OF PRECEDENCE

BETWEEN PHYSICIANS AND CIVILIANS

INQUIRED INTO.

"Tu major, tibi me est æquum parare, Menalca." VIRG. "Fidis offendar medicis? irrascar amicis?" HOR.

I HAVE waited hitherto with no little impatience, to see some good effect of that debate, which I thought was happily started at a late meeting of our university*, upon the subject of precedence between professors of law and physic. And, though I cannot join in opinion with the worthy gentleman who first moved in it, I must needs say, the motion was seasonable, and well became him: for, beside that he intended an honour to a faculty he was promoted above†, and was so self-denying as to wave all debates of that nature as long as he was a party concerned in the motion, he did what in him lay to put an end, by authority, to a point in controversy, which had long divided the gentlemen of those two faculties; and I am very much mistaken if the same person does not hereafter prove as much a friend to piety and learning in his other designs, as he has been already in this, to the peace and agreement of learned men.

* Trinity college, Dublin. N.

+ Some eminent civilian, probably, who had recently received preferment. N.

But, to my great disappointment, little more has been said upon the subject, since the first debate, than what has been argued in private, more for the entertainment of single gentlemen, than the use and information of mankind. I have heard that the matter is brought to a compromise; and professors in both faculties have agreed to yield precedence to one another, according to their standing and the date of their commence

ment.

of

But this to me appears no satisfactory way deciding a point of such importance. And, to speak freely, it is but drawing a skin over a wound, and giving it a face of a soundness, when there lies filth and purulence within, which will another time break out with more pain and greater danger.

The time is approaching, when it will be proper once more to bring this affair upon the carpet; and I am humbly of opinion, that the point is of such consequence, that it ought not to subside, as it has done of late: it should neither rest upon that slight baffle it received at its first appearance in public, nor be hushed up in silence, under the pretence of any private accommodation, which the parties concerned have since come to, for the sake of civility and good manners in company.

I am one of those who love peace upon a good foundation; and do, for that reason, no less admire truth, upon which alone a lasting peace can be founded. And, as I am qualified to introduce this matter at the next meeting of our university, and fully determined to do so, I thought it reasonable to give this friendly notice to all parties, that they study the point, and make themselves