Note 3 — EDITOR’S PREFACE.
Reading edition
Of this rare volume the only copy that the Editor has seen or heard of is in the library of the Manchester Royal Infirmary, and was given by Dr. Percival himself. In the beginning there is the following Note in his own hand-writing:—“The completion of the Medical Jurisprudence has been long suspended; and it is uncertain when the undertaking will be resumed. A title page; an introduction; a fifth and sixth section; and an appendix, containing Notes and Illustrations, are wanting to finish this little work.
Manchester, March 17, 1794.”
It ends abruptly on p. 96, which terminates chap. iv. The text for the most part agrees with that which was afterwards published, except that this latter contains about twenty paragraphs that are not to be found in the original sketch, and that great part of what forms Note XIV. in the present edition is there found in the text. At the end of the treatise there is the following Note, also in Dr. Percival’s own hand-writing:—“Two sections wanting. Sect. V. On the Powers, Privileges, Honours, and Emoluments of the Faculty. Sect. VI. On the Moral, Religious, and Political Character of Physicians.”