It
was felt that dissection by the Surgeons was part of the sentence passed
on a murderer, and therefore carried with it shame and disgrace. To make
provision by law, therefore, for the dissection of the bodies of any other
class of persons was, not unnaturally, distasteful, in that it partly put
them in the same position as murderers.

The answer to the desire for the repeal of this obnoxious clause was that
nothing must be done to weaken the law; it was stated that to withdraw the
part of the sentence which related to dissection would rob the punishment
of its prohibitive effect. It is somewhat difficult to understand the
argument; surely if the risk of suffering the extreme penalty of the law
would not keep a man from crime, the extra chance of being dissected after
death could hardly be expected to do so. As Sir Henry Halford said, "I
certainly think that while that law remains they [the public] will connect
the crime of murder with the practice of dissection; an order to be
dissected, and a permission to be dissected, seem to be too slight a
distinction."

Another objection to the dissection of murderers came from the teachers.
They stated that when the body of a notorious criminal was lying at either
of the Anatomical Schools, the proprietor was pestered by persons of a
morbid turn of mind for permission to view the body. This difficulty was
also felt by the College of Surgeons, and in consequence a placard was
hung up outside the place where the dissections were made, giving notice
that no person could be admitted, unless accompanied by a member of the
Court of Assistants.

To make dissection less distasteful to the general public, and to show the
advantages of anatomy, some endeavours were made to explain the structure
of the human body to non-professional persons. In Ireland Sir Philip
Crampton lectured with open doors, and gave demonstrations in anatomy to
poor people. These persons, he tells us, became interested in the subject,
and often brought him bodies for dissection. A newspaper cutting of 1829
shows that this was also tried in London. A surgeon called in the
overseers and churchwardens of St. Clement Danes, and gave a demonstration
on a body, explaining its construction, and the use of the internal
organs. "By this means," says the paragraph, "he so fully absorbed the
self-interest of his audience as to extinguish the pre-conceived notions
of horror and disgust attached to the idea of a spectacle of