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that the licensing power of the provincial bishops should cease, and that in future no person in the dioceses out of London should practise physic until he had been examined and approved by the College, "except he be a graduate of Oxford or Cambridge, which hath accomplished all things for his form without any grace." But within London and its precinct of seven miles, not even Cambridge and Oxford graduates could legally practise, unless licensed by the College: and, in the reign of king James I., Dr. Bonham of Cambridge was imprisoned by the College for practising in London without the due license.
The acts of Henry VIII. were confirmed in the first year of queen Mary, 1553; and it appears from the terms of the acts of Henry and Mary, and of the charters of James I. and Charles II., that all who had been examined and approved by the College, were "collegæ" or "socii" of the College; and that all such "collegæ" or "socii" were considered by those acts as being on an equality one with another, with the temporary exception of those who held certain offices in the College, to which offices however all the members were eligible.
The College, having the privilege of making by-laws, by degrees introduced distinctions among its members; admitting some applicants as fellows, and eligible to the offices—admitting others under the name of licentiates, with powers of practising medicine equally extensive as those of the fellows; but ineligible to college offices, as not being considered fellows.
