THE ALUMNI JOURNAL, 



131 



cally have these duties been performed 

 that the pharmacology of pharmacy has 

 fully caught up with that of medicine, 

 and is to-day in quite as high a state of 

 perfection. Indeed, while much will be 

 done in perfecting this department of 

 pharmacy, no great extension of its field 

 is to be looked for. But while the phar- 

 macist has been busy with this important 

 branch, the physician has been exploring 

 to excellent purpose the fields of prophy- 

 laxis and diagnosis. He has determined 

 the causes of many diseases and has 

 demonstrated the possibility of detecting 

 their presence or approach in time to 

 prevent their pernicious activity. To an 

 even higher perfection has he developed 

 the art of recognizing them after their 

 work has been put into operation, and of 

 estimating their force and the extent of 

 their ravages, as an intelligent basis for 

 his measures of therapeutics. But to ap- 

 ply in practice the results thus worked 

 out introduces into his work a fresh mass 

 of detail labor which it is impossible for 

 him to satisfactorily perform, and which 

 sooner or later will inevitably devolve 

 upon the pharmacist. It must be with 

 the physician as it is with the manager 

 of any other business ; he must become 

 an executive head, determining the prin- 

 ciples and planning the action, but he will 

 be compelled more and more to assign the 

 details of examination, as well as of treat" 

 ment, to his associates, the pharmacist 

 and the nurse. 



It is quite as naturally impossible that 

 the physician should develop all the de- 

 tails of hygienic and diagnostic exami- 

 nations and do justice to the subjects, as 

 that he should make his own chemical 

 investigations of drugs and prepare his 

 medicines from them. It is not the lack 

 of ability, but of facility, with which he 

 is forced to contend. The physician 

 must keep an office, but he should not 

 maintain a laboratory. He can use the 



curette and the exploring needle, but it 

 will become increasingly difficult for him 

 to apply to the specimens so obtained 

 the tedious process of culture and mi- 

 croscopical preparation which the occa- 

 sion calls for. He may secure instructive 

 exhibitions of morbid products, but must 

 depend upon others with proper facil- 

 ities to estimate their composition when 

 great accuracy is necessary. Upon 

 his judgment must the public rely as to 

 the hygienic effects of the constituents of 

 water and of the atmosphere, but he will 

 be unable to determine their presence or 

 estimate their amounts. 



It is then in these directions that phar- 

 macy is to be developed. The really 

 professional pharmacist of the future 

 must be prepared to make water and air 

 analyses ; to examine microscopically 

 and chemically articles of food, or even 

 of wearing apparel, or of the soil ; to 

 recognize and estimate poisonous sub- 

 stances wherever found, to determine the 

 morbid nature of tissues and the pres- 

 ence of morbid bodies in the tissues or 

 excretions, and in general to perform the 

 physician's detail laboratory work. It 

 is true that not all pharmacists will be 

 able to perform all of these services. 

 There will naturally arise classes and 

 specialists among pharmacists as there 

 are among physicians. But our phar- 

 macy schools must make ready the path 

 for the performance of all these duties. 

 And this will necessitate a closer alli- 

 ance between our schools of medicine 

 and of pharmacy. Not only does econo- 

 my forbid that there should be any un- 

 necessary repetition of expenditure in 

 the same field by the two classes of 

 schools, but reason teaches that certain 

 instruction needed by the pharmacist can 

 better be obtained at a school of medi- 

 cine, and vice versa. 



As to the College of Pharmacy of the 

 City of New York, she now stands ready 



