Botanic Remedies 141 



macology in demonstrating the action of drugs on 

 the living body; in many cases it teaches us why 

 and through what channels the remedy acts, it 

 allows us to measure the dosage of many new 

 remedies and assign them to their proper place in 

 our classification, it renders exact much knowledge 

 that has hitherto been empirical; but, in quite a 

 number of cases, it furnishes no information what- 

 ever because the drug under examination gives no 

 salient evidences of its action, and in many cases 

 chemical evidence is also lacking. A modern school 

 of therapeutics a school whose tenets are very at- 

 tractive to men whose minds tend to mathematical 

 exactitude would deny recognition to all drugs of 

 this class. Their attitude is about as follows: 'If 

 the drug under examination does not respond to 

 physiological testing, if it furnishes no active prin- 

 ciples or concentrates that can be shown to modify 

 function, we will have none of it.' It should not 

 be necessary to point out that the passing of the 

 judgment we have outlined above would deprive 

 us of quinine, colchicum, arsenic, calomel, phos- 

 phorus, gentian, indeed of a host of remedies of 

 long established clinical reputation." 



THERAPEUTICS. In therapeutic doses root, 1 to 

 5 grains; seed, the same; fl., 1 to 4 minims; tr., 

 10 to 30 minims; vinum, the same; colchicine, 

 1-150 to 1-60 grain (average, 1-128 grain), is of 

 thoroughly established value in the treatment of 

 gout and allied conditions; and these therapeutic 

 doses give rise to none of the toxic symptoms 

 enumerated except purging if the administration 

 is pushed. It is open to question if the active prin- 

 ciple is as effective as is the whole drug. 



