1884.) 435 {Ruschenberger. 
advantage of this plan is, that each revision represents at the 
date of publication the common opinion of the profession, and 
the work is kept in accord with the progress of pharmacy and 
of medical knowledge. 
The result of the labors of the convention of January, 1820, 
was the publication, at Boston, Mass., December 15, 1820, ot 
the first Pharmacopoeia of the United States of America, and 
since, of decennial revisions of it, the sixth of which is now in 
use. 
The achievement is notable. The pharmacopoeia of every 
nation of Kurope is a public work directed and paid for by the 
government. Without the influence of a statute of any kind 
to sanction or enjoin its use, this, through the force of public 
opinion created in its favor, has been established as the law, 
the standard in the premises, which is generally respected. 
The work is purely charitable. It has been done, for three- 
score years at least, at the cost of the labor, time and money of 
many medical men without any compensation to the workmen 
for their work; and the results of it have been freely given for 
the common good. 
Dr. Bridges was among the most skillful of those who labored 
to perfect the Pharmacopoeia. The Philadelphia College of 
Pharmacy appointed him, March, 1847, one of a committee to 
revise the issue of 1840, and prepare the report on it to be 
given to the National Convention of 1850, the first in which 
pharmacists were represented. He assisted on a committee of 
the College of Physicians, appointed February, 1868, to report 
on the fourth decennial revision ; was one of the delegates from 
the college to the meeting of the National Convention of 1870, 
and was amember of the committee on publication of the fifth 
decennial revision. In July, 1877, the College of Physcians 
appointed him one of a committee to revise the Pharmacopoia 
of 1870, and prepare a report on it for the National Conven- 
tion of 1880. 
The labor of those committees of revision is considerable. 
Inspection of materials, pharmaceutical experiments and thera- 
peutic observation are often necessary to determine the value 
