84 PROSE HALIETJTICS. 



on KaX oKir^olcn- top api£/M)v roia-iv axiea-iv i-xpernvro' but 

 lie lived in an early age of the iatric art ; had his life 

 been prolonged, to test all he recommends, there can be 

 no doubt he would have been an earnest advocate for 

 short pharmacopoeias and have rejoiced accordiagly in 

 ours. But though our pharmacopoeia has been set to 

 rights, there is one thing which has not yet undergone 

 so thorough a reform as the friends of medicine could 

 wish ; we mean, simplicity in prescribrag, — the unmixing 

 of many complex long-established mixtures, boluses, and 

 pUls, with a view to assign to every medicine its parti- 

 cular duty. Too many ratthng rural practitioners still 

 flourish down recipes which look in their irregular length 

 and wildness like the strophe of a Pindaric ode ; but 

 how is it possible to know the real value of drugs whilst 

 there exists such a mesalliance of tonics, alteratives, and 

 astringents ? — one for this symptom, one for that, an- 

 other for a third. Give us ever short rational prescrip- 

 tions, in which every drug, like the words in a well- 

 weighed epigram, or a close piece of reasoning, helps the 

 other, and all combine to a result. Thought cuts every- 

 thing down to its proper dimensions. Such self-interro- 

 gatories as — might not this be spared ? — do I know any- 

 thing of the action of that ? — ^by mixing several vmknown 

 things, am I likely to produce a callida junctura that 

 will be of advantage, or, contrariwise, a mischief to the 

 patient? — would much simplify all prescriptions; and 

 though it may be pleaded that such combinations are 

 occasionally made for the sake of giving elegance to the 

 prescribing art, the sick man for whom they are intended 

 neither cares for, nor pays his fee for that ; but values 

 them only, as the medical practitioner ought, in propor- 

 tion to their utility. 



