THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL. 
SECOND SERIES. 
YOL. X.—No. YII.—JANUARY, 1869. 
THE PHARMACY ACT OP 1868. 
The year 1868 now becomes time past, and will take rank in the Pharmaceu¬ 
tical calendar as a red letter year; with 1841, in which the Society was first 
established ; 1843, the year of incorporation by Royal Charter ; and 1852, the 
date of the first Act passed by an English Parliament to place Pharmacy on an 
honourable and independent footing. The progress from one to the other of 
these periods has been steady; perhaps, as rapid as could reasonably have 
been expected, when we remember that in England it is in reality the voice of 
the public which says “ ay,” or “ no,” to the question of placing restrictions on 
any trade or calling exercised within the realm, and remember also the vast 
amount of that public which had to be convinced of the benefits to be derived 
from utilizing the efforts of the few men who stepped from their own prosperous, 
because well-conducted, shops in 1841 to create we might almost say, a race of 
Pharmaceutists worthy of this great country. Had there not been an utter ab¬ 
negation of self, a fixed determination to avoid interference with private regu¬ 
lations for conducting trade, which could only be made properly by each 
individual according to the requirements of his own special position, and a re¬ 
solve to make education the groundwork of the institution which our founders 
desired to establish, there would have been no Pharmacy Act passed in 1868 to 
prevent any but examined and certified persons hereafter dispensing medicines, 
however powerful or dangerous, for Her Majesty’s lieges. 
The Pharmacy Act, which at the commencement of 1868 was a thing 
wished for by all, but hoped for only by the sanguine, is now an accomplished 
fact. This accomplishment, however, must not be considered as a completion 
of their work by those who have laboured to promote it. 
A Statute, as it issues from Parliament, is seldom that perfect piece of legis¬ 
lation which men expect it to be, and is rarely, if ever, agreeable to all parties. 
It is an old saying, that “ a coach and four may be driven through any Act of 
Parliament,” but if some of our contemporaries are to be believed, there is no 
passage even for a single horseman through the Pharmacy Act. This is all na¬ 
tural enough. The framers of a Bill having a certain object in view, looking 
at that object from all points, introduce with their enactments qualifications 
where needed. Members of Parliament, on the other hand (with all reverence 
be it spoken) think too often of particular details only, and introduce amend¬ 
ments which, although excellent perhaps in themselves, are not u in gear ” with 
the rest of the Bill. It generally, however, happens that the whole may be made 
vol. x. 2 d 
