AN APOLOGY FOlt LATIN. 3?i) 
laws themselves, as now proposed, are inserted m exlcnso in another part of this 
Journal. 
We might name other points of doubt or difficulty, but we believe they will 
be easily solved, and we think we have already said enough to convince the pro¬ 
moters of the Pharmacy Bill that their work is not yet complete. They have 
achieved a great success ; if they now proceed in the spirit which guided them in 
1868 in obtaining their Act, to bring it into good working order, they will 
earn for themselves the thanks of the public as well as of the trade. 
AM APOLOGY FOE LATIN. 
BY JOSEPH INCE. 
The subject here presented is of the deepest and most urgent importance. I 
implore those who have under their care apprentices, or others who may here¬ 
after seek a living by what is called Pharmacy, not to be led astray respecting 
this matter. 
It is not intended, because special stress is laid upon one point, to disparage 
the usual branches of a liberal education. We are Englishmen, and must learn 
to read and write correctly the language which we speak, as well as to be con¬ 
versant with the works of those who have made us proud of our nationality ; 
but it is my object to demonstrate the evil consequences entailed by the neglect 
of a particular study. Eecent examinations and the confession of many who 
are anxious to prepare themselves, have shown how incalculable is the help to 
be derived from an early moderate acquaintance with the classics, due not only 
to positive knowledge gained, but to an enviable facility of concentrating men¬ 
tal power. 1 have no wish (save for the marvellous pleasure of the thing, and 
its gilding of the monotony of life) to recommend the study of Virgil, Horace, 
Livy, and Cicero ; still less to become romantic and utopian in praise of Greek ; 
but it cannot be denied that such studies form a mental training which men 
with easy fortunes may neglect, but the loss of which we, as pharmacists, who 
have to gain a living, cannot possibly afford. 
Why is Latin thus prominently introduced? Is it sought by a trick of 
literature, or by an affectation of profound scholarship, to write sensational 
sentences ? 
A new existence opens out for pharmacy, higher and better than the past; 
a career for which we may prepare our sons without sense of social degradation. 
But excelsior status can only, though secured officially, be supported by corre¬ 
sponding fitness. 
Now Latin strikes at the root of the superficial—its teaching cannot be 
guessed at: in itself as a commencing study, it is utterly unattractive. Every 
word means something, no one noun or adjective can be substituted for another. 
Vir is man, and so is homo, in English, not in Latin. To grasp its elementary 
principles nothing but close attention and thoroughness of labour will avail. 
A youth scarcely fledged—given a certain amount of cleverness and self-suf¬ 
ficiency, can soon theorise and discourse in a popular manner about most other 
things ; the mysteries of religion are explained on Sunday afternoons by young 
gentlemen in the Regent’s Park, to an admiring family audience and one Lon¬ 
don Member of Council, whilst the novice easily becomes familiar with the 
run of scientific experiments in a manner which (unhappily for himself) may 
astound the listener as much as the Fellows of the Royal. But Latin is impera¬ 
tive iu its demands : a page of Ovid or of Sallust is a battle-field which must 
2 d 2 
