574 PHARMACEUTICAL LEGISLATION AND THE SALE OP POISONS. 
appeared in your columns,* will, I think, suggest the true principles of pharma¬ 
ceutical legislation, and explain why it has made such slow, or, I may say, no 
progress hitherto. A Pharmacy Bill adapted to meet the requirements of the 
trade, and likely to receive the sanction of Parliament, must, I conceive, embody 
provisions for the uniform registration of all chemists in business at the date of 
the Act. for the compulsory examination of all chemists before entering busi¬ 
ness, avoiding all meddling with the question of poisons, or the introduction of 
restrictive clauses of any kind, together with any complex machinery for carrying 
the Act into effect, and placing the examinations under an executive appointed, 
or at any rate controlled, by Government. Both the measures hitherto proposed 
have, I think, failed in consequence of their not meeting these provisions; but 
perhaps nothing has tended more to delay legislative action with reference to 
pharmacy,—by introducing confusion and misapprehension over the whole 
subject,—than the association of the question of the qualification of chemists 
aud druggists with that of the sale of poisons. These two questions, bot 1 
highly important, have really nothing in common (except in so far as every social 
reform is designed to enhance the public good), involving totally distinct prin¬ 
ciples, and affecting altogether different classes of the community. 
A Pharmacy Bill is designed to secure the proper qualification of persons 
having duties to perform affecting the health and lives of individuals, and is 
therefore essentially an educational measure. On this point the evidence given 
before the Committee* was uniformly satisfactory, Drs. Taylor, J. A. Wilson, 
and Mr. Simon, substantially agreeing with Dr. Quain, u that chemists and 
druggists who had to deal with matters that may be dangerous to life, either 
from ignorance or carelessness, should be under some control, and be required 
to give evidence of their competence to deal with drugs and chemicals. . (Pharm. 
Journ. p. 433.) It is not because the chemist deals siniply in, but with , drugs, 
etc., capable of acting as poisons, that compulsory examination is here demanded; 
not merely because he happens to sell poisonous drugs, but in order that he iR&y 
properly discharge duties which render him liable to a thousand chances of 
error, involving health or life. 
A Poison Bill, on the other hand, must be a measure designed to regulate the 
sale of poisonous substances, in accordance with certain prescribed, conditions, 
is based on the principle of restriction upon articles sold, and applicable alone 
to dealers per se , mere retailers , to whom the principle of examination could 
not be applied, such as colourmen, oilmen, grocers, confectioners, drysaltery, and 
chandlers. It is plain that these are the traders for whom a Poison Bill is re¬ 
quired, as it would be neither desirable nor practicable to confine the dealing 
in dangerous drugs, etc., to chemists and druggists, although we find so high 
an authority as that of Dr. Taylor recommending this course. (Pharm. Journ. 
p. 67.) Such an unwarrantable interference, however, with the requirements 
of the public and the freedom of trade could never be tolerated, nor would the 
chemist be benefited by the change \ examination is not necessary to secure the 
safety of the public with regard to the mere retailing of articles, whether poi¬ 
sonous or not, for this restriction on sales would be sufficient, and in this way 
the Legislature can deal with it. . 
If, then, a simple practical measure, providing for the compulsory registration 
and prospective examination of all chemists and druggists, could be obtained, 
the way would be made clear for an enactment requiring certain plain and easily 
fulfilled conditions to be observed in the sale of poisonous articles by all other 
traders. In such a measure, the exception of chemists from its operation would 
be an essential clause, but without an official register of the trade this is obvi¬ 
ously impossible. At present we are an indefinable, though not an indefinable, 
* Pharm. Journ. Vol. VII. pp. 67,121, 433, 479. 
