THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL. 
SECOND SERIES. 
VOL. XI.— No. V.—NOVEMBER, 1869. 
THE HIRST, OR PRELIMINARY EXAMINATION. 
With the present session have been inaugurated the arrangements necessitated 
by the new Bye-laws of the last session, in regard to the Preliminary or Ma¬ 
triculation Examination of the Society. 
So long as the Society was purely a voluntary association of pharmaceutists, 
earnestly desiring the advancement in scientific position of their body, its func¬ 
tions had to be performed by individual exertion and influence, and by making 
the entrance to their own ranks as easy as possible, persuading overwrought 
young men to enter themselves in the race; thus instilling into their minds a 
desire for increased knowledge. Under these circumstances, it was excusable if a 
very wide latitude was permitted to youths commencing their regular study, 
and if the certificate of presumably qualified assessors of their classical attain¬ 
ments was accepted; or if, as was not unfrequently the case, a portion of the 
Minor was accepted in lieu of the Classical Examination, as originally consti¬ 
tuted. So long as pharmaceutical education was thus encouraged purely for the 
pleasure of benefiting the body, such licences were permissible. But so soon as 
the efforts of the last twenty-eight years became recognized by the Legislature 
to the extent of making the hitherto voluntary and pleasurable duties compul¬ 
sory, it behoved the Board of Examiners to potentialize the experience they had 
gained, and apply the results to the construction of new regulations. It had 
been observed that the failures and poor successes of the past had been mainly 
traceable to the neglect of early education in fundamental knowledge,—to a 
neglect, in fact, of the principles of an ordinarily liberal education ; and it was 
found that the required certificate, of some provincial clerical or medical gradu¬ 
ate, in many instances lamentably failed to guarantee the possession of a requi¬ 
site amount of rudimentary knowledge. 
With a view, therefore, to ensure uniformity, it has been insisted upon, in fram¬ 
ing the new Bye-laws, that the examinations of the Society should necessarily 
consist of a Preliminary or first examination, comprising the classics ; a Minor 
or first technical examination ; and, after an interval of at least three months , 
a Major or complete professional examination. It would have been easy, and 
perhaps the easiest solution of the difficulty, to the Council and Board of Exa¬ 
miners to have insisted upon all three of these stages of the curriculum being 
consummated in London. The two latter were put without the power of the 
Council to remove from London, but the former still remained so far at disposal, 
that regulations could be made to obviate the necessity for candidates presenting 
themselves in London for the Preliminary Examination. Under these circum¬ 
stances, it has been decided, and wisely, to accept the Oxford and Cambridge 
Middle Class Examinations, and the examination of the College of Preceptors. 
VOL. xi. s 
