516 
NOTES ON THE PHAKMACOPCEIA. 
Mr. Bland resumed the discussion upon this subject, and observed that some 
apology was due from him, after having occupied so large a portion of the time 
of the last meeting, for being again prepared to trespass upon their attention. 
Whenever he had the privilege of attending meetings of the Society, he had 
found something both to interest and instruct him, and it had always been a 
great disappointment to him when, by any unavoidable circumstance, he had 
been prevented from attending them. He had, however, generally taken the 
part of a listener, but on the last occasion it seemed to him that a very impor¬ 
tant discussion was on the point of being prematurely closed when the subject 
was really not exhausted. There were one or two points in connection with 
the responsibility which devolved upon them as pharmaceutical chemists, in 
bringing about the universal adoption of the British Pharmacopoeia, and also 
upon their relation to the Medical Council, upon which he thought it was ex¬ 
ceedingly desirable to have an expression of opinion from the members present 
who had large experience in such matters. He stated at the last meeting that, 
so far as his experience went, a very large proportion of the prescriptions which 
passed through their hands were written by gentlemen who continued to use 
the old forms, preparations, and expressions of the London Pharmacopoeia. 
From the general indications of assent which came from various parts of the 
room at that time, it seemed to him that his experience was not at all singular 
in that respect, and that in point of fact a very large number of gentlemen 
connected with the medical profession did, in their actual practice, ignore the 
existence of the British Pharmacopoeia. Under such circumstances, he could 
not but feel that it was somewhat hard that the Medical Council, representing 
as they did the medical profession, should insist on chemists following as their 
guide a pharmacopoeia which so many of the profession did not even take the 
pains to become acquainted with. There had been a disposition among some 
members of the medical profession to come to them and say, u You are to re¬ 
ceive this book with a sort of superstitious reverence, as if it were a gift from 
the gods, and you are in no wise to presume to question the perfection of any 
of its formulae, but you are to render to them an implicit obedience, until it 
pleases Heaven and the Medical Council to send you another.” He admitted 
that, on the whole, the Pharmacopoeia was a most excellent production, and 
for his own part he should be delighted to see it introduced, not only into ge¬ 
neral, but into universal practice, as the ordinary canonical standard by which 
their proceedings were to be conducted. At the same time he must be per¬ 
mitted to exercise his judgment in special cases, for this Pharmacopoeia inter¬ 
fered with him at every step in the prosecution of his daily business, often to 
his inconvenience, sometimes to his expense; and such judgment and reflective 
power as he possessed he should presume to exercise upon certain of its formulae 
which seemed to him to be defective and capable of improvement, and, if he 
obeyed, he should still not forego the Englishman’s privilege of grumbling. 
There had been, not only amongst some portion of the medical profession, but 
amongst some of their own body, a desire to insist upon a fastidious and prac¬ 
tically impossible state of purity with regard to some of the chemical prepara¬ 
tions ; and he thought they ought to look this matter calmly in the face and exa¬ 
mine exactly how the facts lay. The great majority of chemists in London 
were people of small businesses, and perhaps the whole labour of the ordinary 
shop routine devolved upon one or two pairs of hauds. Under such circum¬ 
stances it was impossible that a pharmaceutical chemist could have more than 
very scant opportunities for purely scientific investigation ; in fact, it was quite 
certain that nothing but a very ardent following of his profession could enable 
him to snatch such moments for improvement and reading as would keep him 
