August 17, 1872.] THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
131 
dition of the Conference. Thanks to recent agitation in 
the pharmaceutical world, and to the feeling of safety- 
in union engendered thereby,—to the ample return in 
kind members now receive for their small annual contri¬ 
bution,—thanks, abovo all, to the energy of your inde¬ 
fatigable secretaries,—the Conference has attained a 
position in point of size, influence and power for good, 
which was never dreamt of by those who assisted at its 
foundation. In so far as the general history of the 
Conference is concerned, I might have addressed you in 
terms of simple congratulation ; but other questions arise, 
and I should have been disturbed, whilst dilating on the 
augmented power and importance both of our own body and 
of the parent society, by the lurking consciousness that, 
notwithstanding increased disposition to united action, 
somehow or other, pharmacy in this country was not so 
prosperous,—that its higher aspirations were not so 
vigorous—as the numerical strength and popularity of its 
representative associations might lead one to suppose. 
I confess, too, that I am impressed with a fear that had 
I in preparing my address sought for worthy material of 
purely scientific sort in the journals, proceedings, trans¬ 
actions, and the like, which have appeared since our 
meeting in Edinburgh a year ago, I must have relied to 
a far greater extent on the records of foreign than of 
home research. The President of the Chemical Society 
in a recent discourse, adverts in striking terms to the 
lethargy which has enveloped original chemical investi¬ 
gation in this country; and the words spoken, demon¬ 
strably true as to pure chemistry, might be applied with 
almost equal emphasis to other branches of scientific 
knowledge bearing on pharmacy. To judge by our pub¬ 
lications for the past year or two, pharmaceutical energy 
in this country has been directed almost exclusively into 
two channels ; firstly, the relations of pharmacy to the 
State, and, secondly, the more wide-spread provision of 
facilities for that rudimentary scientific education which 
recent enactments impose on the pharmacist of the 
future—both of them difficult, but altogether momentous 
questions. 
It is needless to narrate the process by which the 
present satisfactory condition of legislation, in respect 
to pharmacy, has been arrived at. The patient thirty 
years’ labour originated by a few earnest, far-sighted men, 
seconded, gradually perhaps and not without a safe 
amount of hesitation and doubt, but in the end, as the 
subject came to be understood, ably seconded by the 
body at large, and in due time supported by public 
opinion—has led at length to the carefully devised and 
thoroughly practical law which we now enjoy. In a 
survey of the State relations of pharmacy in the various 
continental countries, I know not where we should look 
for a broader or more satisfactory basis of legislation or 
one so suited to the genius of our institutions, than exists 
at home. The protection of the public from errors 
arising out of incapacity and ignorance, is, prospectively 
speaking (for a generation must pass before the full 
effect of the law is seen), as nearly complete as legal 
enactments can ensure, and this is effected without ex¬ 
cessive interference with the jealously guarded rights of 
property or with that exercise of individual judgment 
which the members of an educated body may justly 
claim. I allow that the present educational status of 
pharmacy might have justified greater legislative strin¬ 
gency, but the very basis of the law is improved education , 
and we are, it is admitted, in that transition stage which 
demands provision for the future rather than the imme¬ 
diate present; behind us is the chaos of chance—before, 
the substantial guarantee of the Pharmaceutical Society 
that order shall reign. A Government granting the 
privileges of the latest Pharmacy Act, could demand no 
less than this guarantee for the future ; respect for the 
circumstances of those whose means of livelihood do- - 
pended on the business in which they were already \ 
engaged admitted no more. How vexatious and unpro- i 
fitable any interference with what we call “ vested : 
. intciests” would have been, we may see from the experi- 
• ence of our brethren in New York. The chemists of 
. that city, by an arbitrary police regulation, were, a 
■ year ago, compelled, old men and young to come up 
- for examination before a Board constituted on prin- 
. ciples that astonish Englishmen; an imposition so 
onerous and oppressive that pharmacists of all con- 
i 1 ditions were compelled to unite to obtain its repeal. 
< Herein we find a sufficiently practical reply to those who- 
look no further than the present. If I introduce another 
point in which circumstances have favoured us, it is only 
because its importance may have been too little appre¬ 
ciated,—I allude to the practical unity of the ex¬ 
amining board, and the practical uniformity of the 
examinations for diplomas in all cases in England 
and Scotland. Happily we have not been beset 
with the complexities that have attended all at¬ 
tempts for the better regulation of the issue of 
licences in medicine ; complexities depending on the 
rights hitherto enjoyed by a large number of historic 
corporations, and hitherto exercised without reference to 
any uniform standard. This want of recognized standard 
exists in the United States, not only in medical, but in phar¬ 
maceutical degrees, with an additional element of confu¬ 
sion in the fact, that except in one or two cities, pharmacy 
is under no compulsory regulation. There the diplomas, 
medical and pharmaceutical, of the colleges of the vari¬ 
ous States are of the same legal value (in so far as they have 
legal value at all), and as examination fees are a consider¬ 
able source of income, other inducements must be held out 
where scholastic advantages are not of the highest sort to 
ensure full classes. Hence the prospect of a diploma on 
easy terms is a not unnatural counter attraction. I 
heard an eminent professor in a New England university 
lament that, owing to these causes, medicine had ceased 
to be a learned profession in his country. I do not wish 
to dwell on these considerations further than is necessary 
to demonstrate at the outset that the great end of recent 
political agitation is gained ; that pharmacy is now 
regulated by a law affording sufficient protection to 
the public by the compulsory education it necessitates, 
giving larger privileges to those practically engaged in 
it, free on the one hand from the looseness of volun¬ 
tary provisions, and on the other from the excessive- 
interference and inspection in vogue in many continental 
States,—hence that we are in a condition in which we may 
turn our attention to advancement from within rather 
than to those political topics which have so exclusively 
occupied the thoughts of our members for the past two 
or three years. This may fairly be expected of us, and 
that it is expected I do not hesitate to say. 
The address of Professor Huxley, a year or more ago, 
when distributing the sessional prizes at University Col¬ 
lege, will be in the recollection of most of you, especially 
certain passages in which he condemned Materia 
Medica (apart from therapeutics) as a subject of medical 
study—a dictum which fell like a thunderbolt in the 
camp of those who are doing to-day, and will do to¬ 
morrow, what they did yesterday, because they did it 
yesterday. The extraordinary development of some 
all-important divisions of medical science, notably of 
physiology and minute human anatomy, renders it im¬ 
possible to cram into the few brief years of collegiate- 
training a satisfactory amount of knowledge in the 
whole of the long list of subjects Avhich it has been the* 
custom to embrace in the curriculum of medical study. 
It is no part of my business to discuss the relations of 
inorganic chemistry, materia medica, and botany, to the- 
scheme of medical education; but words uttered in 
public, by a leader in science, affecting us so closely in 
their indirect bearing, can hardly be dismissed without 
a glance at the issues they involve. It is true- 
enough, as -was stated by Pi'ofessor Huxley, that the 
standard British work on Materia Medica is a trea¬ 
tise de omnibus rebus ; that, in point of fact, “materia 
medica” is a mere nom de convenance for a hetero- 
