March 4,1S?1.] 
THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
717 
enemies, but the official armament is brought to threaten 
itself. At such a time, I cannot feel justified in a complaisant 
assumption that the action of a section of my colleagues is 
necessarily right, and if the negotiations of 1868 are ad¬ 
vanced as the groundwork of the present regulations, I claim 
the right of considering those negotiations, and the situa¬ 
tions of their participants, as matters of public interest. The 
Act of 1868 has been read by pharmacists all over the king¬ 
dom, who can find in clause 1 no warrant for the inflexible 
course insisted upon by Mr. Simon, Mr. Sandford and their 
supporters, as being without any alternative. If the terms of 
the asserted contract in clause 1 are considered, one of their 
essential principles is that the Society is the best judge of 
what regulations are desirable and proper, and it follows that 
it should decide this question without external pressure or 
threats. The objections made to the present proposals are 
not against their object, but are, firstly, to their construction 
and details, and, secondly, to the Government inspection and 
penal consequences which their adoption would entail. 
Now, the Society is bound to regard these practical consi¬ 
derations quite as much as the literal interpretation of a 
dozen permissive words in an Act of Parliament. 
The rights of chemists existed before 1868, and were not all 
bartered away then; whilst it is unquestionable that the 
evils that would follow the adoption of the present scheme 
would, from a State point of view, be infinitely worse than 
those which it sought to remedy. 
The grotesque nature of Schedule A when adopted as a 
basis for storing remedies, and the wild uncertainty existing 
as to its boundaries, would lead to one of two things, either 
the cruel penalties of the Act would be inflicted for merely 
technical breaches of the law, or the regulations would be¬ 
come a dead letter, and disregard of other portions of the Act 
would be fostered. 
There is one passage in the “Statement of Reasons” which 
perhaps deserves a bad pre-eminence over all others. It is 
that where the majority leave the policy which the Chemist 
and Druggist describes when it says the Council “ has suffi¬ 
cient reason left to know that it may still hope for victory if 
it can only succeed in frightening its opponents.” The appeal 
to fear is for the moment laid aside, and the already alarmed 
brother is soothed by this assurance, “ they (the Council) ven¬ 
ture to say that no vexatious proceedings will he adopted to 
inquire into their observance .” Well might Mr. Schaelit 
suggest at a meeting at Bristol that he thought “ compulsory 
regulations, which were not to be enforced, had better be 
called by their proper names, ‘recommendations.’ ” 
Here is a declaration—(is it based on a “ tacit understand¬ 
ing between the Council and the Government” ?)—solemnly 
put forward in the name of the Council. I cannot help ask¬ 
ing, What does this mean? As eleven gentlemen endorsed 
the assertion, will not one of them tell us what are the 
grounds for so remarkable a promise? It is inconsistent 
with what we thought to be the opinions of some of ££ the 
eleven” when studying their anonymously-expressed views, 
to which I have already alluded. 
Under the nom de plume hitherto used by a gentleman be¬ 
longing to “ the eleven,” I lately read the following :—“ A 
more weighty objection, and the only weighty one that I can 
find, is this, that you introduce the thin edge of the wedge, 
which will lead to inspection and annoyance from public 
officers .” 
Are not ££ inspection and annoyance ” to be considered 
vexations to a well-regulated mind and shop? 
As our representatives give us two divergent statements, 
which are we to accept ? 
On the personal relations of the question to Mr. Sandford, 
I submit that I have not exceeded either right or propriety, 
and have kept strictly to the matter in hand. 
Mr. Sandford’s services to the Society have become a part 
of its history, and I need not here enlarge upon them, but 
my reply to the suggestion of inability to recognize these, is 
a reference to a certain meeting at Norwich, which will show 
who was the mover of the resolution ultimately developed 
into a lasting testimony of the grateful feelings of our body. 
Mr. Sandford’s remarks upon the question of leaders in the 
Lancet and Dali Mall Gazette are rather Palmerstonian in 
style, but do not rebut anything that I stated, and as the 
former of these journals has produced another article on the 
subject without giving us the threatened information about 
the earlier ones, I fear our further curiosity will be disap¬ 
pointed. 
With reference to the article from the Dritish Medical 
Journal, I have asked a friend to give notice of a motion on 
the subjeot at the April Meeting of the Council. 
I am sure that many members of the Executive of the 
British Medical Association would not approve of the lan¬ 
guage used by their official organ. Whether the mode of 
advocacy of the Regulations by certain medical journals will 
make them more palatable to those for whom they have been 
prepared is somewhat doubtful, but the unblushing effrontery 
with which these writers ignore any idea of the experiment 
extending to themselves is quite amusing. 
Probably no error ever developed into a system without 
having, as a basis, some half-truth. So it is m the present 
case. Give us, by a uniformity of arrangement, any better 
security against that chance of error which belongs to every¬ 
thing human, and we should all accept it gladly. But it 
happens that the conditions and consequences attached to the 
regulations have convinced the judgment of competent and 
unbiassed persons in every quarter, that the remedy is worse 
than the disease. 
A few persons holding this opinion have been induced to 
acquiesce in what they take to be the necessity of the case, 
their j udgment yielding to the threats which have been made, 
whilst in some quarters we have seen extreme sensitiveness, 
lest it should be supposed that individuals refused to adopt 
every suggestion that could be made for giving security 
against error. 
More moral courage than this is requisite; and if we are 
true to ourselves and to our profession, we have nothing to 
fear. 
In past years we have had to tell Parliament that its 
Poison Bills and Bills for the Prevention of Accidental 
Poisoning were delusive in their promised security, and im¬ 
practicable in their working, and having a good conscience, 
we cared not if ignorant people charged us with indifference. 
We are again put through a similar trial of our moral 
courage, although with aggravated circumstances. 
If the opposition to the regulations arose from selfishness 
and ignorance, should we find the line of demarcation between 
the pros and cons such as it is at present ? 
Let the lists of those who have declared their opinions 
during the past two years answer this question. 
Richard Reynolds. 
Leeds, February 28 th, 1871. 
Sir,—In the early part of last July (I think) you inserted 
a letter from me, which was found fault with by one or two 
of your correspondents, because my name and address did 
not appear, although, of course, both had been sent to the 
editor, though not for publication. 
C£ Quot homines, tot sententise.” The arguments advanced 
on both sides received my candid consideration. There was, 
however, just this simple fact, I wrote to condemn systems 
and practices, and to point out what appeared to me as exist¬ 
ing evils; but knowing that these were tolerably widespread, 
I did not wish to draw attention to any particular place, nor 
to particular individuals. And as then, so on the present 
occasion, the observations offered must stand on their own 
merits. My motives in writing are certainly of an unselfish 
character. 
The following remarks are elicited by a circular received 
from the Secretary with reference to the storing and dispen¬ 
sing of poisons. 
Now, I certainly thought the Council had taken great 
pains in making these proposed rules as little objectionable 
as possible, and was greatly surprised to find such an amount 
of opposition called forth by them. I hope to be pardoned 
for saying that personally I do not see any reason for this 
determined antagonism, nor have I been able to perceive 
much logical force in the arguments made use of to support it. 
One of the stereotyped cries seems to be that hospitals and 
dispensaries required to be placed under regulation as much 
or more than the establishments of chemists and druggists. 
Now, were this anything to do with the matter under consi¬ 
deration, I might be able to say something upon the subject, 
having been several years chief dispenser at one of the Lon¬ 
don hospitals, besides being engaged at different times both 
in private and public dispensaries. 
However, it seems to me that at present there are two 
points for deliberation, and two only. 
Has the Government any right to impose regulations upon 
us ? Are the regulations proposed,, or any regulations, ne¬ 
cessary ? 
The first question I do not feel disposed to argue. But as 
