478 
THE PHARMACY BILL. 
and am quite ready to admit that there are numbers of them quite as well quali¬ 
fied to be members as any who are so now, and whom I should be glad to see 
amongst us; but these are precisely the persons on whose account the practical 
examination for men established in business was instituted as a means of admis¬ 
sion, and if they are as well qualified as we are led to suppose, they can have 
little difficulty in passing it, which would surely be a much more satisfactory 
and more honourable mode of joining the Society than to be floated in on the 
same level with those red-and-green-bottle men, whose future admission to the 
trade it is considered by all parties desirable to prevent. But admitting all this, 
Jcontend that we who are Pharmaceutists ought first to consider the interests 
of our own Society, and, when advocating the claims of others, ought to take care 
that no injustice is done to our own members. Surely men who have supported 
the Society more than twenty years, as well as those who have passed its exami¬ 
nations, are entitled to any privilege or position it is able to give them, and in 
which I cannot admit that persons have any claim to participate who have 
neither done one nor the other, but have rather been opposing us all these 
years. 
As to the supposed injustice of perpetuating two grades, and the consequent 
indignity to which the chemist and druggist is thereby subjected, it is, in my 
opinion, totally imaginary, and, but for the jury question, would never have 
been heard of; that is the great grievance of .the United Society and its sup¬ 
porters, and were a similar exemption granted them (which for my part I should 
be glad to assist them in obtaining), we might use any title we chose without 
any objection on their part. Moreover these distinctions exist in all the pro¬ 
fessions without being thought either unjust or degrading, and there is no 
reason why they should be with us. Besides, differences in social position, in 
degree of education, and in amount of scientific acquirements, will always exist 
amongst chemists, and it cannot surely be considered either a hardship or in¬ 
justice that the man of talent and industry who strives to elevate himself and to 
advance the progress of pharmaceutical knowledge, should have something to 
distinguish him from those who are content to be mere sellers of drugs, and who 
take no interest in pharmacy unless they can make money by it. I must not 
be understood here as speaking of all the non-members, but only of a class of 
which there are too many examples. 
Let us, then, keep faith with the medical profession, the public, and our own 
examined members, by continuing to make examination the condition of admis¬ 
sion to the Society, and all who are really qualified and desirous of joining us 
will find means of doing so; but let us not, by throwing open the Society to all 
in the trade, reduce all to the same level, and thus undo ail that for the last 
twenty years we have been endeavouring to do. 
Yours truly, 
W. Wilkinson. 
Manchester , 'February 10 , 1865 . 
P.S.—Since writing the above, I have seen a report of the York meeting in 
the 1 Chemist and Druggist.’ I am sure the local secretary there must consider 
it a happy thing that in the Pharmaceutical Society the utmost freedom of speech 
and opinion is allowed to the local secretaries, and that the Council do not visit 
the u moral turpitude” of having and expressing views in opposition to their 
own by “ summary dismissal of the delinquents from office.” Had he been an 
official appointed by the “ Vehmgericht ” of the Executive Committee, his 
punishment and dismissal from office would have been swift and certain. In¬ 
deed, I almost wonder that this has not been the fate of their own honorary 
secretary, seeing that he professed to be disposed to support the Pharmacy Bill 
(with amendments) ; but I suppose his delinquency was condoned, and his 
