FALSE ACCUSATION AGAINST A LOCAL SECRETARY. 527 
’Government. I will only express my astonishment that such a proposal should be 
put forth, and add, that if this lie the superior way of benefiting the public and 
protecting the trade , the more completely we are delivered from this protection the 
better. 
One other recommendation remains, garnished with all the titles of libera¬ 
lity, etc., which is, Mr. Proctor says, to “ensure the hearty support of all con¬ 
cerned,” and that is to admit to perfect equality with the present Pharmaceutist 
“ everybody now exercising the calling.” Will it meet with the “ hearty 
support” of the 800 men who have been examined—who have, with industry 
and application, and at cost and inconvenience to themselves, won by examina¬ 
tion the title they possess? One of them told us in a letter to the Journal, a 
few months ago, that the Council did not dare to set forth such a proposition, 
and that if it were thought to be seriously contemplated, it would raise a storm 
such as Bloomsbury Square had never known. Would it have the “hearty 
support of the public,” who are calling for more protection from incompetency, 
to give the highest title (for, to have distinctions of grade or name is denounced 
as narrow, illiberal, etc.) to “ everyone who now exercises the calling,” huckster 
or chandler-shop keeper though he may be? Would it ensure the hearty 
support of the medical profession, who have declared that it is one of the ex¬ 
isting evils, which ought at once to be redressed, that there is no restriction 
upon the making up of medicine by any, however ignorant? And would it 
have the hearty support of the Legislature, which declared thirteen years ago 
that it was desirable that a title should be given to enable the public to dis¬ 
tinguish the man entitled to their support, if we were to go back to the state of 
things in 1853, and give the very title it framed as a mark of distinction and 
honour, to every man who chooses to put up a blue bottle ? 
_ And what is the reason advanced for all this ?—that there are some men out¬ 
side of us who are equal to any among us. Certainly, men who cared so little 
about this equality which they now clamour for that they would not come 
amongst us when they were asked,—who have never spent a shilling to advance 
the education or promote the welfare of the youth who were coming forward in 
our business,—who, whilst the members of the Pharmaceutical Society, examined 
and unexamined, have spent thousands every year, not for themselves, but to find 
education and opportunities for improvement for the young Chemists throughout 
the country, have never troubled themselves to help, or have done all in their 
power to hinder or abuse. Truly, the charge of illiberality has very little founda¬ 
tion in the face of such facts as these, and the measure which is to ensure the 
hearty support of all is scarcely likely to be that recommended by Mr. Proctor. | 
Depend upon it, that if the Society were to yield to clamour, at the ex¬ 
pense of consistency and justice, and to undo all that the last thirteen years 
has done, they would not only be promise-breakers to the public and their own 
examined members, but be looked upon with contempt by all who have en¬ 
trusted them with administrative powers, and by none be more despised than 
by those who now charge them with exclusiveness and illiberality. 
I am, Sir, yours faithfully, 
Opifex. 
FALSE ACCUSATION AGAINST A LOCAL SECRETARY OF 
THE PHARMACEUTICAL SOCIETY. 
In the 1 Chemist and Druggist ’ of February is an address from the Executive 
Committee of the United Society to the trade, in which certain charges are 
preferred against those who obtained the signatures of the trade to the declara¬ 
tion in favour of the Bill of the Pharmaceutical Society, of having made use of 
2 p 2 
