OF THE PHARMACEUTICAL SOCIETY. 
705 
“I do not like tile Society, I am not a member, and I will not become one.” Bui he 
would not be able to say so now. No man would be able to bring his son up to the 
trade of a chemist and druggist unless he was a member of the Pharmaceutical Society. 
Nor would he be able to sell his business unless to some one who had passed its exami¬ 
nation, consequently a man would say to himself, “ If this is to affect my business thus, 
I must become a member.” The meeting was not asked to allow the Society to remain 
as it was, but to allow the Society to go to Parliament and obtain powers that would 
govern and affect every man who in future should set up as a chemist and druggist. 
If they were ready to go on with the Society as it had been hitherto, then do away with 
the Bill; but, on the other hand, if they were of opinion that the object now in view 
was the object for which the Society was formed from the very first, then withdraw the 
opposition to the Bill, for it would grant them all the powers they required. Did they 
suppose for one moment that these extensive premises, large laboratories, and everything 
else connected with the Society, were constructed for the Society in its present form. 
No ! it was plain on the face of it, that when the laboratories were made, a larger and 
a grander scheme was on foot, which had for its object the raising of the chemists and 
druggists of the whole kingdom to a proper qualification as dispensers of medicines. 
The question was not whether certain persons would derive any benefit from the So¬ 
ciety, but whether the Society should have the power to touch every member of the 
trade and compel him to enter the Society. Then, supposing that they are admitted, 
the question arose, what name was to be given to them ? The name proposed was a 
“ Member” of the Society. It was all very well for gentlemen to state that the public 
would not understand what that meant; but that argument would also apply if they 
were called Associates. Then there were two parties to that question : the other side 
said they would not accept the title of Associate. The meeting must recollect that 
they had a reluctant and a careless House of Commons, that would not see matters as 
they did, and an opposition of any magnitude would be sure to throw out a Bill, If the 
meeting wanted a Bill at all, it must be one in a cordial spirit, one agreed to by both 
sides, or they would get none. In the living and dying words of the late Mr. Jacob 
Bell, they must either be content to go on as they were, or else open their doors more 
freely; and they might depend upon it that without they went to Parliament hand in 
hand, the House of Commons would throrv out their most important clauses. There 
was more difference between the terms “ Member of the Pharmaceutical Society ” and 
“Pharmaceutical Chemist,” than any others, which were all pretty much alike in the 
eyes of the public. It was said that the Society was going on very well. No doubt it 
was, but to what was it due, but the promise of legislative enactment ? Some time ago, 
he remembered, their members diminished, but since they had tried to obtain the legis¬ 
lative influence they were now endeavouring to obtain, they had increased. He again 
alluded to the difficulties they had in their way, unless they could come to some arrange¬ 
ment by which both sides could go to Parliament and ask for a Bill unopposed. With¬ 
out they did so, they would again most certainly decline. 
Mr. OiiRiDGE, in reply to a member who expressed a wish to hear the opinion of some 
other members of the Council, said that there were two points on which he might state 
facts worthy of the consideration of the meeting. One speaker, Mr. Tugwell, had asked 
whether there was any evidence of the feeling of the late Mr. Jacob Bell relative to the 
Society embracing all the members of the trade. Now, beyond the information on this 
point afforded by the Journal, he (Mr. Orridge) was able to testify that it was at the 
express wish of Mr, Bell that he had moved a resolution to that effect,* and that this 
very resolution was drawn by Mr. Bell and handed to the chairman in his handwriting. 
He might further point out that, among those who had entered the Society when the 
door was thrown open was Mr. Abraham himself, and he, Mr. Orridge, was glad to 
welcome him as an ornament to the Society, and believed that if the door were once 
again opened in order to obtain unanimity with the view of a permanent settlement of 
the question by getting an Act for compulsory examination hereafter, that men would 
be found to enter not less competent than Mr. Abraham, and equally with him orna¬ 
ments to the Society. 
Mr. Richardson (Leicester) presented a resolution, which had been unanimously 
adopted by the Pharmaceutical Chemists of Leicester. He observed that he quite con- 
* Pharm. Jouvn. vol. xii. p. 106. 
