SELECTED ARTICLES. 
^{cji^ 
ART. LIL— OBSERVATIONS ON THE PRESENT STATE OF 
PHARMACY IN GERMANY. By Robert Kane, M.D. 
Bead before the King and Qusen^a College of Physicians, in Ireland, 
Nuvemher \%th, 1836. 
Most of those whom I have the honour to address, are 
aware of the remarkable difference which is found to exist in 
the relation of the apothecary to the physician, according as 
we contemplate the condition of the medical profession in the 
British Islands, or on the Continent. On the one hand, we 
see him forced by circumstances, against which the will or 
exertions of an individual are utterly unavailing, into seeking 
for medical practice; an attempt in which he can be successful 
only by voluntarily conceding to his aristocratic rival the 
possession of the higher departments of professional qualifi- 
cation. And, on the other hand, he is observed leaving the 
treatment of disease to those who are educated by the State 
expressly to that object, preparing those medicines which are 
deemed by the physician advisable, and employing himself in 
examining the qualities, composition, and method of extracting 
drugs, for the purpose of improving their form, and facilitating 
their therapeutical application. 
I do not mean to occupy the attention of this meeting with 
any discussion on the comparative merits of one or the other 
of these arrangements; such an investigation would here be 
out of place, and, I believe, could not lead to any useful 
result. The voice of society has determined that, in these 
VOL. III. NO. IV. 39 
