40 
Editorial. 
(  Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
I      Jan.,  1881. 
become  adepts  in  both  professions.  For  very  good  reasons,  the  Colleges  of 
Pharmacy  withhold  from  their  graduates  the  title  of  doctor  ;  when  a  drug- 
gist or  pharmacist  desires  such  a  handle  to  his  name,  we  have  no  fault  to 
find,  if  he  studies  medicine  sufficiently  to  j)ass  the  requisite  examination  ; 
but,  as  we  object  to  physicians  practising  pharmacy,  so  we  object  to  phar- 
.  macists  practising  medicine ;  in  other  words,  we  regard  the  union  of  the 
two  professions  by  one  individual  as  an  unmitigated  evil,  whether  that 
individual  be  a  j^hysician  or  a  pharmacist.  On  this  subject  the  ''College 
and  Clinical  Record,"  of  Nov.  15,  has  published  an  editorial  under  the 
caption  of  "  Where  shall  this  prescriiotion  go? "  which  we  feel  sure  will  be 
joerused  with  interest  by  our  readers.    It  is  as  follows  : 
In  England  a  movement  is  on  foot,  having  for  its  object  the  separation 
of  the  general  practitioner  from  his  shop,  on  the  ground,  taken  by  the  pro- 
fession in  this  countiy  many  years  ago,  that  such  a  combination  retards 
the  advance  of  both  pharmacy  proper  and  medical  science.  As  there  is 
strong  feeling  upon  the  subject,  it  is  probable  that  this  measure  will  be  suc- 
cessful, at  least  in  the  large  cities,  and  there  it  will  soon  be  considered,  as  it 
is  here,  undignified,  to  say  the  least,  for  a  practitioner  of  medicine  to  be  at 
the  same  time  the  proprietor  of  a  shop  where  segars,  liair  dye,  mint-sticks 
and  proprietary  medicines  are  sold. 
While  congratulating  ourselves  and  American  physicians  upon  the  great 
advantage  made  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  in  both  medicine  and  phar- 
macy, on  account  of  the  happy  separation  which  permits  men  to  devote 
themselves  fully  to  their  chosen  vocation ;  we  must  not  forget  that  there 
are  constantly  disintegrating  forces  at  work,  which  require  watchful  care. 
Nothing  mundane  can  be  considered  as  absolutely  irreversible  Tempora 
mutantur  et  7ios  mutamur  in  illis.  If  we  have  entered  into  the  possession 
of  a  legacy,  which  our  pioneers  in  medicine  had  wisely  planned  and  with 
great  effort  firmly  established,  it  is  a  matter  of  honor  with  each  member 
of  the  profession  to  transmit  it  untarnished  to  those  w^ho  come  after.  We 
notice,  therefore,  with  apprehension  the  increasing  number  of  druggists 
w^ho  are  coming  out  of  their  proper  sphere  and  taking  degrees  at  our  medi- 
cal scliools,  with  the  view  of  combining  medicine  and  pharmacy  in  their 
l^ractice ;  we  notice  with  regret  that  our  medical  schools  especially  encour- 
age such  men  to  graduate  by  granting  diminished  fees  and  materially 
reducing  their  course  of  study.  It  does  not  seem  to  he  remembered  by  the 
druggists  that  after  they  begin  to  practise  medicine  they  cannot  hope  for 
other  physicians  to  recommend  their  patients  to  go  to  their  stores  for  pre- 
•scriptions,  such  blindness  to  individual  interest  is  entirely  out  of  the 
question  ;  it  does  not  seem  to  be  remembered  by  the  faculties  of  our  colleges 
that  these  men  engaged,  as  they  are,  in  a  profitable  trade  in  specifics, 
homoeopathic  medicines  and  patented  prei^arations  make  no  pretense 
whatever  of  being  subject  to  the  ordinary  etliics  of  the  profession  as  laid 
down  in  the  Code  of  Ethics  of  the  American  Medical  Association ;  nor 
can  they  become  members  of  our  county  medical  societies  until  they  give 
up  the  sale  of  patent  medicines.  This  is  a  subject  which  we  will  return  to 
again. 
In  the  meantime,  when  our  patients  inquire  "Where  shall  this  prescrip- 
tion go  to?"  we  answer  "Anywhere,  except  to  a  druggist  who  practises 
medicine." 
Orthography  of  the  Metric  Units. — Prof.  Remington's  paper  on 
this  subject,  which  is  published  on  pp.  9  to  12  of  the  present  issue,  is  an 
excellent  pleading  for  retaining  the  French  orthography  unchanged  in 
English ;  but  we  do  not  regard  the  arguments  advanced  as  overwhelming. 
