AmMay?i^arm'}     The  Scope  of  the  National  Formulary.  207 
macy  which  is  in  professional  or  popular  demand  and  for  which  the 
Pharmacopoeia  prescribes  no  standard. 
The  preface  to  the  first  edition  also  says :  "  The  mission  which 
this  work  is  to  fulfil  can  only  be  properly  accomplished  by  the 
co-operation  of  the  medical  profession.  It  is  therefore  of  the 
greatest  importance  that  the  members  of  this  profession,  throughout 
the  country,  be  made  acquainted  with  the  existence,  contents  and 
objects  of  this  book,  and  that,  if  the  same  be  approved  by  them,  as 
is  confidently  expected,  they  will  consent  to  accept  the  preparations 
made  in  accordance  with  the  formulas  contained  therein,  instead  of 
designating  any  special  maker's  product." 
Despite  the  fact  that  the  opinions  expressed  in  the  above  para- 
graph are  self-evidently  correct  and  absolutely  indispensable,  it  has 
taken  twenty  years  for  the  retail  pharmacist  to  awaken  to  a  realiza- 
tion of  the  possibilities  involved,  in  popularizing  the  National 
Formulary  with  physicians,  and,  perhaps  as  the  consequence  of  his 
own  oversight,  the  pharmacist  himself  is  anything  but  prepared  to 
cope  with  the  difficulties  that  will  present  themselves  in  this  pro- 
posed propaganda. 
Retail  druggists  in  all  parts  of  the  country  are  taking  up  the 
work  of  popularizing  U.S.P.  and  N.F.  preparations  with  physicians, 
and  forgetting  entirely  that  they  have  not  been  closely  in  touch 
with  the  advance  guard  in  the  science  of  medicine,  they  are  making, 
and  will  continue  to  make,  serious  mistakes  that  will  hamper  rather 
than  aid  the  progress  of  rational  therapeutics. 
In  this  connection  we  must  not  lose  sight  of  the  fact  that  even 
the  Pharmacopoeia  of  the  United  States,  elaborate  and  comprehen- 
sive as  that  work  really  is,  is  not  above  reproach  and  has,  in  fact, 
been  criticised  severely. 
With  the  National  Formulary,  however,  in  addition  to  the  natural 
shortcomings  and  errors  usually  evidenced  in  works  of  this  kind, 
we  must  also  contend  with  the  fact  that  the  compilation  itself 
largely  reflects  but  an  ephemeral  survival,  or  at  best  a  revival, 
of  empiric  practices  that  are  not  at  all  compatible  with  real  science 
and  progress. 
A  very  fair  proportion  of  the  formulas  contained  in  the  National 
Formulary  are  representative  of  the  poly-pharmacy  of  bygone 
centuries  and  have  no  legitimate  reasons  for  existence  at  the 
present  time.    This,  too,  is  quite  irrespective  of  the  fact  whether  or 
