312  Commercial  Training  for  Pharmacists.  {  AmjuJiyUr;9^7arm* 
drugs  as  well  as  climatic  effects  upon  their  growth,  etc.,  is  quite 
essential  to  the  shrewd  buyer.  But  how  many  teachers  of  botan> 
and  pharmacognosy  ever  handle  the  subject  from  this  point  of  view? 
They  are  usually  profound  students  of  the  subject  and  teach  what 
custom  dictates  every  educated  pharmacist  should  know  about  these 
sciences  and  they  usually  teach  it  in  a  highly  scientific  way,  regard- 
ing any  commercial  consideration  of  the  subject  as  beneath  their 
dignity. 
It  is  necessary  to  remember  that  we  are  not,  in  this  day  and 
generation,  teaching  pharmacists  who  will  go  out  and  collect  green 
drugs,  dry  and  grind  them  and  manufacture  them  into  elegant  prep- 
aration. We  are  teaching  men  who  to-morrow  will  be  in  the  thick 
of  the  fight  for  a  living  out  of  a  business  which  has  some  profes- 
sional trimmings  but  requires  the  ability  to  utilize  these  trimmings 
in  a  commercial  way  for  success. 
Chemistry  is  a  big  subject,  which  requires  four  years  of  under- 
graduate study  and  some  more  postgraduate  work  in  our  universi- 
ties before  it  is  felt  that  the  student  or  graduate  knows  enough  to 
speak  with  authority  on  the  subject.  Yet  we  try  to  make  our  men 
master  chemistry  in  two  short  years  and  crowd  the  work  in  at  an 
enormous  rate,  with  the  result  that  there  is  little  time  for  absorp- 
tion, because  it  is  all  needed  for  cramming.  Chemistry  is  invaluable 
to  the  pharmacy  student,  but  it  should  be  handled  from  the  view- 
point of  the  pharmacist.  Our  professors  are  victims  of  a  system 
which  does  not  recognize  that  the  object  of  teaching  chemistry  in  a 
pharmacy  school  is  not  to  turn  out  chemists  but  to  turn  out  good 
pharmacists,  just  as  the  object  of  teaching  botany  is  not  to  develop 
botanists  but  better  pharmacists.  Here,  too,  a  consideration  of  the 
commercial  aspects  of  the  subject  from  the  pharmaceutical  stand- 
point is  a  crying  need. 
The  time  has  come  when  the  traditions  of  the  past  must  be 
shaken  off,  for  they  have  burdened  us  heavily  for  too  long  a  time. 
Commercial  training  must  mean  more  than  bookkeeping,  account- 
ing, selling  and  advertising  in  the  future.  It  should  be  considered 
in  connection  with  every  subject  in  the  curriculum  and  the  men  now 
teaching  the  various  subjects  at  our  colleges  will  find  a  keener  in- 
terest in  their  work,  on  the  part  of  students,  if  it  is  approached  from 
the  present-day  retail  druggists'  standpoint.  And  further  than  this, 
the  colleges  will  then  be  fulfilling  their  mission,  which  is  to  pro- 
vide trained  men  to  meet  the  needs  of  the  hour. 
