Am.  Jour.  Pbarm.  ) 
January,  1914.  / 
Book  Reviews. 
45 
As  one  reads  through  this  volume,  depicting  the  work  done  at 
this  institute,  the  impression  is  gained  that  the  aim  of  the  workers  is 
the  scientific  one,  the  desire  for  the  truth;  the  truth  about  those 
remedies  for  which  there  may  be  a  legitimate  use  and  which  are 
more  or  less  ethically  introduced,  and  the  exposure  of  those  remedies 
which  are  secret  in  composition  and  for  which  extravagant  claims 
are  made.  John  K.  Thum. 
"  A  Hankbook  of  Useful  Drugs."  A  selected  list  of  important 
drugs  suggested  for  the  use  of  teachers  of  materia  medica  and 
therapeutics  and  to  serve  as  a  basis  for  the  examinations  by  state 
medical  examining  and  licensing  boards.  Prepared  under  the  direc- 
tion and  supervision  of  the  Council  on  Pharmacy  and  Chemistry  of 
the  American  Medical  Association.  Press  of  the  American  Medical 
Association,  535  North  Dearborn  Street,  Chicago,  1913. 
It  does  not  require  the  gifts  of  a  seer  or  the  abilities  of  a  prophet 
to  venture  the  opinion  that  this  rather  diminutive  volume  of  167 
pages  is  destined  in  the  near  future  to  have  a  decidedly  far-reaching 
influence  on  the  teaching  and  on  the  practice  of  therapeutics  and, 
consequently,  is  designed  to  have  an  equally  important  bearing  on 
the  future  development  of  pharmacy  and  the  efficiency  of  pharma- 
cists generally. 
Conscientious  students  of  medical  economics  have  long  appre- 
ciated the  waste  of  energy,  money  and  even  life  resulting  from  the 
haphazard  or  ignorant  misuse  of  drugs  and  medicines  so  general  a 
decade  or  more  since.  Some  nine  years  ago  the  Council  on  Phar- 
macy and  Chemistry  of  the  American  Medical  Association  made  its 
first  onslaught  on  quacks  and  quackery  in  the  medicine  supply  busi- 
ness and  although  the  Council  at  that  time  had  fair  reason  to  be- 
lieve that  it  might  be  assisted  in  its  efforts  by  at  least  the  more 
progressive  of  professional  pharmacists,  this  expected  cooperation 
has  not  been  forthcoming,  in  this  country  at  least.  Medical  prac- 
titioners, largely  through  the  American  Medical  Association,  have 
been  compelled  to  stand  practically  alone  in  their  fight  against  the 
purely  commercial  spirit  in  the  practice  of  pharmacy  of  to-day.  The 
little  book  before  us  is  the  latest  step  in  this  warfare,  representing  as 
it  does  the  fundamentally  constructive  work  of  the  Council  on  Phar- 
macy and  Chemistry,  as  the  earlier  work  "  Propaganda  for  Reform  " 
represents  the  destructive  work  of  the  same  body,  and  the  now  well- 
known  book,  "  New  and  Non-official  Remedies  "  represents  a  com- 
pilation of  reasonably  good  material  that  is  offered  for  future  in- 
