Am.  Jour.  Pharm.  \ 
Dec,  1918.  J 
Bolshevism  in  Pharmacy. 
835 
is  the  address  of  the  chairman  of  the  Section  on  Education  and 
Legislation  of  the  American  Pharmaceutical  Association,  published 
in  the  Proceedings  for  1910,  page  605.  The  other  is  an  article  en- 
titled "When  is  an  Education  not  an  Education?"  Journ.  A.  Ph.  A., 
191 5,  p.  176.  The  views  expressed  on  fundamentals  in  these  two 
articles  have  not  materially  changed  during  the  passage  of  time,  but 
conditions  have  recently  arisen  which  seem  to  call  for  further  ex- 
pression of  opinion  on  certain  phases  of  the  situation. 
There  seems  to  be  at  present,  a  peculiar  tendency  to  throw  dis- 
credit on  commercialism  of  any  kind  in  connection  with  pharmacy. 
The  reason  for  this  is  seen  every  time  one  looks  into  the  windows  or 
sees  the  advertisements  of  a  certain  type' of  drug  store,  but  why  the 
large  number  of  high  minded,  ethical  pharmacists,  who  are  practicing 
their  profession  with  the  respect  and  support  of  leading  members  of 
the  medical  profession  in  their  communities,  should  on  that  account 
be  held  up  to  scorn,  is  hard  to  understand. 
We  are  led  to  believe  that  because  Mr.  X.  or  Mr.  Y.  makes  a 
larger  proportion  of  his  gross  profits  from  the  sale  of  merchandise 
other  than  drugs,  that  pharmacy  is  going  to  the  dogs.  Why  should 
any  stigma  attach  to  a  man  because  he  is  a  good  merchandiser  ?  This 
double  responsibility  of  such  an  individual  to  the  community  has 
been  well  expressed  by  Dr.  Jacob  Diner  as  follows : 
"  On  one  side  we  must  have  the  professionally  trained  man ;  on 
the  other  we  must  prepare  the  same  man  to  be  commercially  able  to 
avail  himself  of  every  honest,  legitimate  means  for  the  financial  ad-' 
vancement  of  his  business." 
The  attempt  to  classify  pharmacists  according  to  professional 
attainments  has  been  recurrent  for  centuries  past.  One  of  the  first 
recorded  legal  enactments  affecting  pharmacy  was  that  of  Frederic 
II  of  Sicily  in  1233  A.D.  This  law  mentions  "  apotheca  "  in  the 
sense  of  warehouses  where  drugs  were  stored ;  compounders  of  med- 
icines were  called  "  confectionarii,"  and  sellers  of  simple  medicines 
were  called  "  stationarii."  As  throwing  light  on  the  subject  of  "  side 
lines,"  the  following  will  be  found  of  interest : 
In  the  sixteenth  century  the  Guild  of  Nuremburg  druggists  pre- 
sented a  memorial  of  grievances  in  which,  among  others,  are  the  fol- 
lowing complaints : 
1.  The  sale  of  all  confections  has  now  fallen  into  the  hands  of 
the  sugar  dealer. 
2.  Counter  sales  (of  spices)  are  now  made  by  all  of  the  large 
