72  Advantage  of  Preliminary  Examination.        { ^'"■reb^^isss*^™" 
the  fifteen  years  following  the  average  number  has  reached  99|-,  almost 
a  100  each  year.  We  present  this  statistical  statement  without  com- 
ment, although  it  would  be  a  matter  of  interest  to  connect  cause  and 
efFect.i 
It  must  be  borne  thoughtfully  in  mind  in  considering  this  subject 
that  with  the  growth  of  this  College  handsome  pecuniary  interests  have 
also  grown  and  continue  to  increase — interests  which,  if  kept  sub- 
servient to  the  ethical  status  of  the  College  and  of  the  profession,  would 
be  looked  upon  simply  as  gratifying  evidence  of  prosperity,  but  which, 
if  permitted  to  exercise  their  natural  influence,  are  at  variance  with 
and  inimical  to  those  principles  of  ethics  controlling  professional  wel- 
fare. Professor  Parrish,  an  eminent  authority,  writing  in  1854,  see 
Am.  Jour,  of  Pharm.,''  page  215,  Vol.  ii.  No.  3,  says,  "Against  the 
establishment  of  numerous  schools  of  pharmacy  there  lie  many  objec- 
tions founded  upon  the  difficulty  of  maintaining  them,  and  upon  the 
almost  inevitable  lowering  of  the  standard  of  graduation  consequent 
upon  this  kind  of  competition.'' 
A  conviction  now  well  settled  in  the  public  mind  and  largely  added 
to  by  the  expressions  of  the  public  press,  is  that  the  degree  granting 
institutions  of  this  country  have  let  go  the  old-time  safeguards  and 
entered  into  an  era  of  business  rivalry.  That  the  diploma  has  lost  a 
measure  of  its  credit  of  value,  except  as  a  testimonial  of  a  certain 
amount  of  zeal  and  industry  in  the  pursuit  of  study. 
By  a  retrospect  of  the  history  of  this  College  we  are  able  to  ascertain 
something  of  its  origin  and  the  causes  which  promoted  it.  As  original 
members  whose  connection  with  the  College  dates  with  the  beginning, 
ten  respected  names  appear,  seven  of  whom  were,  we  believe,  classed 
in  the  directory  of  the  day  as  wholesale  druggists.  From  this  and 
other  historical  information  which  surrounds  its  foundation  and  early 
history,  we  are  led  to  believe  that  it  had  its  conception  in  the  fact  that 
the  assistants  of  the  wholesale  stores  were  deprived  of  that  important 
rudimentary  education  of  greater  familiarity  with  drugs  which  the 
retail  shops  at  that  time  so  well  afforded,  and  this  disparity  of  oppor- 
tunities resulted  in  throwing  upon  the  profession  a  class  of  illy-in- 
formed men,  many  of  whom,  by  drift  of  circumstances,  ultimately 
found  their  way  into  retail  establishments  as  assistants  or  principals 
and  thus  ignorance  multiplied.    In  other  words,  the  original  object  of 
iThere  are  about  28,000  proprietors  of  drug  stores  in  the  United  States;  how  many  of 
these  are  Graduates  iu  Pharmacy  ?— Editor  Am.  Jouk.  Phar. 
