476  Alcohol:  Its  Relation  to  Science,  Etc.     { ^''Jn\y^'^^: 
no  way  be  embarrassed,  the  preparation  and  administration  of  drugs 
would  in  no  respect  be  restricted  or  inconvenienced,  while  the  science 
of  therapeutics  would  actually  be  benefitted  thereby. 
It  is  usual  for  these  enthusiasts,  none  of  whom  claim  any  knowl- 
edge of  medicine,  pharmacy  or  chemistry,  to  take  as  a  text  a  state- 
ment of  some  physician  or  a  resolution  adopted  by  some  medical 
society  to  the  effect  that  the  position  of  alcohol  as  a  therapeutic 
agent  is  more  or  less  doubtful,  and  urging  that  physicians  use 
a  greater  degree  of  restraint  in  prescribing  alcoholic  stimulants. 
Upon  these  premises— which,  of  course,  are  debatable  ground — 
is  based  an  argument  that  alcohol  is  no  longer  necessary  in  medicine, 
and  I  have  heard  some  of  the  more  extreme  advocates  of  this  theory 
declare  that  no  exemptions  should  be  provided  in  the  Federal  Pro- 
hibition Act  for  standard  drugs,  proprietaries,  toilet  articles  or 
flavoring  extracts. 
Of  course,  what  the  physicians  who  are  quoted  in  this  connection 
have  said — and  there  is  a  wide  divergence  of  expert  opinion  on  the 
subject- — has  been  confined  exclusively  to  the  use  of  spirits  for  their 
direct  therapeutic  or  stimulating  effect,  and  has  had  no  bearing 
whatever  upon  the  employment  of  alcohol  as  an  extractive  agent, 
solvent  or  preservative. 
I  think  it  is  only  fair  to  say  that  in  the  majority  of  cases  these 
zealous  gentlemen  have  been  entirely  ignorant  of  the  technical 
reasons  for  the  employment  of  alcohol  in  the  manufacture  of  medi- 
cines, and  have  been  honest  in  their  belief  that  such  spirits  as  are 
used  in  the  average  alcoholic  medicinal  preparation  are  deliberately 
introduced  for  the  purpose  of  stimulating  the  patient,  the  physiologi- 
cal effect  of  the  spirits  being  counted  upon  by  the  manufacturer  or 
prescriber  in  exactly  the  same  way  that  the  other  ingredients  are 
relied  upon  to  produce  certain  results. 
Conceding,  however,  that  these  gross  misrepresentations  have 
been  made  in  good  faith,  what  shall  be  said  of  the  arguments  predi- 
cated upon  such  ignorance,  or  of  law-makers  or  administrators 
who  permit  themselves  to  be  swayed  by  such  influences? 
While  the  efforts  which  pharmacists  and  chemists  in  many  lines 
of  industry  have  been  making  in  recent  years  to  discover  satisfactory 
substitutes  for  alcohol,  especially  for  purposes  of  solution  and  pres- 
ervation, are  in  line  with  the  broad  basic  principles  underlying  the 
progress  of  science,  nevertheless  they  should  not  mislead  us  into 
assuming  a  timid  or  equivocal  attitude  with  respect  to  alcohol,  or 
