102 
ORIGINAL COMMUNICATIONS. 
practices of imposition, which either entirely elude or are 
difficult of detection. Its processes are complicated and ne- 
cessarily elaborate; many of the substances with which it ma- 
nipulates, either naturally possess a resemblance in sensible 
properties, or may be made to assume a similarity by art, 
more wonderful than alchymy. The persons to whom are 
dispensed its products, are generally the ignorant and unwary, 
who easily yield themselves the victims of deception; and as 
there are no legislative enactments by which it may be 
checked in its career, fraud in its Protean forms stalks with 
impunity throughout the land, amenable to no tribunal, and 
scarcely at the bar of public opinion. In the scheme of instruc- 
tion with which you have been presented, it has been inva- 
riably an object to point out, and comment upon the methods 
by which fraudulent practices are accomplished, and to pro- 
vide you with tests whereby to discriminate between spurious 
and genuine articles of the materia medica; in your hands 
this knowledge may be made a blessing or a curse, it may 
constitute you benefactors of your fellow citizens, or the 
veriest scourges that infest society. But I fear not that your 
acquirements will be applied to any improper uses. I entertain 
the belief that you have too long breathed a healthful moral 
atmosphere, to exist amidst the noxious vapors of imposture. 
I little apprehend a prostitution of your talents to the un- 
worthy purposes of surreptitious gain; but rather possess the 
confident assurance, that by your future conduct you will 
evince the utter detestation in which you hold every thing 
approaching a dereliction of the most rigid honesty, and 
that, should ever sophistication, the opprobrium of your pro- 
fession, be brought within your notice, you will lend your 
willing aid in its exposure. 
Having now performed the task assigned to me, I shall 
terminate my remarks by expressing the hope that what has 
been said will be productive of future advantage to you. The 
matters of which I have treated are of the highest conse- 
quence, possessing an especial bearing upon the success at- 
tending your efforts in life; they constitute, however, but a 
