AMFeb!i',iP873RM'}  Poitent  Medicines  and  Private  Formulas.  5T 
bers  of  which  are  in  honor  bound  not  to  have  any  secrecy  in  regard  to 
their  mode  of  treatment  or  to  the  remedies  employed.  Whether  or 
not  the  use  by  physicians  of  preparations  made  by  secret  formulas  is 
tantamount  to  a  violation  of  medical  ethics,  in  letter  or  in  spirit,  is 
not  for  us  to  determine.  But  we  know  that  if  physicians  and  phar- 
macists had  always  acted  upon  the  principles  advocated  by  our  cor- 
respondent, the  days  of  antiquity  would  be  still  upon  us,  when  the 
meagre  knowledge  was  communicated  from  father  to  son,  or  from 
teacher  to  particularly  favored  pupils,  when  there  was  no  pharmacy, 
and  when  the  medicine  man  was  merely  a  sorcerer  and  magician.  If 
the  numerous  pharmacists  and  physicians,  who  have  successfully  la- 
bored to  establish  chemistry  as  an  independent  science,  had  kept  their 
discoveries  secret,  our  correspondent  would  now  not  be  in  the  position 
of  handling  morphia,  quinia,  strychnia,  or  any  other  of  the  active 
principles  of  medicinal  drugs,  and  chemical  analysis,  to  which  he  re- 
fers, would  be  totally  unknown. 
The  suggestion  of  our  correspondent,  to  reward  the  inventor  of  a 
new  formula  with  a  degree  commensurate  with  the  value  of  the  same, 
is  novel  merely  in  these  days  of  supposed  education  and  knowledge, 
and  we  doubt  not  would  receive  the  hearty  approval  of  all  inventors 
of  golden  pills,  expectorants,  cures  for  consumption,  invigorating 
bitters,  and  of  the  entire  host  of  quack  nostrums.  Happily,  the  days 
of  the  middle  ages  are  passed,  when  the  maker  of  a  renowned  nostrum 
would  be  rewarded  by  those  in  authority  with  money  and  perhaps  with 
titles  for  divulging  its  composition. 
The  action  of  the  American  Pharmaceutical  Association  at  its  last 
meeting,  and  of  several  local  associations,  in  regard  to  elixirs  and 
similar  semi-nostrums,  is  evidence  that  there  is  an  honest  desire  to 
suppress  this  nuisance  of  having  in  pharmacies  a  multitude  of  differ- 
ent preparations  bearing  the  same  name  ;  and  this  movement  will  be 
crowned  with  success,  if  it  meets  with  the  favorable  consideration  of 
the  medical  profession. 
For  other  points  on  the  elixir  question,  we  refer  our  readers  to  the 
Proceedings  of  the  American  Pharmaceutical  Association  for  1872. 
PATENT  MEDICINES  AND  PRIVATE  FORMULAS. 
By  Chas.  G.  Polk,  M.  D. 
Under  this  caption  Mr.  James  W.  Long  makes  some  very  excellent 
points  in  regard  to  one  of  the  greatest  curses  to  society  at  the  present 
