AFebr°uary!^m-}  Pharmacy  and  Medicine.  53 
How  to  extract  these  principles  demands  a  mastery  of  the  science 
of  chemistry,  so  self-evident  that  it  is  needless  to  more  than  give 
it  mention.  The  magnitude  thereof  speaks  for  itself;  its  require- 
ments are  self-evident ;  but  that  the  mastery  of  chemistry,  as  ap- 
plied to  pharmacy,  in  contradistinction  to  the  mastery  of  chemistry 
as  applied  to  medicine,  constitutes  practically  an  especial  study  and 
pursuit,  cannot  be  too  strongly  emphasized,  and  the  one  cannot  be 
substituted  for  the  other. 
That  these  two  phases  of  chemistry  do,  however,  possess  some 
features  in  common,  as  is  illustrated  in  incompatibility  in  unscien- 
tifically formulated  prescriptions,  goes  without  saying.  Yet  this 
constitutes  an  entirely  different  question,  and  should  not  prevail, 
except  for  lack  of  proper  qualification. 
To  be  brief,  a  knowledge  of  the  inherent  properties  possessed  by 
remedial  agents  includes  their  physical,  chemical  and  physiologic 
potentials.  The  two  former  belong  to  the  pharmacist,  and  the  lat- 
ter, in  an  especial  sense,  to  the  physician. 
This  fact  cannot  be  too  clearly  appreciated  and  comprehended, 
and  may  be  emphasized  by  stating  that  "the  science  of  pharmacy 
requires  a  mastery  of  botany,  including  the  anatomy  and  physiol- 
ogy of  plant  life,  as  well  as  of-chemistry  in  a  specific  sense. 
The  technical  phases  include  the  ability  to  recognize  both  the 
macroscopic  and  microscopic  characteristics  of  the  medicinal  plant 
world,  the  proper  methods  of  obtaining  active  principles,  and  pre- 
paring the  various  tinctures,  infusions,  extracts,  alkaloids,  gluco- 
sides,  etc.,  and  to  be  able  to  know  that  these  products  are  of  an 
approximately  standard  strength  and  value.  In  a  more  special 
sense,  a  pharmacist  must  be  skilled  in  the  art  of  properly  com- 
pounding a  correctly  formulated  prescription,  which  latter,  it  is  stated 
with  regret,  is  not  as  uniformly  written  as  the  qualification  right- 
fully expected  from  the  medical  profession  should  supply. 
The  preparation,  and,  what  is  equally  important,  the  means  of 
preserving,  unaltered,  the  inherent  potentialities  of  remedies,  also 
belongs  to  the  domain  of  pharmacy.  The  same  general  principles 
or  facts  are  applicable  to  the  remedial  agents  obtained  from  the 
mineral  world. 
Science  and  art,  therefore,  in  their  highest  significance,  charac- 
terize pharmacy,  and  demand  of  its  followers  a  high  standard  of 
scholarly  attainment  and  an  equally  exalted  degree  of  skill. 
