Am.  Jour.  Pharm.  \ 
August,  19 19.  > 
Revision  of  the  Pharmacopoeia. 
513 
and  energy  have  been  expended,  shall  be  fostered,  continued  and 
protected. 
The  Medical  Man  and  the  Pharmacopoeia. 
The  several  last  revisions  of  the  pharmacopoeia  called  forth 
acrimonious  criticisms  on  the  side  of  the  medical  practitioner.  It 
should  be  recollected  that  in  its  inception  the  pharmacopoeia  was 
purely  a  medical  document.  The  first  edition  stated  on  its  title 
page  that  it  was  published  by  the  authority  of  the  medical  societies 
and  colleges.  At  the  time  no  college  of  pharmacy  existed  in  this 
country.  The  medical  control  continued  in  the  three  subsequent 
revisions. 
In  1850  pharmacists  were  recognized  as  delegates  to  the  conven- 
tion, and  from  that  time  forward  pharmacy  took  an  active  part  in 
the  work  of  revision. 
The  criticism  of  medical  writers  are  on  one  hand  directed  against 
certain  drugs  and  preparations  which  are  contained  in  the  pharma- 
copoeia. On  the  other  hand,  the  work  is  criticized  because  certain 
drugs  and  preparations  are  omitted.  "You're  damned  if  you  do, 
and  you're  damned  if  you  don't."  One  medical  writer  styles  the 
pharmacopoeia  "  a  medical  barbarism,"  and  wants  half  its  pages  cut 
out. 
On  another  side  the  contention  has  been  that  the  pharmacopoeia 
should  contain  every  article  used  in  medicine.  A  practitioner  of 
medicine  has  stated  that  "  if  a  physician  prescribes  brick  dust,  that 
brick  dust  must  be  defined  by  the  pharmacopoeia."  Again,  there 
are  a  small  number  of  critics  who  are  primarily  pharmacologists, 
who  intimate  that  "there  is  no  use  for  any  drug  that  has  not  been 
proven  on  frogs."' 
As  to  the  great  variance  of  medical  writers  on  what  should  not 
be  admitted  to  the  pharmacopoeia,  Professor  Remington  tersely 
says,  that  "While  it  is  true  there  are  plenty  of  things  in  the  pharma- 
copoeia that  the  doctors  in  Chicago  never  thought  of  using,  it  is 
equally  true  that  the  doctors  in  Texas,  or  somewhere  else,  do  use 
them  largely,  and  the  doctor  there  is  just  as  much  entitled  to  a 
standard  for  his  preparations  as  the  doctor  in  Chicago,  or  Philadel- 
phia, or  New  York,  who  has  never  heard  of  these  articles." 
Physicians  naturally  do  not  take  much  interest  in  the  botanical 
or  chemical  description,  or  in  the  tests  for  identity  or  for  purity. 
According  to  Charles  Rice,  the  main  objects  which  a  physician  usu- 
