256 
INTRODUCTORY LECTURE. 
many respects illy fitted for the responsible duties they have 
assumed. 
In 1840, on the application to parliament by the other 
medical bodies for a law to regulate the practice of 
Pharmacy, which bore hardly on the chemists and drug- 
gists, the latter, by one of those universal movements that 
sometimes occur in professions, as well as in nations, arose 
and assumed the initiative, organized a society, whose cen- 
tre was in London, with ramifications in the chief cities and 
towns of England and Wales; founded a central, and, 
prospectively, several provincial schools of Pharmacy, and 
now present the noble spectacle of a flourishing, self-consti- 
tuted institution, numbering 2500 members, with an annual 
income of over $20,000. Since their commencement, the 
society has issued a monthly Journal of transactions and 
scientific papers, which has a powerful influence on the 
members and others, by its open, unflinching advocation of 
correct principles and practice. In the past six years the 
difficulties that assailed its youthful endeavors have been 
boldly met, and many objections overcome ; the school has 
been placed on a firmer basis, and a practical laboratory 
established. With the inherent energy of the English 
people, it is by no means hazardous to predict that in ten 
or twenty years a body of pharmaceutists will be raised up 
that will do honour to English Pharmacy. 
It is a characteristic of our national and state govern- 
ments to interfere as little as possible with the working of 
private interests, and competition is left unimpeded to con- 
trol the business affairs of society. This liberty of action, 
so advantageous in the common intercourse of men, is un- 
fortunate in reference to medicine, which, as no guarantee 
of qualification is required by law of its practitioners, is 
thrown open to any individual who chooses to adopt the 
title of doctor or apothecary, be he ever so ignorant. 
When we look abroad in the lan<J and witness the work- 
ing of the complex systems of quackery, which, like the 
