EDITORIAL. 
85 
stitution  which  has  no  existence  under  the  title  designated,  and  this  per- 
haps is  one  reason  that  no  attempt  has  been  made  to  enforce  it." 
University  of  Michigan. — The  following  letter  was  alluded  to  in  our 
last  number,  but  was  received  too  late  to  afford  space  for  it: 
Michigan  University,  Sept.  24,  1869. 
Editor  American  Journal  of  Pharmacy  : 
Dear  Sir, — Your  September  number  contains  a  list  of  the  graduates 
from  the  Michigan  University  School  of  Pharmacy,  prefaced  by  some 
editorial  comments.  You  say  you  are  not  well  assured  of  the  prelimi- 
nary requirements  of  this  school  as  regards  practical  training  in  the  shop, 
and  hence  do  not  know  the  real  value  of  the  diploma  granted."  Perhaps 
some  explanation  upon  this  point  may  be  in  order. 
No  requirement  of  training  in  the  shop  is  made,  either  for  admission  to 
the  course  or  for  graduation.  Our  school  believes  it  to  be  quite  as  well 
for  the  young  pharmacist,  better  for  his  employer,  and  far  better  for  the- 
public,  that  scientific  preparation  for  the  drug  business  should  precede 
experience  in  it.  Some  students  enter  our  course  after  several  years  of 
shop  experience  ;  in  consequence  they  have  the  advantage,  in  the  college, 
of  greater  eagerness.  Others  graduate  to  engage  for  the  first  in  the  drug 
store  ;  they  have  thereby  the  advantage,  in  their  vocation,  of  a  more  en- 
lightened experience.  The  course  now  established  here  embraces  train- 
ing, under  supervision,  at  the  prescription  stand, — actual  work,  certainly 
as  well  deserving  the  credit  of  responsible  experience  for  the  pharmaceu- 
tical student  as  hospital  practice  does  for  the  medical  student.  This 
training  is  valued  as  a  means  of  binding  principle  to  practice,  but  it  is 
not  allowed  to  take  the  place  of  more  fundamental  education.  Our  classes 
are  assured  that  it  is  not  our  design  to  enable  them,  in  the  least  possible 
time,  to  enter  upon  drug  dispensing,  but  to  prepare  them  for  more  re- 
sponsible positions  during  life.  It  is  our  endeavor  to  educate  scientific 
experts, — competent  for  drug  assays,  familiar  with  the  toxical  properties 
of  medicines,  habituated  to  accuracy,  capable  of  professional  truthfulness 
and  earnest  to  maintain  it, — not  mere  ready  tradesmen  in  pharmacy,  but 
such  as  shall  be  worthy  of  the  often  abused  designation  of  pharmaceutical 
chemist.  The  facility  in  detail  acquired  during  years  of  activity  in  a  drug 
store  has  its  value, — one  in  no  danger  of  depreciation.  Certificates  of 
shop  experience  can  be  obtained,  by  good  behaviour  and  old  Father  Time, 
upon  sufficient  authority  without  resort  to  the  College. 
"In  this  couutry  the  words  Pharmaceutical  Chemist  have  no  meaning 
beyond  the  other  terms  used  to  express  the  business  or  profession  of  a 
pharmaceutist."  In  the  definitions  of  American  dictionaries,  apotheca- 
ries, pharmaceutists  and  druggists  are  those  engaged'm  preparing,  selling, 
buying  drugs,  while  a  pharmaceutical  chemist  is  (constructively)  "one 
versed  in  chemistry,"  "  pertaining  to  preparing  medicines,"  &c.  Certainly 
druggists  do  style  themselves  pharmaceutical  chemists  if  they  choose, 
without  regard  to  scientific  education.    And  any  man  whose  occupation 
