The American Medical Association and the United States pharmacopoeia / a reprint of the pamphlets of H.C. Wood, Alfred B. Taylor, the Philadelphia County Medical Society, and the National College of Pharmacy ; with a rejoinder addressed to the professions of medicine and pharmacy of the United States, by Edward R. Squibb.

E. R. Squibb

Date:: 1877

Credit: The American Medical Association and the United States pharmacopoeia / a reprint of the pamphlets of H.C. Wood, Alfred B. Taylor, the Philadelphia County Medical Society, and the National College of Pharmacy ; with a rejoinder addressed to the professions of medicine and pharmacy of the United States, by Edward R. Squibb. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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$must, in its ultra conservatism remain a mere catalogue of the materia moilica, cnroIliii<^ witli autlioritativi' <rnxiiity surli articles as worm- wood, vinegar and oatnep, while relu>.iug pepsin, nitrite,' of aniyl, and bromide of sodium;—and the still worse doctrine that it must follow in the wake of advancing knowledge (U. S. P., p. xiii.) rather than keep up with it, cannot be accepted iiuleliiiilely by the profession. The British, German, and Austrian Pharma- copoeias had all, more or less, broken through tliis ultra conserva- tism before the last revision, but tlieir exami>le was not follow- ed, much less was any advance made upon their advances. If the U. S. Pharmacopoeia is to be kept a mere catalogue of substan- ces, and processes wliich are so far buliind the time, some other must ultimately be made, and if this other should be up to the time, and should even lead the profession a little, in its special work, rather than hold it back to old notions, then the doctrine of survival of the fittest will take care of the results, and the disadvantages might soon disappear. Hence the curse of two pharmacopceia-s, as the writer of the pamjjhlet expresses it, is sure to come sooner or later if the sufficiency of the ])rosent revision and its ))rincip!es and doctrines be maintained against the needs of a progressive utilitarian profession. And if it be unavoidable, then the sooner it comes the better. Beside this, the present revision is not consistent in its ultra con- servatism, for its half-way endorsement of sugar-coated pills, and its leaning toward the abomination of elixirs by the introduction of glycerin into so many duid extracts, have tended strongly to support and emboidiii tlic rival makers of pills and elixirs until no physi- cian's otKce, nor any large meeting of medical n\en, are free from tlu' <1 rummer and his samples. Again, in this part of the pam])hli't it is re-atlirmcd with great pos- itiveness that it is not a new Pharmacopcria, but a Dispensatory aiul a sjiecial journal of Materia Medica and Therapeutics, that The Association is asked to undertake, as hidden under this jilan. To maki' this statement moderately correct and accurate it must be assMiiicd that any inatci'ial departure from the time-honored plan of the |>resent revision would convert it into a disjjensatory and give rise to a commeicial contest whose severity will be proportionate ti> the value of the interests involvedi No part of the proposed plan can be reasonably construed to justify this statement. To de- part from the present ])lan and improve the Pharmacopoeia as pro- posed does no^ convert it into a dispensatorj', but would simply ena- ble it to do without a dispensatory as the modern European Pharma-$

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