Experience will convince you that spiritus c. c. (per se) obtained by distillation from the accumulated stale urine of a parish workhouse, or the bones of animals, will be by far preferable to that drawn from the purest cornu cervi; as are the rasura c. c. from the shank bones of horses, or cows, preferable to all other.—Sp. terebinthinæ (carefully and proportionally incorporated) becomes an admirable associate with the ol. juniperi.—Ol. amygdalinum (and many other articles blended secundum artem) form an excellent combination with, and increase the stock of ol. anisi verum.—Genuine gum guaiacum—galbanum—storax, and bals. tolutanum, may undergo the process of purification much better, if impregnated with the occasional assistance of either the resina nigra, or flava.—The various unguents will derive advantage from the salutary introduction of auxungiæ porcincæ, as a substitute for those more expensive and unnecessary articles cera flava and ol. olivarum.
Pulv. anisi verum will be much more easily reduced from the cakes, after the seed has been expressed, the oil obtained, and their medical virtue entirely extracted; it is an article only in use for horses and cows; whether they are killed or cured, is an object not worthy your consideration. Liquorice, fenugreek, diapente, turmeric, and elecampane, are to receive their basis from horse beans ground (at the medical mills) exceedingly fine, and to be impregnated properly with the different articles from which they derive their names, so as to retain each their predominant effluvia; and as these are articles in use for cattle only, you will give proof of your humanity, by drenching them with food instead of physic. The species hiera will be much more certain in its effects, if prepared with the Barbadoes, instead of the Succotrine aloes; and the true Dutch biscuit powder, will form no unprofitable union with the powder of Salop. In fact, innumerable instances of professional skill and œconomy might be introduced, extending instructions to a much greater length than originally intended; protracting the explanatory parts beyond the limits of utility, an accusation it has been my principal care to avoid.
It may perhaps be almost unnecessary to remind you, how absolutely needful it will be, to reduce to impalpable pulverization and complicated forms, all inferior and damaged drugs of every denomination; in powders, tinctures, electuaries, and other preparations, their defects will not be perceptible, and it will prove matter of no small gratification to you, that many practitioners are very inferior judges of the compositions they constantly prescribe; to these may be added the still greater number, that never condescend to undergo the task of inspection, forming together a major part of the very numerous and respectable body I have undertaken to instruct.—If you are a dispenser of chemicals and galenicals by retail, one additional observation will prove worthy your attention—never let your shop, or dispensary, get into disrepute by too much modesty, in saying you are without the most obsolete or ridiculous article that can be enquired for; if oil of swallows, oil of bricks, lobsters’ blood, or milk of lilies, should be the objects in request, let the fertility of your invention instantly furnish a substitute for either; of these, such a great variety are always to be found, the least enumeration becomes unnecessary.
The series of instructions advanced for the promotion of professional interest, have been promulgated without a fear of offence, or hope of reward; amidst the very great number of different practitioners, into whose hands these admonitions must inevitably fall, happy he who can exultingly exclaim,
“Let the gall’d jade wince, our withers are unwrung.”
From the physician, who lingers out a life of studious suspense, and derives a scanty subsistence from the alternate labour of morning visits and evening lectures—from that dignified “member of the corporation,” whole mercurial abilities are thrust into the hand of every dirty passenger, in the more dirty avenues of the metropolis—from that industrious accoucher, whose incessant nocturnal labour renders him, in common life, little superior to the nightman, and that equal drudge the metropolitan pharmacopolist, I can have little to expect but universal denunciation of vengeance, and threats of malevolence: to the effect of these, I oppose the stability of truth, that will render me invulnerable to all their attacks.
A steady observance of the iniquity of medical practice has long since powerfully convinced me of the absolute necessity of professional reformation, and should I (by arming the public with a weapon of self-defence) succeed in producing a change in the systematic imposition of one, and preventing perpetual depredation upon the other, every idea of personal ambition will be fully gratified, for
“So little slave to what the world calls fame;
As dies my body—so I wish my name.”
But this obscurity in the present instance is much more anxiously to be hoped than expected, for there cannot be the least doubt entertained but some one of his Majesty’s ministers (who are ever anxious for the public good and increase of revenue) will, through the medium of the publisher, discover the joint secret of name and residence, that by placing the author in the TREASURY, CUSTOMS, or some office equally lucrative, they may avail themselves of his INTEGRITY, not hesitating a moment to believe, that so just an investigator of professional impositions upon individuals, must unavoidably render the STATE adequate service, in the discovery of official depredations upon the PUBLIC.