Respectrully presented 
by the author 
THE 
PROBLEMS AND EDTURE 
OP 
Pharmacy in Germany. 
BY 
FREDERICK HOFFMANN, Ph.D. 
Repeated from the “American Journal of Pharmacy,” July, 1874. 
PHILADELPHIA: 
MERRIHEW & SON, PRINTERS, 135 N. THIRD STREET. 
1874. THE PROBLEMS AND FUTURE 
OF 
PHARMACY IN GERMANY. 
It appears to be of interest and utility to take notice of the prob- 
lems which are now being discussed in Germany, where pharmacy 
has been, for over two centuries, the main cultivator of natural sciences, 
and as such, and as a branch of the healing art, has attained a position 
not reached in any other country, and where not only its sphere and 
import, but even its very existence seems to be at stake. Though 
the political, social and industrial conditions of Germany and the 
other European countries differ in many respects from those of North 
America, it will be found that the aims and interests of pharmacy, 
and its relations to other trades, are the same everywhere ; and for 
this reason, the crisis into which pharmacy has entered in Germany, 
merits a wider attention. With the radical changes of popular views, 
in consequence of general intellectual advancement and the popular- 
ization of all branches of physical and sanitary sciences and of 
rational medicine, the former state and practice of medicine, and also 
of pharmacy, have undergone considerable changes in Germany and 
in Central Europe. Although difficult to comprehend outside of Ger- 
many, the most important necessary consequence has been the removal 
of all restrictions formerly placed, on the part of the State, upon the 
practice of medicine and hygiene, in Germany as well as in Switzer- 
land. Medicine, in consequence of its extent and its unlimited sphere 
of application, has separated into several parts, which in study as 
well as in practice, have more or less become specialties, while some 
branches have become the common property of all well educated, and 
have occasionally been successfully practised also by others than physi- 
cians. Notwithstanding these innovations, modern medicine pro- 
gresses ; “with the higher aim that its object is not the cure, -as-1 
the prevention of disease.” (Virchow.) As another conse- 
quence of these tendencies the fact was lately stated, that “modern 
medicine has ceased to resort to and find its centre of gravity in the 4 
pharmacies.” (Pettenkofer.) How far these assertions represent 
the reality, may be judged not only from the pharmaceutical papers, 
but far better from the number and quality of popular science publi- 
cations covering the field of hygiene and sanitary and medical 
sciences ; the widely-known popular works which have passed through 
many editions and translations, of Professors Bock and Reclam, of 
Leipzig, may be mentioned as instances. 
The medical schools have skeptically discarded a large portion of 
the old array of remedial agents, and retained comparatively few sub- 
stances of certain chemical composition and hence proportionable 
with exactness ; these are more and more administered by subcuta- 
neous injection or in minute concentrated doses, and in forms which 
are more handsomely prepared by the confectioner than the apothe- 
cary, while the preparation of the chemicals has been transferred 
from the laboratory of the latter to that of the manufacturer,* so 
that the sphere of the apothecary has been materially narrowed and 
simplified, and a chemical knowledge, though always desirable, is not 
in the same degree requisite as heretofore. 
When, therefore, we hear of a decline of pharmacy and of a de- 
crease of its efficiency in Germany and other European countries, as 
yet not a degeneration of pharmaceutical education and proficiency, 
nor of the status of pharmacy, is intended; but principally the reac- 
tion of the conditions briefly sketched above upon pharmacy. An 
increase of medical skepticism and a lessening in the public mind of 
the value of remedies must certainly be followed by the lowering 
of of pharmacy. Medicine cannot well be subject to 
such a retrogression, because its successful practice lies in an unalter- 
able path, concerning the instability of human nature and life, and 
presupposes, besides actual knowledge, an individual fitness, technical 
skill, experience and judgment, with which the educated physician 
can always successfully encounter the ignorant or half educated 
competitor, while the competition amongst pharmacists scarcely exists 
upon the scientific, but almost exclusively upon the mercantile field. 
The future status of pharmacy in Germany, as influenced by these 
factors, and in consequence of the rapid intercourse of nations and 
the generalization of ideas, their influence upon pharmacy in other 
* See synopsis of lecture in Druggists' Circular, 1874, March, p. 57; and 
Pharm. Jour. and Trans., March2B. 1874, p. 781 ; also Prof Redwood’s lecture 
on the “Past, Present and Future of Pharmacy.” Ibid., April 25,1874, p. 863. 5 
countries has been for some time the subject of deliberations in the 
pharmaceutical journals and in the meetings of pharmaceutical 
societies. To this must be added the pending abrogation of the pro- 
tective grants, an institution antiquated in its origin and nature, 
but which has been one of the most important factors through 
which German pharmacy has reached its high status and its pregnant 
co-operation in the advancement of the physical sciences. The 
nature of these grants has been explained by me in a former paper, 
entitled “ Pharmacy in Prussia and the German Empire.”* Latterly, 
besides many reforms in relation to arts and industry, the grants 
and concessions have been abolished, and since the release of the 
practice of medicine, that of pharmacy appears to be merely a ques- 
tion of time and a financial problem, the solution of which is attended 
with so many difficulties, because upon these grants large amounts 
have been invested, which, with the legal abolition of the former, 
would be lost as far as they exceed the real value of the business. 
This question of national economy, which is now being discussed 
and is under consideration before the government and the legisla- 
ture (Reichstag) in Germany, has been apparently satisfactorily 
solved in Sweden in this manner, that every newly established 
pharmacy has to contribute a certain sum, in accordance with fixed 
principles of valuation, towards the redemption of the capital invested 
in pharmacies, as far as its value is lessened in the same place. It 
is probable that a similar way will be chosen in Germany for the 
inevitable solution of this problem. 
These are, in brief, the principal causes of impediment to the progress 
and prosperity of pharmacy in Germany, and which have tended to 
keep talent and capital from being invested in pharmaceutical pur- 
suits, and to induce many young and promising pharmacists to leave.- 
their chosen avocation for others more remunerative. 
Among the recent publications on this subject, those of three 
pharmaceutical authorities, equally prominent by experience, knowl- 
edge and standing, have attracted a wide attention, namely, those of 
Professor Dr. Phoebus, of G lessen,f of Professor Dr. Hlasiwetz, of 
Vienna, and of Mr. W. Danckwortt, of Magdeburg, formerly Chief 
Director of the North German Apothecaries’ Association. The fol- 
lowing synopsis of the remarks of the two last-named men may 
* American Journal of Pharmacy, 187 L, p. 389. 
t Pharmac. Zeitung, Nos. 17, 35, 47, 67, 85 and 89, 1873. 6 
serve to elucidate more fully their views of these vital questions and 
their bearings upon the future of pharmacy in Germany. 
Prof. Hlasiwetz, formerly an apothecary, now Professor of the 
Imperial Polytechnic School of Vienna, in a recent lecture on 
Modern Pharmacy,”* said in substance ; 
“ Until recently, chemistry had its ablest and most useful represen- 
tatives among the pharmacists, and for a long time this profession 
has pre-eminently supplied the chairs of chemistry of the universities- 
with professors to whom we owe the vast amount of labor and dis- 
coveries which were necessary to bring practical and theoretical 
chemistry to its present scope and position. But this has greatly 
changed by degrees, the consequent rapid progress has called forth a 
chemical industry of the most varied description and extent, which, 
in its rapid strides has substituted the methods of manufacturing on a 
large and commercial scale for those on a small scale in the labora- 
tory of the pharmacist. This change in the scope and drift of phar- 
macy has deprived the pharmacist of one of the principal objects 
and profits of his legitimate business, and since the fact has become 
fully established that he cannot enter into competition with the manu- 
facturer, neither in regard to quality or price, there is nothing left 
to his share than to dispose and retail the products of the former. 
Not only the whole series of medicinal chemicals and alkaloids are 
now supplied by the manufacturer cheaper and, as regards the latter 
substances, better, but also those pharmaceutical preparations which 
belong pre-eminently to the province of the pharmacist; as, for in- 
stance, fluid extracts, tinctures, syrups, ointments, plasters, etc. 
“ Since the inauguration of this sweeping change dates the decline 
of the so-called pharmaceutical chemistry, and all that the pharma- 
cist yet applies is a moderate degree of analytical skill for the estab- 
lishment of the identity and quality of the preparations as supplied 
by the manufacturer. And even this limited sphere of proficiency is 
encroached upon by the manufacturers by offering on the labels of 
their preparations brief instruction for ready tests, and by supplying 
pure and ready-made reagents, so that the tests may be made by any 
skilled and informed person. 
“ Our schools and universities still furnish a sound pharmaceutical 
education and a stock of chemical knowledge ; but the truth is that 
* Pharmac. Zeitung, No. 8, 1874. 7 
these attainments, as a rule, do not bring fruit, for the reason that 
pharmaceutical practice has ceased to afford any longer the former 
compass and opportunity of application, nor a sufficient impetus to 
practically cultivate the acquired proficiency. 
“ Moreover, the advanced state of rational medicine has discontinued 
the use of many remedial agents, and has greatly limited not only 
the list of materia medica, but also the former liberal administration 
of medicines ; the consequence of this restriction is a decrease of the 
legitimate business and income of the pharmaceutist; being formerly 
a remunerative pursuit, it hardly furnishes, any longer, a respectable 
living to a great many highly-educated men, and we see, therefore, 
the pharmacist enter more and more upon mercantile resources for 
subsistence, with the aim to gain, on the other hand, as a dealer, what- 
the professional scope of his business falls short to supply; he en- 
riches his stock with homoeopathic and with patent medicines, and 
enters into competition with the dealer in fancy articles, with the 
perfumer, the confectioner, etc. 
“ The business of the pharmacist depends for the future largely upon 
the drift of the manufacturing business, which, when it should also 
extend its aim and scope to the production of the medicinal sub- 
stances in ready-dosed and elegantly-prepared forms, will deprive 
the pharmacist, more or less, from the last remnant of his proficiency. 
This inroad has already commenced, and bids fair way to an increas- 
ing extent and to success; it tends to relieve the physician from the 
necessity of prescribing so many grains of Dover’s powder, of quinia, 
of calomel, etc., to be rubbed up with sugar and divided into so many 
doses ; he will merely have to direct his patient to buy a number of 
dosed capsules or tablets. He will soon find all the chief formulae of 
his dispensatory provided in elegant forms and envelopes, disguising 
smell and taste, and both the physician and the patient will gladly dis- 
pense with the old, repulsive forms of mixtures,decoctions, powders, etc. 
The great number of vegetable drugs of uncertain value and variable 
quality, will be discarded, and will be replaced by the active princi- 
ples, obtained from them in a pure and stable form, so that the materia 
medica of the rational physician will henceforth be like that of the 
homoeopathist, ready prepared and dosed, and all emanating from the 
manufacturing establishment. 
“When system and method will extend and consummate this mode 
of administration of the remedial agents, nothing will be left of the 8 
pursuit of the pharmacist than a retail dealer of the products of the 
manufacturer of medicinal articles.” 
Mr. W. Danckwortt expresses himself in an article “ On the Future 
of Pharmacies,”* thus: “I believe that after forty years pharmacy 
will have greatly changed its physiognomy ; I do not entertain pes- 
simistic views, and consider it an honor to have served for forty years 
in a profession which I esteem highly, but when I compare its pre- 
sent condition and prospects with those of forty years ago, I cannot 
but admit that pharmacy is on the decline, and will henceforth de- 
generate far more rapidly. But thirty years ago chemistry and 
botany were pre-eminently the sciences of the pharmacist; Berzelius, 
H. Bose, Liebig, Fresenius, Berg, Henkel, Mohr, and many others 
of equal fame, emanated from pharmacy. Now-a-days, chemistry 
has grown in extent and volume so vastly, and its practical applica- 
tion embraces such a wide compass, as completely to leave behind 
the pharmacist’s sphere. Yet the pharmacist has maintained a com- 
paratively high status of chemical knowledge and learning, and a 
comparatively wide compass of attainment is still required from him. 
But the fact is that these accomplishments have to be attained mainly 
to enable him to pass the examination which the State makes yet 
obligatory ; after this, he has not any more the old arena to practi- 
cally apply and profitably enlist his attainments, nor the former im- 
petus, so that, in many cases, the knowledge acquired at the univer- 
sities is gradually lost for want of application and encouragement. 
Formerly, the pharmaceutist used to be the legitimate expert in all 
forensic investigations; now the extent of knowledge and experience 
required are such as to exclude him in preference of the professional 
chemist. The pharmaceutical laboratory of yore has become a myth, 
and we must admit that most of the medicinal chemicals and pharma- 
ceutical preparations can be obtained cheaper and better when manu- 
factured on a large scale ; many of them are now furnished by the 
manufacturer already dosed and labelled for ready dispensation and 
retail sale. And when we compare the prescriptions of our days with 
those of forty years ago, what a change, what a remarkable simplifi- 
cation 1 The whole array of the old-fashioned decoctions, infusions 
and mixtures have been discarded; morphia, codeia, quinia, digi- 
talin, chloral-hydrate, atropia, and a number of other principles are 
the consummation of materia medica, and even the prescriptions for 
* Pharmaceut. Zeit., No. 20, 1874. 9 
these disappear more and more from the pharmacies, inasmuch as the 
physician carries their minimal solutions in his pocket for ready ad- 
ministration by subcutaneous injection, or orders them in tablets or 
sugar granules as supplied by the manufacturer or confectioner in 
lieu of the pharmacist. 
“Moreover, the rapid progress of general culture, of the knowl- 
edge of the rational principles of life and health and the conditions 
of their maintenance, of the sanitary sciences and of hygiene and 
medicine, exercise a considerable influence upon the decrease of the 
use of medicines, for it cannot be denied that knowledge and culture 
counteract the principles and conditions upon which, to a great ex- 
tent, the prosperity of pharmacy rests. 
“When we have witnessed such changes within the comparatively 
brief space of forty years, who has the assurance to predict what, or 
if anything, will be left of pharmacy after another equally progressive 
lapse of forty years ?” 
It is not the aim of this essay to parallel the conditions and pros- 
pects of American pharmacy with those just described, nor to deter- 
mine whether and how soon the same questions may come up here, or 
whether the present state of American pharmacy really justifies the 
exalted views of the future, as occasionally expressed in valedictories 
and similar addresses. In its trade relation it has practically the 
advantage over German pharmacy, inasmuch as it still stands upon 
the basis of a commercial trade, and cannot therefore be injured 
in a similar manner by being displaced from a .professional basis, 
secured by a noble career of usefulness and achievements through 
more than two centuries. 
As a natural consequence of the growth and extent of sciences, 
and the increase and diffusion of learning and a correcter knowledge of 
nature, which is the tendency of modern times, we must view the fact 
that an enhanced general, as well as special, education is becoming 
more necessary in all pursuits and gives the impulse to innovations 
and reforms, particularly in those pursuits which are based upon the 
knowledge of the laws of nature, and upon the application of the 
principles of physical and sanitary sciences, and that this agitation 
is felt in medicine and pharmacy, precisely as in other circles. 
After the first abortive legislative attempt in several States of our 
Union in demanding directly, and without previous preparation, a 
higher qualification, the education of pharmacists, and in consequence 10 
thereof a superior status of pharmacy, have made successful progress, 
and increased facilities for attaining this aim have been inaugurated 
by the establishment of, and increased attendance at, the various 
pharmaceutical schools.* In this advance movement, pharmacy 
stands, however, by no means alone ; generalization and unity of 
sciences on the one hand, and education, scientific knowledge and 
higher intellectual culture on the other, are, as already stated, the 
demands of our time, and this tendency pervades in our country, also 
all classes of its population and all pursuits, and is practically exem- 
plified in the increase and prosperity of all higher educational insti- 
tutions,—the medical, polytechnic, commercial and other colleges,— 
and in the entire literature of the present day. 
Pharmacy in this country will therefore, probably meet with fewer 
difficulties on its high road to improvement, and the less so, as it is in 
the happy position of profiting by the pharmaceutical experience and 
acquisitions of older countries, and particularly of Germany, without 
having to undergo the struggles and errors of its gradual develop- 
ment extending over two centuries. The problems which it will 
inevitably have to encounter with the progress of time and civilization, 
I have briefly referred to above, and they are more fully stated in 
Mr. Danckwortt’s and Prof. Hlasiwetz’s papers; aside from other 
more technical and less important arguments, they have been felt 
here likewise for some time, and have been repeatedly and timely ex- 
but appear not to have received due consideration. 
The lively interest taken by the American people in progress and 
*lf do other, at least one result of high value must be acknowledged to be 
due to the continued agitation for, and the enactment of, laws regulating the 
practice of pharmacy, namely, the increased attendance of the pharmaceutical 
pupils at the courses of the colleges of pharmacy. Although this attendance 
is not yet dependent upon a preliminary examination and qualification, and 
though the want of sufficient primary education and knowledge is a priori pre- 
judicial to the full value of a course of theoretical study compressed into so 
short a time, capable and assiduous young men will find at least the path 
pointed out, and receive the incitement for the further acquisition of knowledge, 
while American pharmacy will, for the next generation, be supplied with new 
productive heads and hands for its scientific continuance 
t Dan. C. Robbins, Annual Address, Proceedings Alumni Association, N. 
Y. Coll. Phartn., 1872, p. 34 and ibid., 1873, p. 30. 
Chas. C, Fredigke, in Chicago Pharmacist, 1874, p. 36, and Am. Journ. 
Pharm., 1874, pp. 209 and 265. 
Dr. Streit, in Chicago Pharmacist, 1874, p. 72. 11 
the questions of the times, its acceptation for new ideas and their prac- 
tical application leave no doubt that the modern popularized teachings 
of hygiene and of the sanitary and medical sciences, which are promul- 
gated by the advanced schools of medicine and by popular literature,* 
as well as of medical skepticism will here find a fruitful soil, just as 
homoeopathy has found its adherents not merely among the ignorant, 
but rather among the wealthier and educated classes of society. The 
consequences of such a popularization of a corrector knowledge of 
hygiene and of rational methods of and restor- 
ing health without the former resort to umvise and excessive medica- 
tion, must be the same here as in Europe, as far as the material 
emoluments of the pharmaceutical pursuit are concerned, and inasmuch 
as they will in time greatly diminish the income of the pharmacist, 
they will also be in direct antagonism with the demands of modern 
times for higher education, which requires increased expenditure of 
time, labor and money. All legislative restrictions and regulations 
will prove one-sided and without real and permanent value, as long 
as they aim to raise the claims for a higher qualification and standard 
only, without affording, on the other hand, some guarantee for a sure 
and remunerative application of the higher proficiency, and for the 
conditions necessary for the material prosperity of the practice of 
pharmacy. Compared to the physician and the tradesman, the phar- 
macist occupies an exceptional position ; the former applies his indi- 
vidual knowledge and skill without investment of capital or risk, and 
without any-restriction ; the merchant chooses his wares according to 
demand and want, and can control his investments quantitatively and 
qualitatively; he employs laborers or clerks with less knowledge and 
without responsibility; his wares usually retain their value, and are 
less prone to deterioration. In this material age and concrete and 
practical country of ours, there cannot be expected for any length of 
time, an acquisition of talent and skill, or a permanent and steady 
elevation of a calling whose resources appear to be everywhere on the 
*The Sanitarian, the Herald of Health, and the Journal of Health, are 
monthlies published in New York. See, also, the annual Proceedings of the 
American Public Health Association ; also, Youman’s P'opular Science 
Monthly, No. 10, p. 422 ; No. 12, p. 665 ; No. 22, p. 421, and numerous similar 
publications. 12 
decline,* and which involves an amount of time, icsig rtion and re- 
sponsibility as no other pursuit requiring a similar amount of learn- 
ing, and which, for superior attainments and proficiency, does not offer 
an adequate equivalent in the shape of pecuniary compensation. 
These are some of the problems which American pharmacy will 
likewise have to encounter sooner or later, and in the discussions of 
which the recourse to the wholes truth will unquestionably prove the 
best remedy for the evils of imperfectly stated truth. They certainly 
deserve earnest consideration and invite our congenial interest in the 
pending strives of pharmacy in Germany for its existence and con- 
tinuance. Whatever may be the future fate of pharmacy, that of Conti- 
nental Europe has the high merit of having fulfilled its mission of 
culture, and particularly in developing and applying the natural 
sciences, and mainly chemistry, and that its achievements are not 
perishable, but on the contrary will forever be useful in the further 
evolution of the healing art and of applied chemistry in general. 
*The practice of our profession is becoming more arduous,—its scientific re- 
lations more complicated as civilization and science advance, while its legitimate 
rewards diminish, because the scope of the business contracts, while compe- 
tition 'increases and it is evident that, unless we can arrest or overcome these, 
we cannot long retain in our ranks a superior or desirable personnel. The 
character of any pursuit depends upon the men who fill it, and we cannot have 
men of culture and attainments unless they are adequately rewarded. (I). 0. 
Robbins, annual address, N. Y. Alumni Assoc., 1872-73.)