Note 111 — HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION. (continued 2)

The first Pharmacopœia was published at Nuremburg, under the sanction of its Senate, in the year 1542; for this important act we are indebted to Valerius Cordus, a young student, who during a transient visit at that place, accidentally produced a collection of medical receipts which he had selected from the works of the most esteemed writers, and with which the physicians of Nuremburg were so highly pleased that they urged him to print it for the benefit of the apothecaries, and obtained the sanction of the Senate to the undertaking; so casual was the circumstance to which we owe the institution of Pharmacopœias. The London College were among the last to frame a standard Code of Medicines; most cities in Europe having anticipated us in the performance of this task; our first Pharmacopœia was not published until the reign of James the first, A. D. 1618, exactly a century after the College had received their Charter from Henry. Successive editions appeared in the following years, viz. in 1650; 1677; 1721; 1746; 1787; 1809.