AMERICAN DERMATOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION. 419
however, like the majority of its predecessors, was defective in that it followed no single system of arrangement, etiology and pathology, for example, both receiving consideration. A classification to be acceptable must be consistent, the subject-matter being disposed of according to one system. Let this be clinical, etiological, ana- tomical, or pathological, according to the views of the author, but not a mixture of all, nor even of three or two, for by such arrange- ment the object is completely defeated.
In Bulkley's scheme Class II. was designated "glandular affec- tions," and included both structural and functional disorders. Under diseases of the sebaceous glands acne was adopted as a generic term, under which further were placed acne sebacea, embracing the several varieties of disease generally known as seborrhoea ; while as varieties of acne punctata were grouped the diseases commonly designated comedo and milium, termed by the author acne punctata nigra and albida. As varieties of acne we also have acne molluscum (the molluscum sebaceum of the majority of writers), acne simplex, acne indurata, and acne rosacea. While it will of course be granted that these diseases are all allied, and would unquestionably be brought together in a natural classification, it is manifest that they are mis- placed in a scheme based on pathology. Thus, for example, if a scheme contain a class of inflammations, as exists in that under con- sideration, acne, as the term is understood by most writers, is en- titled to a place there.
Class III. the author terms neuroses, or neurotic affections, to which is evidently extended a broader definition than that ordinarily given. Here, for example, we find herpes zoster. Now, if this disease be admitted to this class, unquestionably numerous other diseases having nothing in common but a nervous origin, as for in- stance, urticaria, alopecia areata, and other atrophic affections, may with equal propriety be arranged here. In brief, if the class of neuroses be extended so as to include other diseases than those of functional disorders of the nervous system, we are surely opening the way to theory and speculation. It may be remarked in passing that the author is in error, we think, when he states that it is the first time that the disease has been so grouped. Damon, in 1868, in his work on neuroses of the skin, entertained the same views con- cerning the nature of this disease.
In commenting on this subject it will scarcely be expected that I should speak of the work so recently done in this direction by the Association. With the co-operation of the members, together with mature deliberation on the part of the Committee, there is no reason why in time the Association may not offer a classification worthy of adoption wherever dermatology is taught. In connection with this train of thought, I may be permitted to say a few words on nomen- clature, a topic of vital importance to the progress of our science, and one upon which I would gladly see more attention bestowed by both writers and teachers. It is a subject which concerns derma- tology at large. The great confusion which for the past fifty years
