Essay on the origin, symptoms, and treatment, of cholera morbus, and of other epidemic diseases : with a view to the improvement of sanitary regulations / [T. Forster].

  • Thomas Ignatius Maria Forster
Date:
1831
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Essay on the origin, symptoms, and treatment, of cholera morbus, and of other epidemic diseases : with a view to the improvement of sanitary regulations / [T. Forster]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    if PREFACE. With regard to particular places, already attacked, I shall be at all times ready to communicate to individuals such news as may come to my knowledge; but it would be unfair, in a publication likely to be extensively spread abroad, to establish local prejudices against any towns or counties, by naming them as infected, nor shall I detail particular cases. ‘To do so would be to create those very fears which predispose to the disorder, and would thereby defeat one of the objects contem- plated in this imperfect attempt to break the spell of terror, and to rescue the commerce and social intercourse of this and other countries, from the danger which Boards of Health and illjudged sanitary restric- tions have hitherto involved them in. I am aware that there is some conflicting evidence on the ques- tion of contagion; but be it remembered that within the last century, judicial proceedings, founded on evidence were taken against Witch- craft and Incantation; this humiliating consideration will induce us to sift the mass of testimony adduced, and to rely for truth on the united counsels of men of genius, talent, and observation alone. All the evidence for contagion vanishes before the proofs of the contrary doc- trine: in this position of affairs then, let us hope that men will show their wisdom, by a prudent application of all those measures which seem calculated to prepare the human body for the evil, instead of wasting time and ingenuity in a fruitless attempt to avert that which is irrisistible. P.S. Having just examined the very latest accounts which have come to hand, both manuscript and printed, I am induced to repeat what I before said, that alarms have been injudiciously created, which the actual state of the disorder and the chances of danger do not warrant. New cases certainly occur in various parts of Europe, and in the British islands; but these are comparatively few in comparison with the terrors raised about them, and have chiefly occurred to persons who might well be considered predisposed to disorder. After carefully perusing the official and other accounts just this moment arrived from abroad, it is but just to observe, that some of the English reporters have expressed opinions favourable to the doctrine of contagion; but the very circumstances, on which they have grounded such an opinion, have been such as to confirm, to my mind at least, the very opposite doctrine; moreover they have been generally of a conflicting nature; nay, even in the long string of detached sentences which constitute our official reports, one paragraph frequently appears contradictory to another: while in the accounts of the foreign writers, clearness of views and consistency of description are equally remarkable. J shall conclude by observing that up to this moment every account that I have perused, has tended to confirm the opinions advanced in the ensuing pages. Boreham, Nov. 15, 1831.