An exposition of the dangers of interment in cities; illustrated by an account of the funeral rites and customs of the Hebrews, Greeks, Romans, and primitive Christians; by ancient and modern ecclesiastical canons, civil statutes, and municipal regulations; and by chemical and physical principles. Chiefly from the works of Vicq d'Azyr ... and Prof. Scipione Piattoli ... / with additons by Felix Pascalis.

  • Félix Pascalis Ouvière
Date:
1823
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An exposition of the dangers of interment in cities; illustrated by an account of the funeral rites and customs of the Hebrews, Greeks, Romans, and primitive Christians; by ancient and modern ecclesiastical canons, civil statutes, and municipal regulations; and by chemical and physical principles. Chiefly from the works of Vicq d'Azyr ... and Prof. Scipione Piattoli ... / with additons by Felix Pascalis. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    PREFACE. When I published last year some strong admonitory re¬ marks on the insalubrious influence of our numerous places of interment, I did not presume to indulge the most distant expectation that I should see, before the return of another season, a legal prohibition of interment in the city, and that many other writers would engage their services in the cause of this salutary reform. Although I have not the honour of being the first (A) that deprecated a practice introduced by slow degrees, in the dark ages, through the superstition of the majority, against the better sense, the purer piety, and the repeated efforts of the more enlightened few, and which is now established among every class of society,—yet I was, at the time, rebuked very severely for supporting this doc¬ trine, which was defined to be as novel as it was false. \ The task of acquainting my fellow-citizens with the dan¬ gerous consequences of city interment, and of illustrating the subject by references to historical facts, civil and reli¬ gious statutes, and to results drawn from the principles of natural philosophy, a task which 1 thought 1 might accom¬ plish, with the assistance of the writings of Vicq cPAzyr and Scipio Piattoli, has proved a much more difficult one than I imagined it would be, from my previous acquaint- * •atige with those works. Much-of the controversial matter
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