Fighting foes too small to see / [Joseph McFarland].

  • McFarland, Joseph, 1868-1945
Date:
1924
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Fighting foes too small to see / [Joseph McFarland]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    103/318 (page 97)
    Restrictions upon Lepers. Jews cannot be determined, but in their law, as it came to be interpreted later, lepers were greatly feared, and very strictly segregated from the people in general. Especially was this true in New Testa- ment times, if the accounts given by Lew Wallace in lien Hur” are trustworthy. Gustav Flaubert in his historical romance “Salambo” represents the Carthagenian patrician and general, Hanno, as suf- fering from leprosy at an advanced stage, and hide- ously disfigured, yet living in his own home, asso- ciating with his fellow townsmen, conducting politi- cal negotiations, and even leading armies to battle. In passing, it is interesting to note that lepers are variously dealt with at the present time. In some places they are most carefully segregated, in others they are permitted to mingle with other people. The explanation is to he found in the fact that though the cause of the disease is well known, no one understands how it is transmitted. For centuries after it was fully recognized that certain diseases were communicable and that we “got them from one another,” the measures taken for pre- venting them were very ineffective because not enough was known about their causes and trans- mission to enable scientific measures to he insti- tuted. The same general rules were supposed to apply to all cases; some times they succeeded, some-