Volume 1

Public health: a popular introduction to sanitary science : being a history of the prevalent and fatal diseases of the English population from the earliest times to the close of the war of the French revolution in 1815 / by William A. Guy.

  • Guy, William A. (William Augustus), 1810-1885.
Date:
1874
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Public health: a popular introduction to sanitary science : being a history of the prevalent and fatal diseases of the English population from the earliest times to the close of the war of the French revolution in 1815 / by William A. Guy. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    Sources of o?ir Knowledge. It is of public hygiene that I am to speak in this course of lectures; and it is a very large and comprehensive science. It has to do with persons of every rank, of both sexes, of every age. It takes cognizance of the places and houses in which they live; of their occupations and modes of life ; of the food they eat, the water they drink, the air they breathe; it follows the child to school, the labourer and artisan into the field, the mine, the factory, the workshop ; the sick man into the hospital; the pauper into the workhouse; the lunatic to the asylum; the thief to the prison. It is with the sailor in his ship, the soldier in his barrack ; and it accompanies the emigrant to his new home beyond the seas. To all of these it makes application of a knowledge remarkable for its amount, and the great variety of sources whence it is derived. To physiology and medicine it is indebted for what it knows of health and disease; it levies large contributions on chemistry, geology, and meteorology ; it co-operates with the architect and engineer; its work commends itself to the moralist and divine. The Council of this College have always acknowledged this its moral and religious aspect; and from the first establishment of the Theological Department, have ar- ranged that its pupils should not leave this place ignorant of the fact that the destitution which attracts disease repels religion. Among our sources of knowledge there are two to which I must make special reference. I mean the past history of disease, and its current history as displayed in the periodical returns of the Registrar-General. Of its liistojy in times past, I may observe that it is in many points ot view extremely important. It teaches us that several fatal epidemics, some imported, some bred at home, have ceased to afflict us because we have relinquished the habits of life that welcomed or produced them ; that some en-