A sermon, preached in the Cathedral, Manchester, on Sunday morning, April 30th, 1854 / by the Rev. Charles Richson ... with notes by John Sutherland of the General Board of Health, London.

  • Richson, Charles.
Date:
1854
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: A sermon, preached in the Cathedral, Manchester, on Sunday morning, April 30th, 1854 / by the Rev. Charles Richson ... with notes by John Sutherland of the General Board of Health, London. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    *‘the Book of Books;” for that which elevates the human spirit to the secret things of God, and disciplines the moral nature to a likeness to the Divine image, and addresses itself While cholera ravaged the whole of the neighbourhoods in which the model dwellings are situated, it never passed their threshold. It appeared to have no mission within. There is the same immunity from typhus fever. In the words of Dr. South wood Smith: 44 By enforcing scrupulous cleanliness we have for some time past banished this disease (typhus) from our union workhouses and from prisons; and now, by giving to the houses of the indus¬ trious classes efficient drainage, the ready means of removing solid refuse, a good supply of water, and water-closets instead of cesspools, we have placed a barrier around these dwellings -which this mortal pest of our towns and cities has not been able to pass.”*' In a certain part of Lambeth, called Lambetli-square, the houses of which were so built that the excreta were retained under and around them, in imperfectly constructed drains, the deaths were 55 in 1,000 in a single year, chiefly from fevers. As soon as impervious self-cleansing drains were laid down, and the excreta removed immediately to a distance, the mortality fell to the rate of 13 in 1,000 per annum. So true is it that godliness hath 44 the promise of the life that now is,” while that ungodliness which consists in the practical denial of the Creator’s physical laws is as certainly followed by 44 the pestilence that walketh in darkness,” and 44 the destruction that wasteth at noon-day.” Pestilence and premature death are in themselves mercies when compared with the inevitable moral degradation and physical debasement of a people which expects to reap the advantages of civilisation without conforming to the eternal laws of the universe; for unless the predisposed generation were swept away, it would give place to others in succession, more predisposed and debased, until the human race itself became ripe for extirpation. Results of Sanitary Improvement.