IT is manifestly much more adviseable to keep off the Invasion of a Pestilence, than to stand its violent and fatal Shocks; and Self-Preservation, as well as the Example of all other wise People, admonishes us to use all possible Endeavours to keep it from us, and guard our selves against it while at a Distance. This Part therefore concerning our Preservation from a Pestilence, regards both the Duty of the Magistrate, and the Care of every Individual; that is to say, it is the Magistrate’s Duty, that when the Nature and peculiar Qualities of this Disease are known, and reported by Physicians, such Laws should be provided, as might best conduce to prevent its Spreading, if not to its utter Extirpation.
FIRST of all therefore, they ought to be deemed as a kind of Traitors, who frighten the credulous Populace with the Apprehensions of an approaching Plague, by idle and groundless Reports and Predictions; for the Propagation of the late Sickness was too notoriously assisted by this Means, to want any Arguments to prove it.
THE timely Separation also of the infected from the well, is absolutely necessary to be done; because the most sure Way of spreading it, is letting the sick and well converse together. Publick Funerals ought to be forbid, as also all kinds of Meetings, and frequent Intercourses of several Persons together: An Injunction also of Quarentine from infected Places, according to the Custom of Trading Nations, is by any Means not to be omitted, and carefully to be executed.
ALTHOUGH it is looked upon as almost impossible by the most artful Contrivances, and the most prudent Councils, to avoid the Influence of a common Cause; yet the Call of Nature, and the Laws of Self-preservation, demand our utmost Diligence
and Labour, both in publick and private, to prevent the Encroachment of such a subtile and cruel Destroyer. And it was certainly to this purpose a wise Contrivance of the Magistrates, to constitute two in every Parish daily to visit every Family, and be satisfied whether every one belonging thereunto was well, and free from any Infection.
BUT both the Ancients and Moderns have taken the utmost Pains in contriving to purge the Air, on a Supposition that, in a pestilential Contagion, that is substantially infected: But as the Air, as before demonstrated, is only the Lodgment or Vehicle to the pestilential Miasmata, which are every Way agitated in it, it does not seem so much to want Depuration on its own Account, as that poisonous Mixture which is joined with it. Indeed the pestilential Particles residing in the Porosities of the Air, may often, without any Change of Figure, for Want of due Agitation, remain and stagnate in it a long Time, so as to be drawn in by the Lungs in Inspiration, and hence from the intimate Mixture and Confusion as it were of both, a Suspicion may be entertained of the Taint coming from a
Corruption of Air; but of this we have said enough already; and as howsoever this Matter is, a Purgation of the Air is by common Consent called for on all Sides in these Cases, we shall consider this Matter, chiefly in these two Respects.
FIRST, That the pestilential Seminium be dislodged; and to this Purpose contribute brisk Winds, especially from the North, and the frequent Explosions of great Guns, in the Morning and Evening chiefly; because such Concussions agitate the poisonous Miasmata, and not only help to dissipate them; but to change and alter them in those particular Configurations whereby they become so noxious; and it hath been attested by Experience, that an intimate Combination of Nitre and Sulphur greatly alters the saline Qualities of the pestilential Taint.
SECONDLY, The utmost Diligence is to be used to prevent the pestilential Particles from taking Effect; which is succesfully done by proper Fumigations. Hippocrates, the Oracle in Physick, hath left it to Posterity, to kindle Fires in the publick Streets; and these sometimes I conceive
may do good; but not as some will have it, by absorbing the pestiferous Humidities, but by diffusing on all Sides a great deal of Nitre, which gives a considerable Change to the venomous Miasmata; I judge it best therefore that such Fires should be made of resinous Woods, which throw out a clear and unctious Smell, such as Juniper, Fir, Oak, Ash, Elm, Chesnut, &c. but by no Means Coals, which exhale an impure, fetid, and suffocating Sulphur.