What therefore the opponents of vaccination demand is, that the respect thus accorded to the religious conscience be extended to the scientific conscience—to those who are convinced that vaccination does not prevent smallpox or is an injurious practice. Even allowing it to be a harmless ceremony, resistance would be justifiable. It would be in vain to console a Baptist, forced to convey his child to the parish font, with the assurance that a few drops of water could do no harm. It is not in human nature to submit to the indignity of imposture; and to thousands of Englishmen vaccination is a cruel and degrading imposture, and to punish them for their loyalty to what they think right is every whit as tyrannical as it was for Catholics to persecute Protestants, and Protestants Catholics, and Catholics and Protestants Jews. There is no difference in the terms of intolerance; and there is no difference in the spirit with which this latter-day tyranny is confronted, and that spirit with which religious liberty was vindicated and won.
CONDITIONS OF THE CONFLICT.
To some eyes the conflict is not only arduous; it is hopeless; but we are of a different mind. The conflict may prove even less arduous than it appears; and for these reasons. The law as it stands is perfunctorily defended. No politician answers for it without reluctance. Many allow that a serious mistake was made when legislation was enacted for medical advantage at medical dictation. The Gladstone government proposed to abolish repeated penalties. The central authorities at the Local Government Board make no secret of the insuperable difficulties which attend the administration of the law. They advise concession to its resolute adversaries. They do not reinstate the law where it has broken down. Legislation thus discredited is sure to collapse under broader pressure. The medical support is still weaker; and is chiefly confined to those who represent the trade element of the profession—men who would defend any abuse however flagrant if established and lucrative. It is the custom to laud the immortal Jenner and the salvation he wrought, but these are words of an old song. Those who have penetrated to the inception of the Jennerian rite; who know the absolute promise by which it prevailed and its absolute failure; who have followed its successive transformations and varieties with their respective injuries and fatalities; who are aware of the Babel of confusion and contradiction in which its venal practitioners are involved—these we say recognise how impossible it is for vaccination to be brought under discussion and survive. It is this consciousness which accounts for the reserve of the more prudent order of medical men. They excuse their acquiescence in the delusion (after the manner of ecclesiastics) by the exigencies of professional loyalty; and by the supposition that the harm of the practice is exaggerated, whilst it serves for the consolation of the vulgar. It is for such reasons that we consider the conflict less arduous than it appears. The fortifications are undermined; the bulwarks are rotten through and through. Over all, we place our confidence in the omnipotent favour of the truth. Goliath, mighty and vaunting, is evermore laid low by a smooth stone shapen in the waters of verity.
A WORD FOR THE AUTHOR.
The Story of this Great Delusion, I have tried to tell concisely, keeping close to matter-of-fact, and with some exceptions adhering to English experience. When we venture abroad, we are apt to fall into inaccuracies and draw unwarrantable conclusions. I am told my animus is too pronounced, and that I should have done better had I adopted a more judicial tone. Ah well! we should always have done differently had we done differently. It seems to me a man does best when he is most truly himself; and I question whether I should have improved my case had I tried to conceal my real mind in order to make a more startling show of it at the close.
L’ENVOI.
Lastly, a word to those who are accustomed to dismiss opponents of vaccination as fools and fanatics. It is related of Sydney Smith that calling on Lord Melbourne one morning, he found his lordship in an evil temper and cursing at large. Smith, urgent about his own affairs, at last observed that they should take everything for damned and proceed to business. For like reason I would suggest that the familiar tirade of fool and fanatic be taken as spoken, and that we proceed to discuss vaccination and compulsory vaccination on their merits.