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Show 19~ PURPOSE AND GENERAL CONDITION' cendency; the causes of the evils are_ seen and avoided, and disease shrinks into a c01nparahvely narrow con~pass. The experience of oul' ?wn country places th1~ 111 a striking light. In the. Mtddle. Ages, when .. larg~ towns had no police regulations, society ~as every no" and then scourged by pestilence. The thu:d of the people of Europe are said to h~ve been earned off _by one epidemic. Eve~ i~ London.~ the annu~l m.ortahty h~s greatly sunk vnthin a century. ~he Impiovement. In human life, which has taken place stn?e th~ construction of the Northampton tables by Dr. Pnce, Is ~qually re~ markable. lVIodern tables shll ~h?~ a prodigl?Us rr.o~· tality among the young in all civthzed co,~ntnes-evidently a result of some prevalent error. In ~he usu~l modes of rearing them. But t.o remedy this eVIl there Is the sagacity of the ln~man mtnd, and the sense to adopt any reformed plans whiCh may be shown ·to be ~ec~ssaFY· By a change in the management of an orpha? Inshtutwn Jn London, during t~e last fifty years, an Immense reduction in the mortality took place. '\Ve may of course hoJ?e to see measures dev_ised an? adopted for producing a similar improvement of Infant l1fe throughout the world at larae. In this part of our subject, the most difficult point cer-tainly lies in those occurren~es of disease \vhere t~e afflicted individual has been In no degree concerned tn bringing the vis~tation. upon h~n:sel~. Daily experience shows us infectious d1sease ansing Jn a place where the natural law in respect of cleanliness are neglectPd, and then spreadinO' into re()'ions where there is no blame of this kind. We then s~e the innocent suffering equally with those who may be called the guilty. Nay, .the benevolent physician ·who comes to succor the ~rrns~rab~e beincrs whose error may have caused the mischief ~s som~times seen to fall a victim to it, while many of hts patients recover. We are also on ~y too familiar ~ith the transmission of disea es from ernng parents to 1n!loccnt children who accordingly, suffer, and perhaps die pre· maturely, as it were, for the sins of ~thers. After .all, however painful such cases may be In contemplatwn, they cannot be regard ~din any other light t~an as exc~p· tions from arrangements, the general workmg of wluch is beneficial . . With 1·egard to the innocence of the sntfenng parties, OF THE ANIMATED CREATION. 193 there is one in1portant consideration which is pressed ~pon us from many quarters, namely, that moral condit~ ons have ~ot the least concern in the workin~ of these s~mply physrcal laws. These laws proceed with an en .. hre Independe~ce of all such conditions, and desirably so, for olherwise there could be no certain dependence placed upo~ the~. Thus it may happen that two persons ascendln$ ~ pwce of scaffolding, the one a virtuous, t~e other a VICious man, the former, being the less cautwus. of .the two,. ventures upon an insecure place, falls, l and 1.s lnlle.d,, whtle the .other, ~hoosing a better footing, remains umnJured. It Is not In what we can conceive of the ;nature of thing~, that there should be a special e~emphon from the ordinary laws of matter to save this Yll'tuo?-9 man. So it .might be that, of two physicians, attend1ng fever case~ .In a mean part of a la1·ge city, the o~e, an excellent citizen, may stand in such a position yVIth ~espect to. the beds of the patjents as to catch the Infectwn, of winch he dies in a few days, while the other, a bad husband and father? and who, unlike the other, only attends such cases with selfish ends, takes care to be as much as possible out of the stream of infection and .accordingly escapes. In both of these cases man's ;ense ?f g?od a~d evil-his faculty of conscientiousness-would Jnchne him to destine the vicious man to destruction and save the virtuous. But the Great Ruler of Nature does not act on. such prin~iplP.s. fie has established laws for the ?perahon of Inanimate matter, which ar·e quite unswerv-· tng, so .that wh~n vve know them we have only to act in a certa1n way With respect to them in order to obtain all the benefits and avoid all the evils connected with them He. has likewise established moral laws in our nature: which afre etgually unswerving (allowing for their wider range. o ac wn,) .and fi·om obedience to which unfailing good IS to be derived. But the two sets of laws are in~ ependent of each other. Obedience to each gives only Its own proper ad~a~tage, no~ the advantage proper to the. other. He~lCe 1t Is that vutue forms no protection ~ga~nst the evJis conneeted with the physical laws· wlule, on the other hand, a man skilled in and attentiv~ to th~se! bu.t unrighteous and disregardful of his neigh-bor, .Is In . like manner not protected by his attention to physical Circumstances from the proper consequences of neglect or breach of the moral laws. - ·- |
