CLEANLINESS.

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would often prevent colds and fevers. Were people careful tobathe their feet and legs in lukewarm water at night, after beins;'exposed to cold or wet through the day, they would seldom expe-rience the ill effects which often proceed from these causes.

A proper attention to cleanliness is no where more necessary than onshipboard. If epidemical distempers break out there, no one canbe safe. The best way to prevent them is to take care that thewhole company be cleanly in their clothes, bedding, &c. Wheninfectious diseases do break out, cleanliness is the most likelymeans to prevent their spreading : it is likewise necessary to pre-vent their returning afterwards, or being conveyed to other places.For this purpose the clothes, bedding, &c. of the sick ought to becarefully washed, and fumigated with brimstone. Infection willlodge a long time in dirty clothes, and afterwards break out in themost terrible manner.

In places where great numbers of sick people are collected to-gether, as jails, hospitals, &c. cleanliness ought to be most reli-giously observed. The very smell in such places is often sufficientto make one sick. It is easy to imagine what effect that is likely tohave upon the diseased. In an hospital or infirmary where clean-liness is neglected, a person in perfect health has a greater chanceto become sick than a sick person has to get well.

Few things are more unaccountable than that neglect, or ratherdread of cleanliness, which appears among those who hare thecare of the sick : they think it almost criminal to suffer any thingthat is clean to come near a person in a fever, for example, andwould rather allow him to wallow in all manner of filth than changethe least bit of his linen. If cleanliness be necessary for personsin health, it is certainly more so for the sick. Many diseases maybe cured by cleanliness alone ; most of them might be mitigatedby it ; and where it is neglected, the slightest disorders are oftenchanged into the most malignant. The same mistaken care whichprompted people to prevent the least admission of fresh air to thesick, seems to have induced them to keep them dirty. Boththese destructive prejudices will, we hope, be soon entirely eradi-cated.

Cleanliness is certainly agreeable to our nature. We cannot helpapproving it in others, even though we should not practise it our-selves. It sooner attracts our regard than even finery itself, andoften gains esteem where that fails. It is an ornament to the high-est as well as the lowest station, and cannot be dispensed with ineither. Few virtues are of more importance to society than gene-ral cleanliness. . It ought to be carefully cultivated every where ;but in populous cities it should be almost revered.*

* As it is impossible to be thoroughly clean without a sufficient quantity of water, wewould earnestly recommend it to the magistrates of great towns to be particularly attentive to this article. Most great towns in Britain are so situated as to be easily sup-plied with water ; and those persons who will not make a proper use of it after it isbrought to their hand, certainly deserve to be severely punished. The streets of greattowns, where water can be had, ought to be washed every day. This is the only ef-fectual method of keeping them thoroughly clean ; and, upon trial, we are persuadedit will be found the cheapest. *

Some of the most dreadful diseases incident to human nature might, in my opinion,be entirely eradicated by cleanliness.

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