Charles Maclean

“ What possible object, then, can quarantine have in England, with respect to the commerce of the Levant, whether the plague of that country be, or be not, contagious? Positively none. If it be not contagious, it cannot of course be either exported or imported; and, if it be contagious, its non-importation during an intercourse of three centuries, ships, goods, and persons almost constantly arriving from pestilential places, is a proof that it is incapable of being imported into England. ”

“ Thus, then, it is evident, in direct contradiction to the terms of their report, not only that the nature and application of the quarantine regulations did "fall within the scope of inquiry," to which the Committee must have been directed; but that they constituted precisely what ought to have been its principal object. Considered in a view to legislation, it is self-evident that the proof of the existence or non-existence of contagion, in the plague, can be no otherwise of consequence than as it regards sanitary regulations. ”

“ By what process of reasoning persons appointed to inquire into the validity of the doctrine of contagion in the plague, could have arrived at the conclusions, that it is immaterial, or that it is not their business to ascertain whether the effects of quarantine regulations, as the immediate consequence of that doctrine, be to increase or to diminish the sum total of sickness, misery, and mortality, incidental to epidemic diseases; whether the immense sums annually employed for the maintenance of sanitary establishments, at home and in our colonies, be a necessary or a superfluous expenditure ”

“ In matters of science, according to the maxim, that "de quid non apparentibus, et de quid non existenbus eadem est ratio," absence of all proof of existence ought, in fairness, to be deemed sufficient proof of non-existence. But, as if pestilential contagion, instead of a matter of fact, were only a matter of faith, it has been represented as safer to believe than not to believe in its existence, without any reference to its truth or falsehood. ”

“ This power of suspending trade for the space of one year, virtually amounted to an almost unlimited power over the affairs of commerce; since, as pestilence always exists in some of those parts of the world, with which we have commerce or intercourse, there would never want colorable pretexts for enforcing such regulations, as far as the exercise of them, at the same time that it was conducive to the unavowed views of government, might not be too glaring a despotism. ”

“ Other countries copied the regulations of Venice. The quarantine laws of England, of which I have above given some account, and those of Spain, of the most recent projects of which I am now going to give a short analysis, are improvements upon the ancient codes; which entirely supercedes the necessity of my giving any description of them. The systems of England and Spain (which latter, however, may now be considered as abandoned) are but the embryo errors of other nations grown to a gigantic stature; and, therefore, in their effects on public prosperity, great evils. ”

“ Thus the power of sinking ships, as well as burning goods, was exercised. Upon the Levant trade being laid open that year, it was thought necessary to enact that no ships, but with clean bills of health, should be received in England, excepting such as had previously performed quarantine in the Mediterranean, as if contagion, did such a thing exist in respect to pestilence, could be more readily conveyed in private ships, than in ships belonging to a company! ”

“ They are found, upon the evidence of the history of epidemics, to be, in fact, wholly inefficient, as in reason they must be inferred to be, for preventing the propagation of pestilence. Upon what grounds, indeed, can precautions, which are obviously insufficient to prevent the occurrence of diseases, as small-pox, which are incapable of affecting the same person more than once, be rationally presumed to be adequate to prevent diseases, as pestilences, which are capable of affecting the same person repeatedly, even in the same epidemic, and the same season? ”

“ In conformity with the same principle, some modern functionaries have considered it quite harmless that they themselves should land, immediately upon arriving in port, from ships, of which the crews have been held bound to perform quarantine, as if they had the privilege of being non-conductors of that contagion, which they imagine others cannot avoid propagating. ”

“ Every thing centres in the general direction, under the authority of the government. The nine gentlemen composing that direction would, in effect, have an unlimited authority—an unqualified arbitrary power—over the lives and properties of the people. ”

“ The dominions of the Grand Signior are of so vast an extent, that the plague may be in one part, and no way dangerous to another. But this act, as we humbly presume, may oblige all ships coming from Turkey to perform quarantine, though even from places not infected, since it must be concluded that there is a constant correspondence through the whole empire, which has been scarce ever known to be free from infection in every part of it. ”

“ Muratori, another decided contagionist, applying his observations to Italy, says: no one has produced a true and solid reason why forty days of quarantine should be necessary for expurgation. But, taking it for granted that infection cannot remain above fifteen days, twenty days quarantine is sufficient for persons. As to goods and other things, however highly infected, their expurgation may be completed in twenty-four hours, insomuch that they may be handled with perfect safety. ”

“ The number of the affected has been assumed as evidence of propagation from person to person; the fact of contact as evidence of contagion; and the cessation, or diminution of sickness, as evidence of the efficacy of sanitary precautions. With power always on their side, the adherents of pestilential contagion have been enabled to maintain their positions, without the trouble of adducing any valid proof, unfairly throwing the onus probandi, as I have said, upon their adversaries. Their endless assumptions it has been equally impossible to prove or to disprove. ”

“ The whole of the health officers, throughout the kingdom, ought to be under the direction of the board of health in London, consisting chiefly of gentlemen, who have seen something of quarantine abroad, and who would be induced by their public spirit to serve without salaries. To these should be added a secretary, and a physician, to assist in giving the proper directions, and to visit the Lazarettos in cases of emergency. ”

“ By the uniform silence of history, in that case forming the best evidence; by the testimony of almost all the witnesses examined before the Committee; and even by official custom-house returns, it stands confirmed, that, in the memory of man, not a single person has ever arrived in this country laboring under the plague, and that not a single case of that disease has occurred amongst the expurgators of goods in the Lazarettos. The Levant Company, in their printed orders to their factories abroad, assert that the plague was never brought to England by means of their commerce. ”

“ The plague of Marseilles, in 1720, gave occasion to the passing of two other acts of parliament in England, the following session; the one, "to enable His Majesty effectually to prohibit commerce for the space of one year with any country, that is, or shall be, infected with the plague, and for shortening the continuance of an act passed in the 7th year of His Majesty (the quarantine act) ;" the other "to prevent the clandestine running of goods, and the danger of infection thereby; and to prevent ships breaking their quarantine." ”

“ But the committee of public health of the Cortes of 1822, feeling that contagion was losing ground, determined to take a much wider range, and to assume a much more extended object for their code of sanitary laws. That object they stated to be "to procure for the people of Spain the highest health, and for Spain the highest salubrity." ”

“ Russell is quite wrong. The difference is both great and observable between cities where purification is practised, and where it is not; but it is, cœleris paribus, strongly in favor of those places, where no precautions are employed by public authorities, to prevent the propagation of an imaginary virus, and in which the doctrine of contagion, in epidemic diseases, is either not known, or not believed, by the people, or by the faculty. ”

“ Bills of health are certificates, granted to ships, sailing from places subject to pestilence, declaring the state of the public health, as to pestilence, at the period of their departure, for the purpose of regulating the duration of their quarantine at the port of their arrival. ”

“ In 1665, in October, the plague raging in London, a Committee of the House of Commons was appointed to prepare and bring in a bill to supply the defects of that of 1604. It passed the Commons. But amendments being made by the Lords, to which the Commons did not think fit to assent, and the session terminating, the matter dropt, and was never afterwards resumed. Consequently the statute of James I. respecting internal regulations for preventing the spreading of the infection of the plague, remained still in force. ”

“ We now come to the animal creation. Title 6, in 31 articles, contains 'precautions for preventing the communication, propagation, and re-production of the epizooties or epidemics of animals' They too, it seems, are contagious: and rules similar in principle are to be applied to them, as in the case of the human species!
Title 7, in 5 articles, treats 'of the authority of municipalities over the health police of communities, and of the jurisdiction of the municipal and provincial juntas, and of the general direction of the public health of the Kingdom. ”

“ It is not to be denied, that, as matters stand at present, quarantines, without being so secure a defence as is commonly imagined, are a certain heavy tax upon commerce; the benefit they promise to the state is very precarious, the detriment to the merchant is real. ”

“ In 1770, upon the petition of certain merchants of London, trading to Hamburgh and Bremen, the restraint of quarantine was directed to be taken of ships from these places, in November.
Adverting to the fluctuating and contradictory orders of the Privy Council, in respect to quarantine, Dr. P . Russell (p. 453—467) takes occasion repeatedly to recommend the adoption of a board of health, according to the custom of foreign nations. "The quarantine act," says he, marking the great lines only, leaves the details and execution to His Majesty in Council ”

“ Sheweth—That whereas there is a bill now depending in the Honorable House, for altering and amending the laws for obliging ships coming from places infected to perform their quarantine, and for preventing the spreading of infection, wherein there are some clauses, which your petitioners humbly apprehend will put an entire stop to the future carrying on their trade, which principally consists in the exportation of the woollen manufactures of this kingdom, and the importation of raw silk and Mohair yarn. ”

“ The service of health is divided into maritime and terrestrial.
The second part, which treats of the maritime service of health, is divided into five titles. The first, in thirty articles, conveys rules for exploring every acute foreign contagion at its source; and treats of bills of health, and of infested or suspected places. The second indicates the means of "observing and pursuing foreign contagion, on the passage of the vessels, persons, or goods, in which it may be transported." ”

“ The project of a code of sanitary laws, presented last year by their committee of public health, to the Spanish Cortes, (now finally rejected, principally in consequence, as I have reason to know, of my representations to that body,) consists of 400 articles, condensed into 64 close octavo pages, of which an examination will be found in my "Sketch of Proceedings in Spain, in illustration of the invalidity of the doctrine of Pestilential Contagion, and of the pernicious effects of quarantine or sanitary laws, &c." ”

“ Thus, notwithstanding the confidence and solemnity, with which masses of regulations have been obtruded on the world, to prevent the propagation of a nonentity, even those who have most strongly recommended them, are to be found acknowleging, in point of fact, their inefficiency. ”

“ I make this remark, because it appears, from some observations of the board of health, appointed at this period, (1805) "to consider and report the measures which it would be proper to adopt, in case the plague or other infectious disease, attended with great mortality, shall pass the barrier of the quarantine, and actually appear amongst us," that they were not ignorant of the existence of the doctrines, which I had published, upon this subject, in 1796, in India, and which had been also republished in America, and in various parts of Europe. ”

“ It was never in any instance acted upon in Great Britain, until it was revived, as applied to Ireland, by the act of the 58th of Geo. III., cap. 47, in the year 1818. To justify such a law, it would by no means be sufficient that pestilence should be proved to be propagated by means of a specific contagion: it would be further necessary to show, that all diseases so propagated are necessarily fatal. Previous to the passing of the law for the establishment of fever hospitals, &c. ”

“ Green, for many years Treasurer of the Levant Company, in his evidence before the committee of the House of Commons, in 1819, says, "the bills of health are determined by the foreign consuls at Smyrna, upon the report of a number of Greek merchants, who form a committee for the purpose. These merchants carried on principally the trade between Smyrna and Holland, that is, several were concerned ”

“ But to do this "by means of a general direction, or of any other authority, would require of course, besides super-human intelligence on their part, the subjection to the will of that authority of every agent in nature, capable of acting beneficially or injuriously on the body of man, or on the surface of the soil. ”