ON THE REAL CAUSES OF CHOLERA.
" The Lord is merciful and gracious ; slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy." Ps/a.= TO THE EDITOR. OF THE SPECTATOR.
September 11th, 1832.
SIR-Much has been said and written on the subject of Cholera; and many and various are the causes to which that terrible malady has been ascribed. Of these there is one, the belief in which, amongst a certain class of persons, is al- most general ; and which appears to me so absurd, so fraught with mischief, and even so impious, that I cannot refrain from using my humble efforts to expose its fallacy.
Mankind is divided into two classes-the few who think, and the many who
not only never reflect, but who blindly adopt, and suffer themselves to be guided and governed by, the thoughts and opinions of others. Partly from this cause arises that undue subjection to rank and riches, which so frequently induces per- sons in the more humble walks of life to take their tone from, and to be the mere echo of, the opulent and powerful,-those who, however empty, stupid, or ignorant they may be, have the tact to discover, that in order to preserve their opulence and power, it is often their interest to propagate or encourage doctrines in which they themselves have no belief. Hence, and in order to conceal or to prevent investigation into its real cause, it is given out that "Cholera is a scourge inflicted on us by the Almighty as a mark of his vengeance !" The idea is horrible - yet it is fulminated from the pulpit, zealously retailed by the great (so called), greedily swallowed by the "million," and has now become the prevailing cant of the day.
That nothing can or does take place without the permission of the Supreme
Being, is a truism which no one will dispute ; but can we look abroad into this beautiful world, where every thing is so abundantly provided, not only for our wants, but for our enjoyment and gratification,-can we contemplate that sys- tem in which no link is wanting. to perfection, in which it is impossible to de- tect a flaw, or to imagine or devise the slightest or most minute improvement, -can we, I ask, survey the harmony, fertility, the beauty, order, and sublimity of nature, and at the same time believe the CREATOR of the Universe to be a " Goo oe VENGEANCE?" Impossible ! Let us not then be led away by the dogmas of superstition, the craft of interest, or the cant of imbecility • let us not seek afar for that which lies beneath our feet ; but let us trace this dre:idful effect, the Cholera, to its proximate and obvious causes-THE POVERTY AND STARVA- TION OF THE PEOPLE ; and let us convince ourselves, as we assuredly may, that even this awful calamity affords only another instance of that consummate wis- dom, that unerring justice, and that unceasing love for his creatures, which is so eminently conspicuous in all that proceeds from Him whom we are taught to dread as a " God of Vengeance !" It will not, I presume, be disputed, that unprecedented embarrassment and distress exist among the industrious and labouring classes of the People of England ; that its peasantry, and all those who are denominated par excellence the "lower orders"-once, as history tells us, a race the finest and most hardy in the world-are now, generally speaking, become squalid, emaciated, sickly, stunted, and miserable. A long course of misgovernment has reduced those who were once opulent, to poverty ; and those who had nothing tangible to lose, and whose wealth consisted in their labour (no despicable fund, by the by, when a proper remuneration for labour could be obtained) to pauperism. The worst and most unwholesome of food, and even of that not half enough to satisfy the demands of nature; the most scanty apparel, and of a description inefficient for the purposes of warmth and protection from the weather ; too frequently the most miserable huts, in which whole families are crowded into one or two small apartments, destitute of comfort and convenience, and in which I know that four and five individuals, of all ages, and of both sexes, often occupy one bed,- this is the situation in which our labourers, artisans, mechanics, 8ec., have been existing for years. Is not disease, in one shape or other, the natural and in- evitable consequence of such a state of things? Is its occurrence more wonder- ful than that of any other event of which the causes are equally manifest and palpable? And would it not be well that our overpaid Protestant clergy, our- archbishops, bishops, rectors, et hoc genus omne, should be-compelled to devote• some of their enormous wealth to the succour and support of those for whose. exclusive use and benefit the funds constituting that wealth were originally des- tined ? i appeal to common sense, whether the providing of the necessitous por- tion of a congregation with food and raiment would not be mere likely to prove an efficient protection against Cholera than the depressing their spirits, and thus rendering their wretched condition doubly desolate, by the delivery of a long and nauseating tirade on their own iniquity and the " vengeance" of the Almighty?
But to resume. In confirmation of what I have already stated, I will men- tion incidentally, that out of nearly fifty persons who have fallen victims to Cholera in the small town near which I reside, there has not been a single instance of death among the middle or higher classes: and in the few cases where the disorder was not clearly traceable to poverty, destitution, and want, it was in every instance found to have arisen from the previous irregular and dissolute life of the sufferer ; which, by weakening and disorganizing the animal system, had equally the effect of predisposing it to receive disease, and of inca- pacitating it for resistance when attacked. I must not omit to add, that in the town alluded to, the appearance of Cholera having been met, on the part of the medical men and others, by immediate at- tention to the wants of the poor, and relief, in the shape of bread and meat, having been distributed among them with as little delay as possible, not only (lid the Cholera speedily disappear, but the mortality caused by it is considered to have been comparatively less than in almost any other town hitherto visited by the disease. Admitting, however, if it should be urged, that the disorder has not every
where been exclusively confined to the lower classes, that circumstance will form no tenable argument in opposition to the one I maintain. It has invariably, wherever it has appeared, commenced with the poor ; but when an infectious disorder has once established itself, of course there is no class exempt from liabi- lity to its influence : and though poverty of living is, as Dr. MAC AN N and others have pronounced it to be, the great predisposing cause of Cholera, there are many fortuitous circumstances—as natural infirmity of constitution, intemperance, or even, I am told, extreme terror—which, in persons of all ranks, would occa- sion susceptibility to infection.
But why, I would inquire, is the "vengeance" of the Almighty to be at this time especially manifested? Is it pretended that the aggregate amount of crime is greater now than at any former period? And even if this be the case, to what and to whom is it ascribable, but to those who, by their abuse of power and tyrannical enactments, have reduced a large proportion of the people to the condition of paupers, and driven them to the commission of acts which the laws have constituted criminal ? Who can say how often the alternative has lain be- tween the endurance of hunger almost amounting to famine, and the appropria- tion of one of those "wild animals," the taking of which is denominated and punished as a crime ? And would not a God of justice direct his "vengeance" against the authors, rather than the instruments of evil ? Would not the makers, rather than the breakers of such laws have been selected as the objects of condign punishment ? Again, I have heard it remarked, ay, even by men who pass current as " sensible," that " the Cholera is no doubt intended to act as a corrective to our surplus population." Monstrous ! Is it, then, the poor alone(for to them, as we have seen, are the ravages of Cholera almost wholly confined)—is it only the needy and destitute, who are obnoxious to the wrath of the Deity?
" Oh fool ! to think God hates the worthy mind.
Because he wants a thousand pounds a year !"
Or do these " sensible" bipeds imagine that multitudes are called into existence by the Creator through whom we "live, and breathe, and have our being," merely for the purpose of being destroyed ? Sir, I will no longer waste my own time, or trespass on that of others, by dwelling on such palpable absurdities. It only remains for me to endeavour to show that this pestilence is a means
employed by OMNIPOTENCE to work out a merciful end. In saying this, I would notbe understood to assert or to insinuate that any special interference has been exerted, but only that it was ordained in the beginning, by infinite wis- dom, that cause and effect should be so intimately and inseparably connected in nature, that the one, whether in good or ill, must, sooner or later, inevitably succeed the other ; and hence, that abuses, of whatever description, must bear within themselves the seeds of their own correction, and, by a natural reaction, work out their own cure. The rich, the powerful, "the magnates of the land," who have so long turned a deaf car to the prayers of their distressed fellow-crea- tures,—who have known their sufferings without attempting to relieve them,— who, when the people, goaded by famine and oppression, have sought to obtain by force the rights which were denied to their entreaties, have let loose upon them their bands of armed mercenaries, and given not a " stone" but steel to those who " asked for bread,"—who, so long as themselves and their caste were suf- fered to remain in undisturbed enjoyment of their possessions, and revelling -in luxuries, cared not for —heeded not, nay ridiculed,—the cry of the miserable, though made miserable by the unwise, unjust, and devastating enactments of those at whose hands they only petitioned for redress,—the rich are now frightened into the performance of their duty. They can now subscribe to the relief of the destitute; visit—unless the Cholera chance to have preceded them —those hovels so long the abodes of penury and wretchedness, terrified at the hare idea of themselves being snatched from a world where they live " at rest in their possessions ; " where they have "nothing to vex them ; ' where they have " prosperity in all things ;" and are " able "(Oh ! how able !) "to receive meat,"—yea, the rich, the great, become, " as by the stroke of an enchanter's wand, " humane, charitable, and even generous; the poor are relieved ; the hungry fed ; the naked clothed ; and for one human being who has perished, many are rendered comparatively comfortable and happy. Thus are the merciful and righteous designs of Providence fulfilled ; thus does the OMNIPOTENT dis- play his " vengeance," by drawing from " partial evil universal good ;" and thus is essentially verified that maxim of our great poet and moralist, that " WHATEVER IS—IS RIGHT !"
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