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Article THE GENERAL ASSUEANCE ADVOCATE. ← Page 5 of 6 →
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The General Assueance Advocate.
ibis fact to show , that a great deal depends upon the nature of employment , independent of locality , and says , " that even in the same locality in rural districts of the country , where all supposed contaminating influences of ill ventilated houses , narrow streets , bad sewerage , poisoned air , epidemic town fevers , and factory restraints , are absent , there is , neverthelessa very great superiority in the value of life in one class over
, another . " The word " supposed" is printed uniform in Mr . Neison ' s book , but we have printed it in italics , because it seems to mark the writer ' s bias to be towards thinking , that too great stress has been laid upon the influence of locality and the diseases engendered in ill ventilated and undrained districts , and too little upon employment , and consequently , in some degree , to lead him to be sceptical of the influence of a well
regulated sanitary system ; a doctrine which we are sorry to see , even indirectly , supported by so eminent an authority , because we think it injurious , and , as we shall endeavour to show by other data drawn from Mr . Neison ' s work , erroneous . Not that we at all undervalue the influence of employment , but conceive that local position is at least as powerful .
Mr . Neison shortly afterwards asserts that" the general mortality of the town districts exceeds that of the rural districts by about 14 * 981 per cent ; " but , by abstracting the labourers from the rural districts ,
the difference would be diminished to 8 ' 8 per cent . ; and he then ventures on a supposition that if the class of labourers were not only abstracted from the rural districts , but added to the town districts , the mortality of the towns would , instead of exceeding , fall short of that of the rural districts by 1 * 831 per cent . Now , we do not quarrel with Mr . Neison ' s facts or figures , which we are not in a position to dispute ,
and are ready to assume as correct , but we do quarrel with his supposition ; because we think that no one , however eminent , is justified in supposing an impossible hypothesis and using it to influence a case , as he does his to decide the question of Employment versus Locality ; and that the hypothesis is impossible we think we shall be able to show from a subsequent passage , which tends to prove that the
labourersthe most healthy class of the rural districts—are subject to a very high rate of mortality in towns ; so that if labourers could be abstracted from the country districts and added to the town districts , the result would he not only to increase indeed the amount of mortality in the former , but also to increase that of the latter , thus probably leaving the differences between the general results much as they are now .
We readily concede the truth of the remark , that where there is a greater concentration of trades , in themselves unhealthy , the mortality of the district must be in consequence heightened , and that the mortality of town districts must be increased by those means ; but Mr . Neison , VOL . vi . is z
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
The General Assueance Advocate.
ibis fact to show , that a great deal depends upon the nature of employment , independent of locality , and says , " that even in the same locality in rural districts of the country , where all supposed contaminating influences of ill ventilated houses , narrow streets , bad sewerage , poisoned air , epidemic town fevers , and factory restraints , are absent , there is , neverthelessa very great superiority in the value of life in one class over
, another . " The word " supposed" is printed uniform in Mr . Neison ' s book , but we have printed it in italics , because it seems to mark the writer ' s bias to be towards thinking , that too great stress has been laid upon the influence of locality and the diseases engendered in ill ventilated and undrained districts , and too little upon employment , and consequently , in some degree , to lead him to be sceptical of the influence of a well
regulated sanitary system ; a doctrine which we are sorry to see , even indirectly , supported by so eminent an authority , because we think it injurious , and , as we shall endeavour to show by other data drawn from Mr . Neison ' s work , erroneous . Not that we at all undervalue the influence of employment , but conceive that local position is at least as powerful .
Mr . Neison shortly afterwards asserts that" the general mortality of the town districts exceeds that of the rural districts by about 14 * 981 per cent ; " but , by abstracting the labourers from the rural districts ,
the difference would be diminished to 8 ' 8 per cent . ; and he then ventures on a supposition that if the class of labourers were not only abstracted from the rural districts , but added to the town districts , the mortality of the towns would , instead of exceeding , fall short of that of the rural districts by 1 * 831 per cent . Now , we do not quarrel with Mr . Neison ' s facts or figures , which we are not in a position to dispute ,
and are ready to assume as correct , but we do quarrel with his supposition ; because we think that no one , however eminent , is justified in supposing an impossible hypothesis and using it to influence a case , as he does his to decide the question of Employment versus Locality ; and that the hypothesis is impossible we think we shall be able to show from a subsequent passage , which tends to prove that the
labourersthe most healthy class of the rural districts—are subject to a very high rate of mortality in towns ; so that if labourers could be abstracted from the country districts and added to the town districts , the result would he not only to increase indeed the amount of mortality in the former , but also to increase that of the latter , thus probably leaving the differences between the general results much as they are now .
We readily concede the truth of the remark , that where there is a greater concentration of trades , in themselves unhealthy , the mortality of the district must be in consequence heightened , and that the mortality of town districts must be increased by those means ; but Mr . Neison , VOL . vi . is z