Statement of DISEASES for OCTOBER. [Omitted last month.] The violent and extraordinary chanres of the weather have confiderably affected the character of this month's difeafes. Hence we have had numerous pneumonick inflammations, fometimes difappearing in 2 or 3 days, fometimes terminating fatally, fometimes paling off, fucceeded by an obftinate cough and laying the foundation for confumption. From the fame causes, there have been fevere catarrhs and rheumatisms. Some cafes of typhus have appeared, and a multitude of flow fevers; a few of dyfentery, cholera morbus, and flight but fufficiently decided enteritis. The difeafes of children have conffted chiefly of choleras, as is usual at this feafon. To thefe may be added catarrhs with and without fever, quinfies, and flight affections of the lungs, On the whole, there has been lefs difeafe among children during this than the preceding month, and much lefs than in common years, STATEMENT OF BIRTHS AND DEATHS RETURNS OF TWENTY PHYSICIANS. Males.... 13 DEATHS. Accident Atrophy, 6. Bilious fever, 22, 17, Colica meconialis, 46b, Total.....86% M. F. Un. 2 1 Confumption, 29.37.59.35.34. 1 6 Convulfions, 33y.14.493.10. 2 1 1 I 1 1 STATEMENT OF DISEASES FOR NOVEMBER Autumnal difeafes have now become much less frequent, and thofe of winter begin to take place of them. In a few inflances we have seen dyfentery, flow fever, and typhus ; less of the acute, and more of chronick rheumatism than in October. There have occurred fome cafes of eryfipelas ; many pneumonick inflammations; and very numerous, but commonly flight inflammations of the fauces, fometimes pervading a family fo generally as to feem infectious. There have alfo been fporadick cafes of colick, pleurodyne, and fearlatina anginofa. The numerous buildings, railing in this town, have occafioned frequent and fometimes very diftrefling accidents during the fummer and autumn. It is necefiary to remark, that if this matter received the attention ufually given to it by the police of large cities, many ufeful lives might be faved to foeiety, and many limbs preferved from perpetual mencls. Vaccination, which has languished during the fummer, begins to be refumed, We could take this opportunity of exch prefing our thanks to the phyficrans for thein attention to the flatement of births and deaths. Still born.4. To obtain a general view of the fetal dif eafes in this town is confeffedly a very interefiing object to the faculty, and to fociety in general. This has been formerly attempted ; and for a long period, from 1700 # 1775, we find an account of the deaths zeikkauk the intermiffion of a single year. It is our earnest wish to continue the flatement ; and we bape that, with the affiflance of the medi ical gentlemen, we fall render it as aceno ate as poffible. Every bint from them tending to the perfection of this matter will be received with thanks. As it is intended for the information of all our readers, we have mut adopted fo much the names that are frilly proper, as thofe generally underfined; theres fore we would remark, that by the note in 1 last month's Anthology, we intended as well the names fanctioned by cuflom as theft admitted into nofological books. Dropfy, 36 Gravel, Jaundice, 86 1 Infantile complaints, 8d. 6d. 2 1 1 17 14 (Rain laft night.-Fr to-day. HOM Fair and clear. Fair. Clear. Windy. Snow in morning till 10 A. M. Afterwards 31 229,032 Variable Cloudy morning. 5. 29,728 as yefter-Fair and clear. The mean ftate of the thermometer this month by the foregoing obferva sions is 21,37. On the 14th, at funrife the thermometer ftood at 0. MONTHLY ANTHOLOGY. DECEMBER, 1804. FOR THE ANTHOLOGY, are derived from no other truths, and which otherwife could not THE THEOLOGIST-NO. IL poffibly be poffeffed. THE ADVANTAGES OF A REVELATION. WHILE in a ftate of infancy, man prefents no indications of that ftrength of body or greatnefs of mind, which characterife his mature years. If left to himfelf, he would not probably difcover more fagacity, than the highest order of brutes.* For his fuperiority he is principally indebted to education. And as, by this circumftance, we conceive our natural dignity to be in no degree diminished, neither because we cannot, of ourselves, afcertain with certainty what is the character of God, nor what the duties and the destiny of man, are the truths relative to thefe lefs deferv ing of our implicit belief and affiduous obfervance? To receive a knowledge of them by revelation is only different in manner to the reception of faculties adequate to their discovery; and with this is connected advantages which This, it is prefumed, has been fully evinced. See particularly an account of the favage of Avignon. The ftudent of natural philofophy derives from his investigations amusement and instruction; but in moft inftances his refearch es do not extend beyond the regions of probability. In our inquiries after moral and religious truth, we demand, for satisfaction, the moft abfolute certainty. The want of this was experienced and lamented by the wifeft of ancient fages; and till the advent of Chrift, it had not been enjoyed for centuries, except by a fingle nation. The most confirmed unbeliever, if he was fenfible of his obligations to thofe books, the authority of which he denies, and would be perfuaded to compare the truths which they difclofe, with those which were received at the time when Jefus taught upon earth, would acknowledge with the officers who were fent to apprehend him, that never man fpake like this man, and with the centurion at the foot of the cross, that he was truly the fon of God. If man had been capable, by his own exertions, of attaining fatisfaction on thefe fubjects, it would certainly have been effectuated long before the chriftian æra, and the neceffity of a revelation would have been greatly diminished. But, reafoning from analogy, if our Saviour had not come upon earth and difpelled the darkness which enveloped the moral world, we have no facts to fupport the belief, that we fhould not have been worshippers of the works of our own hands; and instead of feeking the divine favour by prayer and holiness of life, that we fhould not have offered in facrifice our flocks and our herds, or given the fruit of our bodies for the fins of our fouls. In the most polished ages of heathen antiquity there were only a few individuals to whom the divine unity and perfections were known; and by them it was concealed from the multitude with the most jealous caution. "We read in the acts of the apoftles of an altar, which was noticed by St. Paul at Athens, infcribed to the unknown God. Concerning this altar there are different opinions, and on what occafion it was erected; but it is very probable, and we have the teftimonies of feveral ancient historians and divines, that it was made by Socrates, whom the Athenians condemned to die on account of his fentiments concerning the divine na Inftead of raifing an altar, as was the custom, to any of the fictitious gods of Greece, he took this way, as the fafeft, to exprefs his devotion to the True and One God, of whom the Athenians had no knowledge, and whofe incom-, prehenfible being he infinuates, by that infcription, was far beyond theirs or his understanding." The afsurance, which now pervades the chriftian world, that there is but one God, the Creator and Governour of the universe; that throughout his adminiftration nothing is accidental; that to him man fuftains the interesting relation of children, and will be received to his future and eternal prefence and favour by obeying his requirements, is certainly de ferving of the most ferious attention and the most ardent gratitude. The revelation of these truths was not of lefs benefit to thofe by whom it was received, than would be the light of the fun to men accustomed to pursue the bufinefs of life affifted only by the faint glimmerings of the ftars. Even if they had been fuggefted to the minds of the ferious and the thoughtful, they could have been adopted only as rational conjectures; but receiving them as they are prefented in the fcriptures, our certainty is unaffected by doubt, and our motives to piety too numerous and powerful to be viewed with indifference, or evaded by artifice. It is a fecond advantage refulting from a revelation, that it has an authority by which no human laws can be enforced. The wifeft and most efficient laws of man may often be difregarded without fear of detection. They can extend only to the regulation of external conduct, and must leave to each individual the government of his thoughts and affections. Among ancient legiflators, fo extensive was the conviction of the neceffity of a divine fanction of their laws, that they always pretended to derive them from the gods. But the chriftian difpenfation derives |