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tailed, yet, as we purify our houses within and without, and
supply them with all the requirements of health, so must we,
step by step, improve the physique of Bethnal Green.
" The rate of death of a district represents the commercial
value, in its widest sense, of its men, women, and children ;
its revelations are not simply of the actual loss of human
life, but of the waste of human intellect and human strength."
Such wastes, through morbific causes, imply with us an excess
of 4 deaths per 1000 over the normal or healthy rate of
17 ; and such, more perfect hygiene can alone correct. " Any
deaths in a people exceeding 17 in 1000 annually are unnatural
deaths." That number, therefore, should be our maximum,
and until that be attained our sanitary status will not
rank high. If, however, our infantile death rate continue to
fall 7 in the 1000 as was the case in 1859, we may hereafter
expect our majority to glide off from life—like the Quakers
of Great Britain wheresoever they dwell—not under 5 but
between 70 and 80 years.
" To supply the arm strong to labour, to substitute productive
for unproductive citizens," to decrease the death-roll
of the young, and to protract life beyond its present span—
these are the tasks that sanitary science imposes on us—
these the duties that we have constantly to fulfill! These,
moreover, will advance the prosperity of Bethnal Green, and
confer on many
" Health till Death through ripe old age."
I have the honour to be,
Gentlemen,
With great respect,
Very faithfully yours,
SAMUEL PEARCE.
To the Gentlemen of the Vestry of
St. Matthew, Bethnal Green.