The skin and its troubles.

Date:
1879
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The skin and its troubles. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    principles were exercised under the form of religious ceremonies, and the priest was the physician. Under the Mosaic economy, ceremonial purification was en- joined on the Jews, and many other nations possess, like them, most minute regulations respecting ablution. In some nations, as the Roman, where the bath ac- quired such a preponderating position in social life, cleanliness was the outcome of the laws of society which made the bath the fashionable and pleasurable resort- In later years amongst the more civilized nations also personal cleanliness has been cultivated more in defer- ence to society, which demands a clean inodorous skin and prepossessing exterior, than the duty of obeying one of the first principles of health. If we have gained in precise knowledge of the importance of the skin, we have as certainly fallen back in the care and trouble we bestow on it. The time is, however, beginning to dawn when these matters shall be carried out on the true founda- tions of physiological knowledge, which is steadily fashion- ing the habits of Englishmen in the cultivation of health. The practical outcome of an increasing knowledge has been seen in the Public Baths and Wash-house Move- ment, which has had such an enormous influence on the habits of the people since the first bath of the kind in London was established in 1845 'm the Docks. It has been remarked that “ it is too little to say that these