HISTORY OF HANDBOOKS.

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indeed, every book is a Handbook. Tomes of theology, volumes of divinity, and tractates of morals, are Handbooks for all, to religion; fictions, fables and fairy tales, are Handbooks, for young and old, to men and manners; the classics are Handbooks to the past; the publications of the periodic press are Handbooks to the present; and history is the Handbook which joins the present with the past. Let these be the extremes to which the all-embracing term extends, and who will deny its application to works upon Agriculture and Astronomy, upon Botany and Biography, upon Economy and Education, upon Law and Literature, upon Morals and Medicine, upon Poetry and Politics, upon Zoolites and Zoophites?

The origin of the compound dissyllabic noun-substantive Hand-book is involved in profound mystery,-a mystery we do not venture to dispel. Etymology is not our theme; yet we cannot forbear to hint, and that in the most diffident of manners, at a period anterior to which the word was probably, if at all, but little used. We suggest then that, if its conception be not due to some more dignified occasion, the appellation owes its existence to a common-place remark of the great lexicographer-" Books that you may carry to the fire, and hold readily in your hand, are the most useful after all;" and also that, if little used before, the phrase has certainly been much employed since, the immortalization of the sentence, as a motto for the Home and Colonial Library, by the father of Handbooks, Mr. Murray. However, this much few will be sufficiently bold to deny, that since the time of Dr. Johnson, and since the issue of the Albemarle series, the race of Handbooks, so ycleped by writers, compilers, or publishers, has increased to a very large extent,—an extent which will not be credible to those who have not examined the London Catalogue of Books, printed between the years 1816 and 1851; wherein they will find, merely to select a few classified in alphabetical order, Handbooks to Art, Architecture, Amusements, Authors, Accomplishments, Angling, and Antiquities; to Bathing, British Museum, Bible Geography, Billiards, and Botany; to Etiquette and English Ecclesiology; to Carlingford Bay, Cheltenham, Cookery, and Chronology; and to Taste, Trade, Turning, and Toilette. The latest Handbook which has come under our immediate notice, is the Handbook to the Charities of London.*

"The Charities of London" in 1852-53, presents a report,

*The Charities of London, 1852-53. By Sampson Low, jun." London: Low & Son.

1854.

the title-page informs its readers, of the operation, resources, and general condition of the charitable, and religious institutions of the Metropolis. The design of this report the introduction states

"is essentially practical, developing itself in a twofold manner; first, to the benefit of the various deserving institutions whose operations it records, by making them better and truly known to those who wish to enjoy the luxury of doing good; and, secondly, to the aid and guidance of those who experience the distress or need they are designed to relieve, and would otherwise be in ignorance of the benefits they are able to confer."

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Scarcely subordinate," it continues, " to these purposes, is that arising from the necessity which has long existed for the objects, operations, and conditions of our charities to be periodically made public, in a form at once more systematic and available than presented by the separate reports of such as publish them for circulation amongst their respective subscribers. Both the direct and suggestive benefit from such a compendium are apparent; it will serve to show at once in what channel, and to what extent public beneficence flows-where it might do so to more advantage—where alteration would be judicious-where union requisite."

We are here concerned with but one portion of Mr. Low's most serviceable little manual,—with that part which treats of the Medical Charities of London; and, as far as he will help us, in conjunction with the reports of such of the institutions as we have been able to obtain, we propose to consider, first, the origin, and rise of Hospitals in general; and, secondly, the present condition and prospects of the Metropolitan Hospitals in particular. This consideration, it is imagined, at a time when much attention has been drawn to the state of our hospitals in the East, will not altogether be devoid of interest.

First, then, to consider with becoming brevity the origin, rise, and progress of the system of Hospitals. For the most comprehensive account with which we are acquainted, we shall find occasion to consult the labours of the indefatigable Professor Beckmann; yet, even he confesses that to offer any complete history of hospitals, it would be necessary to enter also into the history of inns established for the use of strangers and pilgrims, which were in general combined with them; and, likewise, into that of the different Orders instituted for the like purpose, and of taverns which arose at a later period. Into such an extended inquiry it is obviously foreign to the purpose of the present undertaking to enter: we must therefore be content with a more limited view of the historical side

ORIGIN OF HOSPITALS.

33

of the question of hospitals. On all hands it appears to be regarded as a recognised fact, that it is needless to search for the existence of hospitals, as we understand the word, anterior to the promulgation of Christianity. Greece and Rome, without doubt, were in possession of no such institution; nor, we believe, does modern investigation assure us that the more primitive nations of antiquity, the Egyptians and the Assyrians, enjoyed these combined results of a Christian's creed, and of a more refined, and humane civilization. This fact, though patent to every inquirer, it has been the pleasure, and the policy of enemies of the Faith to explain away, upon principles, not only of expediency but of absolute necessity. Bodin,who as our author says, " readily embraces every opportunity of exalting his paternal religion, the Jewish, and deprecating the Christian faith, by which he gained riches and honour,"endeavours, in his celebrated work "De Republica," to lessen this service by asserting that—

"On the introduction of Christianity, freedom was given to many slaves who possessed nothing else and who having learned no trade or handicraft by which they could gain a living, became so burdensome to the state that the clergy were obliged to devise some means to remove them from the public view, and to provide with the necessary support these unfortunate beings, abandoned by all mankind, whose increasing number was asserted by the unbelievers to be an effect of the Christian religion."

The Emperor Julian himself acknowledges his sense of this one result of the preaching of Christianity,-by imitating the principle. Observing, as he could not fail to do, the numerous means for alleviating human suffering introduced by the new religion, he attempted to rival Christian benevolence by causing his priests to provide for the poor" (of whatever creed,—in imitation again of the despised Galileans); and assigning them funds for this purpose to establish inns into which they could be received.”

The days of palmers and pilgrims are to be reckoned among the most early ages of inns and of hospitals. To the Holy Land then, as being originally the centre of all religious journeys, and also the region of scarcity of the bare necessaries of life, much more of medical care and comfort,―to the Holy Land should we naturally look for the first establishment of these houses of refuge and resort. Nor should we look in vain. For on the authority of St. Jerome, we learn that himself built an hospital at Bethlehem, and that his friend Paula caused several to be erected, on the road to that village, in order, as she says, "that devout idlers might fare

VOL. XXXVIII.

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better than the mother of God, who, on necessary journey thither, could find no inn." Though himself not disposed to accord to the clergy any undue amount of praise, Beckmann is prepared to admit that "the establishment of the first house for the reception of the sick is among the services rendered” by the order, and that many decrees of early councils bear upon this very matter. He adds, that the first, or one of the first houses for the reception of the indigent sick was that built at Rome by Fabiola, a Roman lady, a friend of St. Jerome, and consequently in the fifth century of the Christian

era. 4

As we can afford only to point out here and there certain land marks in the course of the rise of hospitals, the reader who will accompany us from the fifth to the ninth century, will find that at this date the Irish, and the Scotch claim the credit of erecting in France, for the benefit of their countrymen passing through that kingdom to the threshold of the Apostles, hospitals for sickly, and inns for weary, pilgrims. At the close of the former century we discover Pope Adrian I. recommending to Charlemagne the hospitals established in the Alps; a circumstance which proves their earlier existence : whilst in the middle of the following one, we read that many of those refuges, whose ruins in wild and desert parts on mountain side or river bank still attest their former position, were visited and restored by the Emperor Louis the Second.

Turn we now to the close of the eleventh, and to the commencement of the twelfth century, and we find brotherhoods, and consequently houses for them, collected in the Holy Land, and elsewhere, whose duty it was to attend to the needs, and to supply the wants of poor, or sickly pilgrims. These once formed, quickly flourished, both in numbers by self-devoted assistants, and in wealth by the dying bequests of those who in time of distress had received consolation, or relief. Hence the hospitals of the East by degrees grew larger, were better organised, and more effectively managed than those of the West; and, consequently, were selected as models, whilst their members were chosen as managers, of those which sprung from the liberality, or the devotion, of princely palmers. The most famous of these brotherhoods was that which derived its name from the hospital of St. John at Jerusalem, and whose duty it was to afford succour to needy visitants to the Holy Sepulchre; a society which after the foundation of the kingdom of Jerusalem, and when its revenues had increased beyond its original requirements, under its master Raymond du Puy about the year 1120, was transformed from a peace

KNIGHTS HOSPITALLERS.

35

ful brotherhood of charity to a warlike order of knights, who fully sustained their high character as determined men in whatever direction their services were required.

The first hospitals, says Beckmann :

"The first hospitals, at least in general, were built close to cathedrals or monasteries, and the Bishops themselves had the inspection of them; but afterwards, either for the greater convenience or the want of leisure, when their occupations increased, they committed their charge to the deacons. In course of time when houses for the sick were erected by laymen, and entirely separated from monasteries, the Bishops asserted their rights, often confirmed to them by imperial as well as pontifical laws of visiting these institutions. We find, however, that in later times they were deprived of the privilege by princes and sovereigns, either because they wished to omit no opportunity of lessening the power of the clergy, or because the latter had given reason to suspect that the incomes destined for the use of the hospitals were not always applied to the intended purpose. These institutions have the appearance of ecclesiastical establishments and still retain in many cases similar privileges. As such they are free from all taxes, are spared as much as possible in war, and enjoy the same rank as churches.'

Of the internal economy, the same author remarks of the oldest houses, no information is extant :

In

"It is not even known whether physicians and surgeons belonged to them, or in what manner they were supplied with medicine. the hospital at Jerusalem the knights themselves attended the sick, bound their wounds, and acted as their physicians. Thus we find in Amadis, and other books of knight errantry, how much exertion was made to obtain the best balsamic mixtures, of which the wellknown baume de commendan belonged to the times of knighthood. Extensive knowledge of medicine could not be expected among these knights, were we even unacquainted with the account given of their skill given by Guy de Chauliac, who, in 1383, mentions the different medical sects, of which the German knights being the fourth sect, were wont to cure wounds by exorcism, beverages, oil, wool, and cabbage leaves, and to trust to the belief that God had conferred supernatural power upon words, plants, and stones."

England can point to the year 1070 as that in which an hospital, built in his diocesan city, probably in imitation of those of his native country, by Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury, was in active working order. It is probable that this was not the first of its sort in our own country; but since it is earlier by half a century than any hospital at present extant in the metropolis, to which our attention is more especially directed, it seemed desirable not to pass the foundation of Lanfranc without at least a casual notice. St. Bartho