A Biblical & Medical Critique of Vaccination (1878) (The National Anti-compulsory-vaccination Reporter)

The following was written in The National Anti-compulsory-vaccination Reporter in 1878. It critiques vaccination on biblical and medical grounds, exposes it as a fraudulent and dangerous practice, and condemns the tyranny of compulsory vaccination:

There was again a large gathering of anti-vaccinators in Albert-square, on Sunday afternoon, August 25th. The weather was fine, and the very place of meeting is at once attractive and inspiring. The magnificent Town Hall fronts the square. It is a poem in stone. Then the Albert Memorial, on the steps of which the speakers stand and some of the auditors sit, is another “thing of beauty.”—Mr. Henry Pitman, who was the only speaker, treated the subject of compulsory vaccination in its relation to the Bible, the human body, and the State. He did not quote chapter and verse, but claimed that the whole spirit and teachings of the Bible were opposed to impurity, falsehood, and force.

As we sow we shall reap. We are not to do evil that good may come. “Do thyself no harm.” The blood is the life, and to infuse animal poison into it, John Hunter, the great physiologist, declared to Jenner’s face was infinitely pernicious and dangerous. Vaccination is a violation of divine and physiological law. Its enactment and support by medical men condemns doctorcraft as a compound of quackery and tyranny. Like begets like. Vaccination is corruption, and a corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit. “Thy Word is Truth.” Vaccination is a lie, or rather a bundle of lies. It is called “pure lymph.” It is not lymph. It is pus, virus, poison. It is not from the cow, therefore not vaccination. It is from arm to arm, therefore inoculation, which is a penal offence. But whether from the cow or not, it is small-pox matter.

Dr. Daniel Noble, of Manchester, was one of the committee of twenty-five doctors who inquired into the “present state of vaccination” thirty-eight years ago at the request of the Provincial Medical Association, and reported in these words: “The vaccine disease is not the preventive of small-pox, but the small-pox itself.” No wonder that the more vaccination the more small-pox. The theory of vaccination is that a mild form of the disease will prevent a severe one. This involves the double fallacy that every one is certain to have small-pox, and that vaccination is a preventive. Small-pox is a dirt disease, preventible only by temperance, cleanliness, and pure wholesome food. Natural small-pox does not increase, but actually lowers the death-rate. Doctors make a “bogie” of it to frighten into vaccination. Fear is the food of this superstition. The women fear to lose their beauty, skin deep (not always that), and men fear fines and imprisonment.

Anti-vaccination … evokes conscientiousness and self-sacrifice. Our motto is, “Rather suffer than do evil.” We believe in God … Doctor-craft and Priestcraft are devil-worship. …

The Bishop of Manchester says that the clergy are “not at all competent to form a judgment” upon vaccination. … Is it right for the State to enforce this damnable, heresy of vaccination? No. The law-makers are the real criminals.

The National Anti-compulsory-vaccination Reporter, Vol. III, No. 1, October 5, 1878, 18.

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