Lastly, that the plague proceeds from too great a quantity of heat, either emitted from the body itself, or some how introduced into it, seems to be pretty plain from the effect it has of augmenting the venereal appetite to an almost inconceivable degree. This was taken notice of in the plague of Marseilles, and indeed in many others. Russel quotes two remarkable passages to this purpose; one in a plague at Genoa, the other in Messina. “Amidst so many dreadful fears and terrors, amid so many fetid and putrefying bodies, amid the shrieks, the sighs and the groans of the sick, what would you have expected? That the people, struck with dread and horror, remained sad, modest and quiet. You are mistaken. They sung, played on instruments, danced, intrigued, and Genoa never was seen so shameless, debauched, and disorderly. I have said before, that God in this plague gathered in a harvest for heaven; but it seemed to be also a vintage for the lascivious of of the earth. If not so, how came so many marriages to be celebrated in the Lazaretto of Consolation, and that so many women, without shedding a tear for the death of their husbands, immediately entered into new engagements? One day, in particular, five marriages were performed, four of the bridegrooms being buriers of the dead, and dressing themselves and their brides in clothes stripped off from the bodies of the deceased.” On the plague of Medina he quotes the following extract of a letter written by a gentleman who resided in that city during the plague in 1743. “It has always been observed, that, after _every_ plague, those who recover are addicted in an extraordinary degree to lewdness and incontinence, which was surprisingly visible at Messina, and carried to such a degree of frenzy and bestiality, that many were known to violate the bodies of dead virgins!”