Many diseases are infectious. Every person ought therefore, as far as he can, to avoid all communication with the diseased. The common practice of visiting the sick, though often well meant, has many ill consequences. Far be it from us to discourage any act of charity or benevolence, especially towards those in distress; but we cannot help blaming such as endanger their own or their neighbours lives by a mistaken friendship or an impertinent curiosity. The houses of the sick, especially in the country, are generally crowded from morning till night with idle visitors. It is customary, in such places, for servants and young people to wait upon the sick by turns, and even to sit up with them all night. It would be a miracle indeed should such always escape. Experience teaches us the danger of this conduct. People often catch fevers in this way, and communicate them to others, till at length they become epidemic. It would be thought highly improper, for one who had not had the small-pox, to wait upon a patient in that disease; yet many other fevers are almost as infectious as the small-pox, and not less fatal. Some imagine that fevers prove more fatal in villages than in great towns, for want of proper medical assistance. This may sometimes be the case; but we are inclined to think it oftener proceeds from the cause above mentioned. Were a plan to be laid down for communicating infection, it could not be done more effectually than by the common method of visiting the sick. Such visitors not only endanger themselves and their connections, but likewise hurt the sick. By crowding the house, they render the air unwholesome, and by their private whispers and dismal countenances disturb the imagination of the patient, and depress his spirits. Persons who are ill, especially in fevers, ought to be kept as quiet as possible. The sight of strange faces, and every thing that disturbs the mind, hurts them. The common practice in country-places of inviting great numbers of people to funerals, and crowding them into the same apartment where the corpse lies, is another way of spreading infection. The infection does not always die with the patient. Every thing that comes into contact with his body while alive, receives the contagion, and some of them, as clothes, blankets, &c. will retain it for a long time. Persons who die of infectious disorders ought not to lie long unburied; and people should keep as much as possible at a distance from them.