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Persons of Quality and Distinction may provide Places remote from others for their Children, and therefore may be in a great Measure excused; yet still there may be some Danger, though not so great, that the Distemper may be communicated by the Conveyance of the Air, or by infectious Goods and Garments; but if this Practice be encouraged and grows common, this Provision cannot be made by the generality of the People. Our Governours formerly thought fit to make a Law, that obliged the Person in whose House a Fire should break out, though by Accident and without his Contrivance, to make good the Damages of his Neighbours, whose Dwellings should be burnt down by the spreading Flames: It is true, that Act is since repealed, but when it was made, there was a great Appearance of Reason and Equity in it, otherwise it had not been enacted. But how much more to be condemned are such, who design and contribute their Endeavours to bring about such a Mischief; and therefore there is a Statute still in Force, that makes it Felony for any Man willingly to burn his own House; the Reason is founded on this, that by so doing he may probably destroy the Dwellings, and perhaps the Lives, of adjoining Inhabitants; And is it not a parallel Case, if a Man from a free and deliberate Choice, sets his own Veins on Fire, and inflames his Blood with the Small-Pox, which by its contagious Quality may endan-

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