390 E5TII0NIAN- BATHS. 



of their elaftic plumpnefs, and by frequently per* 

 fpiring render them flaccid. Wrinkles are then the un- 

 avoidable confequences. To this muft be added, 

 that at every bathing the blood is forced by the heating 

 into the extremities. By this glow the ikin is parched 

 in winter juft as much as it is in fummer by the heat of 

 the fun. Hence proceeds a certain burnt rednefs, 

 which has confiderably more of the coppery than of the 

 rofy hue. 



IV. Might not bathing-houfes or bathing-places be 

 brought into our parts of Europe like wife ; and are 

 there no phyfical and political reafons for fuch intro- 

 duction ? Is not the want of them a defect in the ar- 

 rangements of police in behalf of the health and clean- 

 line fs of the poor ? Might not many a youth be faved 

 alive, who now finds his death by river-bathing, to 

 which his confeitution is not hardened ? What kind of 

 bath (vapour and iweat-bath, warm or cold water-bath, 

 river-bath, &c.) would ■ be preferable locally and per- 

 fonally for us ? How fnould then that which is the 

 moft preferable be beft contracted ? The difcuffion 

 of thefe and other queftions that readily occur, I leave 

 to . thofe who are more able to do them juftice ; as in 

 the anfwering of them I mould be afraid of committing 

 miftakes. However, they appear to me, not unim- 

 portant, the remit of them feems not impracticable, 

 and withal eafdy reconcilable to the views both of the 

 politician and the moral ift. 



Concerning the ufe of the bath, which the Greeks and 

 Romans fo much efteemed, and which the Hebrews and . 

 muhammedans exalted into religious obfervances, I 



