Excerpt from First Annual Report of the State Board of Health of Massachusetts: January, 1870

From the earliest colonial days, the general court has assumed to itself the right to prescribe rules for the intellectual and moral health of the people. The aids given to our col leges and to our primary and normal schools, and recently by authorizing the establishment of public libraries by Cities and towns, all testify to the labors of the Commonwealth in refer ence to these two of the above-named powers of man. But it may well be doubted whether, in the earnest desire to stimulate the intellectual powers of its people, the State has not neglected somewhat the moral, and almost wholly lost sight of the physi cal nature Of man.

The State Board of Health, according to our estimate of its objects, Should neglect none of these three, and if, in this or any future report, it should study any supposed evil upon man, it will adopt the fine old maxim, pagan though it be, that noth ing which pertains to humanity, in its widest sense, will this Board deem foreign to its aims.

We have thought it well thus to lay down certain general principles upon which we intend to act.

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