Germ theory, which secularized infectious disease, had a side effect: it sacralized epidemiology.
Jill LeporeJane Francklyne, born in 1565, had lived for less than a month. She left very little behind. She was buried in the Ecton churchyard, but her father would hardly have paid a carver to engrave so small a stone. If not for the parish register, there would be no record that this Jane Francklyne had ever lived at all. History is what is written and can be found; what isn't saved is lost, sunken and rotted, eaten by the earth.
Jill LeporeConservatism cherishes tradition; innovation fetishizes novelty. They tug in different directions, the one toward the past, the other toward the future.
Jill LeporeEpidemics follow patterns because diseases follow patterns. Viruses spread; they reproduce; they die.
Jill Lepore