Of the direction of our charity.

encouraging people to break their arms and legs. According to the touchstone of utility, the high approbation which Christ gave to the conduct of the good Samaritan, who followed the immediate impulse of his benevolence in relieving a stranger in the urgent distress of an accident, does not, in the smallest degree, contradict the expression of St. Paul, "If a man will not work, neither shall he "eat."

We are not however, in any case, to lose a present opportunity of doing good, from the mere supposition that we may possibly meet with a worthier object. In all doubtful cases, it may safely be laid down as our duty to follow the natural impulse of our benevolence; but when in fulfilling our obligation as resonable beings to attend to the consequences of our actions, we have, from our own experience and that of others, drawn the conclusion, that the exercise of our benevolence in one mode is prejudicial, and in another is beneficial, in its effects, we are certainly bound, as moral agents, to check our natural propensities in the one direction, and to encourage them and acquire the habits of exercising them, in the other.

CHAPTER X.

Different plans of improving the condition of the

Poor considered.

IN the distribution of our charity, or in any efforts which we may make to better the condition of the lower classes of society, there is another point relating to the main argument of this work, to which we must be particularly attentive. We must on no account do any thing which tends directly to encourage marriage, or to remove, in any regular and systematic manner, that inequality of circumstances which ought always to exist between the single man and the man with a family. The writers who have best understood the principle of population appear to me all to have fallen into very important errors on this point.

Sir James Steuart, who is fully aware of what he calls vicious procreation, and of the misery that attends a redundant population, recommends, notwithstanding, the general establishment of foundling hospitals; the taking of children under certain

Different plans of improving the

circumstances, from their parents, and supporting them at the expense of the state; and particularly laments the inequality of condition between the married and single man, so ill-proportioned to their respective wants. He forgets, in these instances, that if, without the encouragement to multiplication, of foundling hospitals, or of public support for the children of some married persons, and under the discouragement of great pecuniary disadvantages on the side of the married man, population be still redundant, which is evinced by the inability of the poor to maintain all their children, it is a clear proof that the funds destined for the maintenance of labor cannot properly support a greater population; and that if further encouragements to multiplication be given and discourage. ments removed, the result must be, an increase somewhere or other of that vicious procreation which he so justly reprobates.

Mr. Townsend, who in his dissertation on the Poor Laws, has treated this subject with great skill and perspicuity, appears to me to conclude with a proposal which violates the principles on

1 Political Economy, vol. i. b. i. c. xli.

condition of the poor considered.

which he had reasoned so well. He wishes to make the benefit clubs, or friendly societies, which are now voluntarily established in many parishes, compulsory and universal; and proposes as a regulation that an unmarried man should pay a fourth part of his wages, and a married man with four children, not more than a thirtieth part.'

I must first remark, that the moment these subscriptions are made compulsory, they will neces sarily operate exactly like a direct tax upon labor, which as Dr. Smith justly states, will always be paid, and in a more expensive manner, by the consumer. The landed interest therefore, would receive no relief from this plan, but would pay the same sum as at present, only in the advanced price of labor and of commodities, instead of in the parish rates. A compulsory subscription of this kind would have almost all the ill effects of

the present system of relief, and though altered in name would still possess the essential spirit of the poor laws.

Dean Tucker, in some remarks on a plan of the same kind, proposed by Mr. Pew, observed, that

* Dissertation on the Poor Laws, p. 89, 2d. edit. 1787.

Different plans of improving the

after much talk and reflection on the subject, he had come to the conclusion, that they must be voluntary associations, and not compulsory assemblies. A voluntary subscription is like a tax upon a luxury, and does not necessarily raise the price of labor.

It should be recollected also, that in a voluntary association of a small extent, over which each individual member can exercise a superintendance, it is highly probable that the original agreements will all be strictly fulfilled, or if they be not, every man may at least have the redress of withdrawing himself from the club. But in an universal compulsory subscription, which must necessarily become a national concern, there would be no security whatever for the fulfilment of the original agreements; and when the funds failed, which they certainly would do, when all the idle and dissolute were included, instead of some of the most industrious and provident, as at present, a larger subscription would probably be demanded, and no man would have the right to refuse it. The evil would thus go on increasing as the poor rates do now. If indeed the assistance given were always specific, and on no account to be increased,