to idleness, pride, or vanity; or to luxurious and intemperate appetites; when it encroaches in any degree upon the feelings of a healthy self-respect, or a regard to character; and when it in any degree lessens in the receiver the feeling, that it is disgraceful to depend upon almsgiving, as long as a capacity of self-support is retained.

It would be easy to enumerate specific abuses both of public and private almsgiving. We all must have met with but too many of them, even in the small circles in which we have moved. There are, in every country, individuals and heads of families, capable of labor, who will not toil themselves, while they can live upon the toil of others. They are indisposed to any effort which they can avoid. Rather than work, they will live upon alms. There are those, too, who might live in great comfort upon their earnings, if they were willing to live within the compass of their earnings. In other words, they might live in great comfort upon their earnings, if they would deny themselves what they cannot afford, and were willing to appear to be simply what they are. But they aim at appearances, which their circumstances do not justify. They would not only find their condition to be a very comfortable one, but they would revolt from the thought of dependence upon alms, if they felt a proper selfrespect, and were under the guidance of a higher principle of right, honor, and duty. To give alms to such persons as these, I say, is an abuse of almsgiving. They need rather a ministration to their self-respect and sense of duty.

Again, there are those, and they are not a few, who, in cases of occasional and even considerable failures of employment, might pass through those seasons entirely without the aid of alms, if they would, while they have employment, but look to the seasons when employment will probably fail them, and appropriate, for these seasons, what might well be spared from their earnings. And would not almsgiving here be at least a ministration to thriftlessness? I need not say, also, what multitudes there are, who, if they would but wholly relinquish the use of spirituous liquors, would never require the aid of alms for their comfortable subsistence. Nay, it may be, that they are in no small degree induced to continue in their intemperance and wastefulness, by their

knowledge of the fact, that when pressed by want, they can avail themselves of alms. Now it is well known, it cannot be concealed, that injudicious almsgiving, has not only relaxed the main spring of industry in many a mind, it has not only acted as a bounty upon idleness, upon intemperance, and upon willing and unnecessary dependence, but it has even led to and encouraged the grossest deceptions, imposture, and recklessness.

Let it be known, that funds are provided for the various objects of human necessity, and these funds will be applied for; and supply, in this case, will indefinitely increase demand. It would be very unreasonable to look for any different result. If no necessity shall be felt, in the spring, summer, and autumn, of provision for winter, on what ground are we to expect that such provision will be made? We shall in vain teach economy by words, where the necessity of it is superseded by the free supply of those wants, which the individual could himself have supplied, merely by an economical use of his own resources.

Nor have parents and adults only been thus injured, perverted, and brought to indolence, thriftlessness, and debasement. Children have been, to a very great extent, made beggars, through the facilities and excitements which are given to beggary. I say, therefore, that to give to one who begs, because he had rather beg than work; or to give to one who is not too proud to beg, and yet is too proud to live and appear as he must, if he lives. upon his own earnings; or to give to those who might support themselves, if they would but look to the future, and economize in preparation for it; or to give to the intemperate, who, simply by abjuring the use of spirituous liquors, might be independent of all eleemosynary aid; or in any way to supersede the necessity of industry, of forecast, and of proper self-restraint and self-denial, is at once to do wrong, and to encourage the receivers of our alms to do wrong. It is patronizing pauperism, and, it may even be, great vice.

I have before said, that almsgiving is one of the highest, and, in the records of our religion, one of the most frequently and impressively inculcated, of our duties as Christians. I would, therefore, by every proper means increase, and would on no consideration do any thing to diminish, our sense of its obligation.

But it is proper, that we feel our responsibility, as well in regard to the evils which may be incidental to it, as to the good which may be done by it. We must not, therefore, shrink from the fullest view which can be obtained of these evils. We know, that it has been abused by many to whom it has been extended; and it is well if we can say, that it has never been abused by ourselves, through the want of care and good judgment with which we have exercised it. In speaking of its abuses, it is, therefore, to be remembered, that the whole blame of them does not fall upon the poor. I would not be unjust to any one, especially to one who is poor. But I am convinced, that a clear knowledge and a faithful avoidance of the evils of an injudicious bestowment of alms, is essential to Christian almsgiving. Rightly to understand uses in any case, we must, also, understand what are tendencies and liabilities to abuses in it. We are to do what good we may, in such a manner and under such precautions, as, if possible, to avoid any evils which may be incidental to it.

II. But guided by the facts, arguments, and illustrations just given, how are we to perform the important duty of almsgiving in such a way as to attain the greatest possible good, and avoid the evils which are incidental to it? This is a grave question, and an attempt will be made to answer it as fully as my limits will permit.

1. Education of every kind, especially moral and religious education, is the most beneficial of all the modes of almsgiving. This is too plain to require, or even to admit, much illustration. The tendency of knowledge, that is, its ultimate tendency, unquestionably is, to improve the habits of those who acquire it, to elevate and strengthen their principles, and to amend all that constitutes their character. Principles and feelings, combined, make up what is called human character. And that the tendency of education is to amend this character by the influence of knowledge, and in proportion to its diffusion, there can be no doubt. Its tendency is to increase habits of reflection, to enlarge the mind, and render it more capable of receiving pleasurable impressions from, and taking an interest in, other things besides sensual gratification. This process operates likewise on the feelings, and necessarily tends to improve the character and conduct of the

individual, to increase prudential habits, and to cultivate, in their purest form, the feelings and affections of the heart.* It is admitted, that education is not always a sufficient guaranty against the commission of crime, it is indeed a mighty instrument of either good or evil, according as it is directed. The great object of education ought to be, the cultivation of the moral feelings, habits, principles, and character.

The children of the poor, then, ought to be special objects of the care of those who take a lively concern in improving the morals and advancing the happiness of mankind. To this end, our infant-school societies are among the most useful of our institutions, in rescuing the children of paupers, and of the most profligate of the poor, from the disastrous exposures of their condition. Their object is, to take these children into their charge, even at the age of lisping infancy, and form their first associations to the knowledge and love of right, to the knowledge and practice of their duty, and to the knowledge and love of God, their Almighty Father. These schools are moral nurseries for those, who, if not gathered into them, or if left where they are, can hardly be expected, when they shall be advanced in life, to have any clear conceptions and permanent regard for right and wrong; and who certainly, if uncared for, will not be wholly accountable for their character and conduct. The responsibility will be divided between themselves and those by whom they shall have been neglected.

2. Furnishing the poor with employment, at a reasonable compensation, is another unquestionable and unexceptionable way of benefiting them. This position, also, does not seem to require much illustration. We shall diminish the demand for alms, in proportion as we can awaken a spirit of industry in those who shall apply for them, and supply those with employment who cannot otherwise obtain it; and not less, in proportion as we shall save the children of paupers from early exposure, and education in the vices, which have brought their parents to debasement and ruin.

3. Alms given by individuals in considerable sums, to merito

* Lord Brougham's Speech in the British House of Lords, 20th June, 1834.

rious persons and families, suffering (laboring) under discouragement, depression, and misfortune, are often highly useful. By sudden or gradual fluctuations of business, by losses in commerce and manufactures, by seasons unfavorable to agriculture, by deprivation of health, by the fraud or other misconduct of persons who prove themselves unworthy of confidence, by fires, tempests, and inundations, the calamities of war, and the thousand other unforeseen contingences against which no prudence or foresight can guard, many meritorious individuals and families, in every community, are occasionally, without any fault of theirs, suddenly reduced to the most humiliating and distressed circumstances, who have all the feelings, habits, and associations of independence, of comfort, and perhaps of affluence.

Few situations are more trying and distressing than this. It not only appeals strongly to the sensibilities and personal endeavours of the friends of such individuals and families in their behalf, it does much more; at times, especially, it appeals to them for aid still more substantial, for loans or even benefactions of money. These are the proper occasions, on which men of wealth, and all persons in easy circumstances, may do good, by unclenching the right hand without letting the left hand know what the right hand is doing. A benefaction may appropriately be bestowed in such cases, "not to be seen of men," but secretly, the open and manifest reward of which is specially promised by the Almighty.†

4. Alms dispensed through the intervention of hospitals, almshouses, infirmaries, asylums, and charitable societies of various kinds. On the first four of these means of administering alms, it is not necessary to enlarge. It does not appear, that previous to the introduction of Christianity, any similar means of relieving the poor and distressed had been provided in any country.‡ They are, therefore among the most precious fruits of Christianity, and an imperishable honor to this divine religion. In these institutions, the suffering poor, the maimed, the halt, and the blind, the distressed and unfortunate of every class, who have none else to care for them, find a refuge, and are cared for.