PART VI.--AFTER THE REFORMATION

The Reformation theory of charity.

During the Reformation, which extended, it should be understood, from

the middle of the 14th century to the reign of James I., the groundwork

of the theory of charity was being recast. The old system and the narrow

theory on which it had come to depend were discredited. The recoil is

startling. To a very large extent charitable administration had been in

the hands of men and women who, as an indispensable condition to their

participation in it, took the vows of obedience, chastity and "wilful"

poverty. Now this was all entirely set aside. It was felt (see _Homilies

on Faith and Good Works, &c._, A.D. 1547) that socially and morally the

method had been a failure. The vow of obedience, it was argued, led to a

general disregard of the duties of civic and family life. Those who

bound themselves by it were outside the state and did not serve it. In

regard to chastity the _Homily_ states the common opinion: "How the

profession of chastity was kept, it is more honesty to pass over in

silence and let the world judge of what is well known." As to wilful

poverty, the regulars, it is urged, were not poor, but rich, for they

were in possession of much wealth. Their property, it is true, was held

_in communi_, and not personally, but nevertheless it was practically

theirs, and they used it for their personal enjoyment; and "for all

their riches they might never help father nor mother, nor others that

were indeed very needy and poor, without the license of their father

abbot" or other head. This was the negative position. The positive was

found in the doctrine of justification--the central point in the

discussions of the time, a plant from the garden of St Augustine.

Justification was the personal conviction of a lively (or living) faith,

and was defined as "a true trust and confidence of the mercy of God

through our Lord Jesus Christ, and a stedfast hope of all good things to

be received at His hands." Without this justification there could be no

good works. They were the signs of a lively faith and grew out of it.

Apart from it, what seemed to be "good works" were of the nature of sin,

phantom acts productive of nothing, "birds that were lost, unreal." So

were the works of pagans and heretics. The relation of almsgiving to

religion was thus entirely altered. The personal reward here or

hereafter to the actor was eliminated. The deed was good only in the

same sense in which the doer was good; it had in itself no merit. This

was a great gain, quite apart from any question as to the sufficiency or

insufficiency of the Protestant scheme of salvation. The deed, it was

realized, was only the outcome of the doer, the expression of himself,

what he was as a whole, neither better nor worse. Logically this led to

the discipline of the intelligence and the emotions, and undoubtedly

"justification" to very many was only consistent with such discipline

and implied it. Thus under a new guise the old position of charity

reasserted itself. But there were other differences.

The relation of charity to prayer, fasting, almsgiving and penance was

altsred. The prayerful contemplation of the Christ was preserved in

the mysticism of Protestantism; but it was dissociated from the

"historic Christ," from the fervent idealization of whom St Francis

drew his inspiration and his active charitable impulse. The tradition

did not die out, however. It remained with many, notably with George

Herbert, of whom it made, not unlike St Francis, a poet as well as a

practical parish priest; but the absence of it indicated in much

post-Reformation endeavour a want, if not of devotion, yet of

intensity of feeling which may in part account for the fact that

sectarianism in relief has since proved itself stronger than charity,

instead of yielding to charity as its superior and its organizer.

Fasting was parted from prayer and almsgiving. It was "a thing not of

its own proper nature good as the love of father or mother or

neighbour, but according to its end." Almsgiving also as a "work"

disappeared and with it a whole series of inducements that from the

standpoint of the pecuniary and material supply of relief had long

been active. It was no wonder that the preachers advocated it in vain,

and reproached their hearers with their diminished bounty to the poor;

the old personal incentive had gone, and could only gradually be

superseded by the spontaneous activity of personal religion very

slowly wedding itself to true views of social duty and purpose.

Penance, once so closely related to almsgiving, passed out of sight.

Charity, the love of God and our neighbour, had two offices, it was

said, "to cherish good and harmless men" and "to correct and punish

vice without regard to persons." Correction as a means of discipline

takes the place of penance, and it becomes judicial, regulating and

controlling church membership by the authority of the church, a

congregation, minister or elder; or dealing with laziness or ill-doing

through the municipality or state, in connexion with what now first

appear, not prisons, but houses of correction.

The religious life was to be democratic--not in religious bodies, but in

the whole people; and in a new sense--in relation to family and social

life--it was to be moral. That was the significance of the Reformation

for charity.

The organization of municipal relief.

Consistently with this movement of religious activity towards a complete

fulfilment of the duties of civic life, the older classical social

theory, fostered by the Renaissance, assumed a new influence--the great

conception of the state as a community bound together by charity and

friendship, "We be not born to ourselves," it was said, "but partly to

the use of our country, of our parents, of our kinsfolk, and partly of

our friends and neighbours; and therefore all good virtues are grafted

on us naturally, whose effects be to do good to others, when it showeth

forth the image of God in man, whose property is ever to do good to

others" (Lamond, p. 14). Economic theory also changed. Instead of the

medieval opinion of the "theologian or social preacher," that "trade

could only be defended on the ground that honestly conducted it made no

profit" (Green, ii. 71), we have a recognition of the advantages

resulting from exchange, and individual interests, it is argued, are not

necessarily inconsistent with those of the state, but are, on the

contrary, a source of solid good to the whole community.

Municipal laws for the suppression of the mendicity of the able-bodied

and the organization of relief on behalf of the infirm were common in

England and on the continent (Colmar, 1362; Nuremberg, 1478;

Strassburg, 1523; London, 1514). Vives (Ehrle, _Beitrage zur

Geschichte und Reform der Armenpflege_, p. 26), a Spaniard, who had

been at the court of Henry VIII., in a book translated into several

languages and widely read, seems to have summed up the thought of the

time in regard to the management of the poor. He divided them into

three classes: those in hospitals and poor-houses, the public homeless

beggars and the poor at home. He would have a census taken of the

number of each class in the town, and information obtained as to the

causes of their distress. Then he would establish a central

organization of relief under the magistrates. Work was to be supplied

for all, while begging was strictly forbidden. Non-settled poor who

were able-bodied were to be sent to their homes. Able-bodied settled

poor who knew no craft were to be put on some public work--the

undeserving being set to hard labour. For others work was to be found,

or they were to be assisted to become self-supporting. The hospitals

provided with medical advice and necessaries were to be classified to

meet the needs of the sick, the blind and lunatics. The poor living at

home were to work with a view to their self-support. What they earned,

if insufficient, might be supplemented. If a citizen found a case of

distress he was not to help it, but to send it for inquiry to the

magistrate. Children were to be taught. Private relief was to be

obtained from the rich. The funds of endowed charities were to be the

chief source of income; if more was wanted, bequests and church

collections would suffice. The scheme was put in force in Ypres in

1524. The Sorbonne approved it, and similar plans were adopted in

Paris and elsewhere. It is in outline the scheme of London municipal

charity promoted by Edward VI., by which the poor were classified, St

Bartholomew's and St Thomas's hospitals appropriated for the sick,

Christ's hospital for the children of the poor, and Bridewell for the

correction of the able-bodied. Less the institutional arrangements and

plus the compulsory rate, the methods are those of the Poor Relief Act

of Queen Elizabeth of 1601. At first the attempt had been made to

introduce state relief in reliance on voluntary alms (1 Mary 13, 5

Eliz. 3, 1562-1563), subject to the right of assessment if alms were

refused. But the position was anomalous. Charity is voluntary, and

spontaneously meets the demands of distress. Such demands have always

a tendency to increase with the supply. Hence the very limitations of

charitable finance are in the nature of a safeguard. At most economic

trouble can only be assuaged by relief, and it can only be met or

prevented by economic and social reforms. If a compulsory rate be not

enforced, as in Scotland and formerly in some parishes in England, a

voluntary rate may be made in supplementation of the local charities.

In Scotland, where the compulsory clauses of the Poor Relief Act of

James I. were not put in force, the country weathered the storm

without them, and the compulsory rate, which was extended throughout

the country by the Poor Act of 1844, came in very slowly in the 18th

and 19th centuries. In France (1566) a similar act was passed and set

aside. If a compulsory rate be enforced, it is inevitable that the

resources of charity, unless kept apart from the poor-law and

administered on different lines from it, will diminish, and at the

same time, as has happened often in the case of endowed charities, the

interest in charitable administration will lapse, while the charges

for poor-law relief, drawn without much scruple from the taxation of

the community, will mount to millions either to meet increasing

demands or to provide more elaborate institutional accommodation. The

principle once adopted, it was enacted (1572-1573) that the aged and

infirm should be cared for by the overseers of the poor, a new

authority; and in 1601 the duplicate acts were passed, that for the

relief of the poor (43 Eliz. 2), and that for the furtherance and

protection of endowed charities. Thus the poor were brought into the

dependence of a legally recognized class, endowed with a claim for

relief, on the fulfilment of which, after a time, they could without

difficulty insist if they were so minded. The civic authority had

indeed taken over the alms of the parish, and an _eleemosyna civica_

had taken the place of the _annona civica_. It was a similar system

under a different name.

Poor Relief Acts and statutory serfdom.

A phrase of Robert Cecil's (1st earl of Salisbury) indicates the minute

domestic character of the Elizabethan legislation (D'Ewes, 674). The

question (1601) was the repeal of a statute of tillage. Cecil says: "If

in Edward I.'s time a law was made for the maintenance of the fry of

fish, and in Henry VII.'s for the preservation of the eggs of wild fowl,

shall we now throw away a law of more consequence and import? If we

debar tillage, we give scope to the depopulating. And then, if the poor

being thrust out of their houses go to dwell with others, straight we

catch them with the statute of inmates; if they wander abroad, they are

within the danger of the statute of the poor to be whipt. So by this

undo this statute, and you endanger many thousands." A strong central

government, a local authority appointed directly by the government, and

a network of legislation controlled the whole movement of economic life.

On this reliance was placed to meet economic difficulties. The local

authorities were the justices of the peace; and they had to carry out

the statutes for this purpose, to assess the wages of artisans and

labourers, and to enforce the payment of the wages they had fixed; to

ensure that suitable provision was made for the relief of the poor at

the expense of rates which they also fixed; and to suppress vagabondage.

Since 23 Edw. III. there had been labour statutes, and in 1563 a new

statute was passed, an "Act containing divers orders for Artificers,

Labourers, Servants of Husbandry and Apprentices" (5 Eliz. c. 4). It

recognized and upheld a social classification. On the one hand there was

the gentleman or owner of property to which the act was not to apply;

and on the other the artisan and labouring class. This class in turn was

subdivided, and the justices were to assess their wages annually

according to "the plenty and scarcity of the time and other

circumstances." Persons between the ages of twelve and sixty, who were

not apprentices or engaged in certain specified employments, were

compelled to serve in husbandry by the year "with any person that

keepeth husbandry." The length of the day's work and the conditions of

apprenticeship were fixed. The assessed rate of wages was enforceable by

fine and imprisonment, and refusal to be apprenticed by imprisonment.

Thus there was created a life control over labour with an industrial

settlement and a wage fixed by the justices annually. There are

differences of opinion in regard to the extent to which this act was

enforced; and the evidence on the point is comparatively scanty. It was

enforced throughout the century in which it was passed, and it probably

continued in force generally until the Restoration, while subsequently

it was put in operation to meet special emergencies, such as times of

distress when some settlement of wages seemed desirable (cf. Rogers, v.

611; Hewins, _English Trade and Finance_, p. 82; Cunningham, _Growth of

English Industry and Commerce: Modern Times_, i. 168). It was not

repealed till 1814.

From 1585 to 1622 there was, it is said, a slight increase in labourers'

wages, which fluctuated from 5s. 3/8d. to 5s. 8-1/4d. a week, with a

declining standard of comfort and at times great distress. Then there

was a marked increase of wage till 1662 and "a very marked improvement;

the rate of increase being very nearly double that of the earlier

periods," and reaching 9s., "as the highest weekly rate for the whole

period." Then from 1662 to 1702 there was "a slight improvement"

(Hewins, p. 89). It would seem indeed that the stir of the times between

1622 and 1662 may have caused a great demand for labour. But with the

Restoration, when the assessment system was falling into desuetude, came

the Poor Relief Act of 1662 (13 & 14 Car. II. cap. 62), which brought in

the law of settlement, and a settlement for relief of a very strict

nature was added to the industrial settlement of the Artificers and

Labourers Act. Thus, if the influence of that act, which had so long

controlled labour, was waning, its place was now taken by an act which,

though it had nothing to do with the assessment of wage, yet so settled

the labourer within the bounds of his parish that he had practically to

rely, if not upon a wage fixed by the justices, yet upon a customary

wage limited and restricted as a result of the law of settlement. And

the assessment by the justices, in so far as it may have continued,

would therefore be of little or no consequence. Settlement also, like

the Artificers and Labourers Act, would prevent the country labourer

from passing to the towns, or the townsmen passing to other towns. At

least they would do so at the risk of forfeiting their right to relief

if they lost their settlement without acquiring a new one. Hence the

industrial control, though under another name and other conditions,

remained in force to a large extent in practice.

By the Artificers and Labourers Act then, in conjunction with other

measures, the labouring classes were finally committed to a new bondage,

when they had freed themselves from the serfdom of feudalism, and when

the control exercised over them by the gild and municipality was

relaxed. The statute was so enforced that to earn a year's livelihood

would have taken a labourer not 52 weeks, but sometimes two years, or 58

weeks, or 80 weeks, or 72 weeks; sometimes, however, less--48 or 35. It

followed that on such a system the country could only with the utmost

good fortune free itself from the economic difficulties of the century,

and that the need of a poor-law was felt the more as these difficulties

persisted. A voluntary or a municipal system could not suffice, even as

a palliative, while such statutes as these were in force to render

labour immobile and unprogressive. Also, while wages were fixed by

statute or order, whether chiefly in the interest of the employers or

not, obviously any shortage on the wages had to be made good by the

community. The community, by fixing the wages to be earned in a

livelihood, made itself responsible for their sufficiency. And it is

suggestive to find that in the year in which the Artificers and

Labourers Act (1563) was passed, the act for the enforcement of

assessments of poor-rate (5 Eliz. cap. 3) was also enacted. The Law of

Settlement, to which we have referred, passed in the reign of Charles

II., was due, it is said, to a migration of labourers southward from

counties where less favourable statutory wages prevailed; but it was, in

fact, only a corollary of the Artificers and Labourers Act of 1563 and

the Poor Relief Act of 1601. These laws, it may be said, were the means

of making the English labourer, until the poor-law reform of 1834, a

settled but landless serf, supported by a fixed wage and a state bounty.

By the poor-law it was possible to continue this state of things till,

in consequence of an absolute economic breakdown, there was no

alternative but reform.

The philanthropic nature of the poor-law is indicated by its

antecedents: once enacted, its bounties became a right; its philanthropy

disappeared in a quasi-legal claim. Its object was to relieve the poor

by home industries, apprentice children, and provide necessary relief to

the poor unable to work. The act was commonly interpreted so as to

include the whole of that indefinite class, the "poor"; by a better and

more rigid interpretation it was, at least in the 19th century, held to

apply only to the "destitute," that is, to those who required "necessary

relief"--according to the actual wording of the statute. The economic

fallacy of home industries founded on rate-supplied capital early

declared itself, and the method could only have continued as long as it

did because it formed part of a general system of industrial control.

When in the 18th century workhouses were established, the same

industrial fallacy, as records show, repeated itself under new

conditions. Within the parish it resulted in the farmer paying the

labourer as small a wage as possible, and leaving the parish to provide

whatever he might require in addition during his working life and in his

old age. Thus, indeed, a gigantic experiment in civic employment was

made for at least two centuries on a vast scale throughout the

country--and failed. As was natural, the lack of economic independence

reacted on the morals of the people. With pauperism came want of energy,

idleness and a disregard for chastity and the obligations of marriage.

The law, it is true, recognized the mutual obligations of parents and

grandparents, children and grandchildren; but in the general poverty

which it was itself a means of perpetuating such obligations became

practically obsolete, while at all times they are difficult to enforce.

Still, the fact that they were recognized implies a great advance in

charitable thought. The act, passed at first from year to year, was very

slowly put in force. Even before it was passed the poor-rate first

assessed under the act of 1563 was felt to be "a greater tax than some

subsidies," and in the time of Charles II. it amounted to a third of the

revenue of England and Wales (Rogers, v. 81).

The service of villein and cottar was, as we have now seen, in part

superseded by what we have called a statutory wage-control, founded on a

basis of wage supplemented by relief, provided by a rate-supported

poor-law. But it follows that with the decay of this system the poor-law

itself should have disappeared, or should have taken some new and very

limited form. Unfortunately, as in Roman times, state relief proved to

be a popular and vigorous parasite that outlived the tree on which it

was rooted: assessments of wage under the Statute of Labourers fell into

disuse after the Restoration, it is said, and the statute was finally

repealed in 1814, and sixty years later the act against illegal

combinations of working men; but the serfdom of the poor-law, the

_eleemosyna civica_, remained, to work the gravest evil to the labouring

classes, and even after the reform of 1834 greatly impeded the recovery

of their independence. Nevertheless, by a new law of state alms for the

aged, or by statutory outdoor relief with, as some would wish, a

regulated wage, it is now proposed to bring them once again under a

thraldom similar to that from which they have so slowly emancipated

themselves.

The endowed charities.

The policy adopted by Queen Elizabeth for the relief of the poor (1601)

included a scheme for the reorganization of voluntary charity as well as

plans for the extension of rate-aided relief. During the century, as we

have seen, endeavours had been made to create a system of voluntary

charity. This it was proposed to safeguard and promote concurrently with

the extension of the poor-rate. Accordingly, in the poor-law it was

arranged that the overseers, the new civic authority, and the

churchwardens, the old parochial and charitable authority, should act in

conjunction, and, subject to magisterial approval, together "raise

weekly or otherwise" the necessary means "by taxation of every

inhabitant." The old charitable organization was based on endowment, and

the churchwarden was responsible for the administration of many such

endowments. What was not available from these and other sources was to

be raised "by taxation." The object of the new act was to encourage

charitable gifts.

Towards the end of the 18th century, when the administration of poor

relief fell into confusion, many charities were lost, or were in danger

of being lost, and many were mismanaged. In 1786 and 1788 a committee of

the House of Commons reported on the subject. In 1818, chiefly through

the instrumentality of Lord Brougham, a commission of inquiry on

educational charities was appointed, and in 1819 another commission to

investigate (with some exceptions) all the charities for the poor in

England and Wales. These and subsequent commissions continued their

inquiries till 1835, when a select committee of the House of Commons

made a strong report, advocating the establishment of a permanent and

independent board, to inquire, to compel the production of accounts, to

secure the safe custody of charity property, to adapt it to new uses on

cy-pres lines, &c. A commission followed in 1849, and eventually in 1853

the first Charitable Trusts Act was passed, under which "The Charity

Commissioners of England and Wales" were appointed.

The following are details of importance:--(1) _Definition._--The

definition of the act of 1601 (Charitable Uses, 43 Eliz. 4) still

holds good. It enumerates as charitable objects all that was once

called "alms": (a) "The relief of aged, impotent and poor people"--the

normal poor; "the maintenance of sick and maimed soldiers and

mariners"--the poor chiefly by reason of war, sometime a class of

privileged mendicants; (b) education, "schools of learning, free

schools and scholars in universities"; and then (c) a group of objects

which include general civic and religious purposes, and the charities

of gilds and corporations; "the repair of bridges, ports, havens,

causeways, churches, sea-banks and highways; the education and

preferment of orphans; the relief, stock, or maintenance for houses of

correction; marriages of poor maids, supportation, aid, and help of

young tradesmen, handicraftsmen, and persons decayed"; and there

follows (d) "the relief or redemption of prisoners or captives"; and,

lastly, (e) "the aid and ease of any poor inhabitants concerning

payment of fifteens" (the property-tax of Tudor times), setting out of

soldiers, and other taxes. The definition might be illustrated by the

charitable bequests of the next 60, or indeed 225, years. It is a fair

summary of them. (2) _Charitable Gifts._--A public trust and a

charitable trust are, as this definition shows, synonymous. It is a

trust which relates to public charities, and is not held for the

benefit of private persons, e.g. relations, but for the common good,

and, subject to the instructions of the founder, by trustees

responsible to the community. Gifts for charitable purposes, other

than those affected by the law of mortmain, have always been viewed

with favour. "Where a charitable bequest is capable of two

constructions, one of which would make it void and the other would

make it effectual, the latter will be adopted by the court" (Tudor's

_Charitable Trusts_, ed. 1906, by Bristowe, Hunt and Burdett, p. 167).

Gifts to the poor, or widows, or orphans, indefinitely, or in a

particular parish, were valid under the act, or for any purpose or

institution for the aid of the "poor." Thus practically the act

covered the same field as the poor-law, though afterwards it was

decided that, "as a rule, persons receiving parochial relief were not

entitled to the benefit of a charity intended for the poor" (Tudor, p.

167). (3) _Religious Differences._--In the administration of charities

which are for the poor the broadest view is taken of religious

differences. (4) _Superstitious Uses._--The superstitious use is one

that has for its object the propagation of the rights of a religion

not tolerated by the law (Tudor, p. 4). Consequently, so far as

charities were held or left subject to such rights, they were illegal,

or became legal only as toleration was extended. Thus by degrees,

since the Toleration Act of 1688, all charities to dissenters have

become legal--that is, trusts for schools, places for religious

instruction, education and charitable purposes generally. But bequests

for masses for the soul of the donor, or for monastic orders, are

still void. (5) _Administration._--The duty of administering

charitable trusts falls upon trustees or corporations, and under the

term "eleemosynary corporations" are included endowed hospitals and

colleges. Under schemes of the Charity Commissioners, where charities

have been remodelled, besides trustees elected by corporations, there

are now usually appointed _ex-officio_ trustees who represent some

office or institution of importance in connexion with the charity. (6)

_Jurisdiction by Chancery and Charity Commission._--The Court of

Chancery has jurisdiction over charities, under the old principle that

"charities are trusts of a public nature, in regard to which no one is

entitled by an immediate and peculiar interest to prefer a complaint

for compelling the performance by the trustees of their obligations."

The court, accordingly, represents the crown as _parens patriae_. Now,

by the Charitable Trusts Act 1853, and subsequent acts, a charity

commission has been formed which is entrusted with large powers,

formerly enforced only by the Court of Chancery. (7) _Jurisdiction by

Visitor._--A further jurisdiction is by the "visitor," a right

inherent in the founder of any eleemosynary corporation, and his

heirs, or those whom he appoints, or in their default, the king. The

object of the visitor is "to prevent all perverting of the charity, or

to compose differences among members of the corporation." Formerly the

bishop's ordinary was the recognized visitor (2 Henry V. I, 1414) of

hospitals, apart from the founder. Subsequently his power was limited

(14 Eliz. c. 5, 1572) to hospitals for which the founders had

appointed no visitors. Then (1601) by the Charitable Uses Act

commissions were issued for inquiry by county juries. Now, apart from

the duty of visitors, inquiry is conducted by the charity

commissioners and the assistant commissioners. By subsequent acts (see

below) ecclesiastical and eleemosynary charities have been still

further separated and defined. (8) _Advice._--"Trustees, or other

persons concerned in the management of a charity, may apply to the

charity commissioners for their opinion, advice or direction; and any

person acting under such advice is indemnified, unless he has been

guilty of misrepresentation in obtaining it." (9) _Limitation of

Charity Commissioners' Powers_,--The commissioners cannot, however,

make any order with respect to any charity of which the gross annual

income amounts to L50 or upwards, except on the application (in

writing) of the trustees or a majority of them. Their powers are thus

very limited, except when put in motion by the trustees. If a parish

is divided they can apportion the charities if the gross income does

not exceed L20. (10) _General Powers of the Charity

Commission._--Subject to the limitation of L50, &c., the charity

commissioners have power (Charitable Trusts Act 1860) to make orders

for the appointment or removal of trustees, or of any officer, and for

the transfer, payment and vesting of any real or personal estate, or

"for the establishment of any scheme for the administration" of the

charity, (11) _Schemes and Remodelling of Charities._--Under this

power charities are remodelled, and small and miscellaneous charities

put into one fund and applied to new purposes. The cy-pres doctrine is

applied, by which if a testator leaves directions that are only

indefinite, or if the objects for which a charity was founded are

obsolete, the charity is applied to some purpose, as far as possible,

in accordance with the charitable intention of the founder. This

doctrine probably received its widest application in the City of

London Parochial Charities Act of 1883. Under other acts doles have

been applied to education and to allotments. About 380 schemes are

issued in the course of a year. (12) _Objects adopted in remodelling

Charities._--In the remodelling of charities for the general benefit

of the poor some one or more of thirteen objects are usually included

in the scheme. These are subscriptions to a medical charity, to a

provident club or coal or clothing society, to a friendly society; for

nurses, for annuities, for outfit for service, &c.; for emigration;

for recreation grounds, clubs, reading-rooms, museums, lectures; for

temporary relief to a limited amount in each year; for clothes fuel,

tools, medical aid, food, &c., or in money "in cases of unexpected

loss or sudden destitution"; for pensions. (13) _Parochial

Charities._--By the Local Government Act of 1892, local ecclesiastical

charities, i.e. endowments for "any spiritual purpose that is a

legal purpose" (for spiritual persons, church and other buildings, for

spiritual uses, &c.), are separated from parochial charities, "the

benefits of which are, or the separate distribution of the benefits of

which is, confined to inhabitants of a single parish, or of a single

ancient ecclesiastical parish, or not more than five neighbouring

parishes." These charities, since the Local Government Act 1894, are

under the supervision of the parish councils, who appoint trustees for

their management in lieu of the former overseer or vestry trustees,

or, under certain conditions, "additional trustees." The accounts have

to be submitted to the parish meeting, and the names of the

beneficiaries of dole charities published. (14) _Official

Trustees._--There is also "an official trustee of charity lands," who

as "bare trustee" may hold the land or stock of the charity managed by

the trustees or administrators. In 1905 the stock transferred to the

official trustees amounted to L24,820,945. (15) _Audit_.--The charity

commissioners have no power of audit, but the trustees of every

charity have to prepare a statement of accounts annually, and transmit

it to the commission. The accounts have to be "certified under the

hand of one or more of the trustees and by the auditor of the

charity." (16) _Taxation_.--In the case of rents and profits of lands,

&c., belonging to hospitals or almshouses, or vested in trustees for

charitable purposes, allowances are made in diminution of income-tax

(56 Vict. 35 S 61). From the inhabited house duty any hospital charity

school, or house provided for the reception or relief of poor persons,

is exempted (House Tax Act 1808). Also there is an exemption from the

land-tax in regard to land rents, &c., in possession of hospitals

before 1693. (17) _The Digest._--A digest of endowed charities in

England and Wales was compiled in the years 1861 to 1876. A new digest

of reports and financial particulars has since been completed.

The income of endowed charities in 1876 was returned at L2,198,463. It

is now, no doubt, considerably larger than it was in 1876. Partial

returns show that at least a million a year is now available in

England and Wales for the assistance of the aged poor and for doles.

Between the poor-law, which, as it is at present administered, is a

permanent endowment provided from the rates for the support of a class

of permanent "poor," and endowed charities, which are funds available

for the poor of successive generations, there is no great difference.

But in their resources and administration the difference is marked.

Local endowed charities were constantly founded after Queen

Elizabeth's time till about 1830, and the poor-rate was at first

supplementary of the local charities. When corn and fuel were dear and

clothes very expensive, what now seem trivial endowments for food,

fuel, coal and clothes were important assets in the thrifty management

of a parish. But when the poor were recognized as a class of

dependants entitled by law to relief from the community, the rate

increased out of all proportion to the charities. A distinction then

made itself felt between the "parish" poor and the "second" poor, or

the poor who were not relieved from the rates, and relief from the

rates altogether overshadowed the charitable aid. Charitable

endowments were ignored, ill-administered, and often were lost. After

1834 the poor-law was brought under the control of the central

government. Poor relief was placed in the hands of boards of guardians

in unions of parishes. The method of co-operation between poor-law and

charity suggested by the acts of Queen Elizabeth was set aside, and,

as a responsible partner in the public work of relief, charity was

disestablished. In the parishes the endowed charities remained in

general a disorganized medley of separate trusts, jealously guarded by

incompetent administrators. To give unity to this mass of units, so

long as the principles of charity are misunderstood or ignored, has

proved an almost impossible and certainly an unpopular task. So far as

it has been achieved, it has been accomplished by the piecemeal

legislation of schemes cautiously elaborated to meet local prejudices.

Active reform has been resented, and politicians have often

accentuated this resentment. In 1894 a select committee was appointed

to inquire whether it was desirable to take measures to bring the

action of the Charity Commission more directly under the control of

parliament, but no serious grievances were substantiated. The

committees' reports are of interest, however, as an indication of the

initial difficulties of all charitable work, the general ignorance

that prevails in regard to the elementary conditions that govern it,

the common disregard of these principles, and the absence of any

accepted theory or constructive policy that should regulate its

development and its administration.

Charity in the parish after 1601.

After the Poor-Law Act of 1601 the history of the voluntary parochial

charities in a town parish is marked by their decreasing amount and

utility, as poor-law relief and pauperism increased. The act, it would

seem, was not adopted with much alacrity by the local authorities. From

1625 to 1646 there were many years of plague and sickness, but in St

Giles's, London, as late as 1649, the amount raised by the "collectors"

(or overseers) was only L176. They disbursed this to "the visited poor"

as "pensions." In 1665 an extra levy of L600 is mentioned. In the

accounts of St Martin's-in-the-Fields, where, as in St Giles's, gifts

were received, the change wrought by another half-century (1714) is

apparent. The sources of charitable relief are similar to those in all

the Protestant churches--English, Scottish or continental: church

collections and offertories; correctional fines, such as composition for

bastards and conviction money for swearers; and besides these, income

from annuities and legacies, the parish estate, the royal bounty, and

"petitions to persons of quality." In all L2041 was collected, but, so

far as relief was concerned, the parish relied not on it, but on the

poor-rate, which produced L3765. All this was collected and disbursed on

their own authority by collectors, to orphans, "pensioners" or the

"known or standing" poor, or to casual poor (L1818), including nurse

children and bastards. The begging poor were numerous and the infant

death-rate enormous, and each year three-fourths of those christened

were "inhumanly suffered to die by the barbarity of nurses." The whole

administration was uncharitable, injurious to the community and the

family, and inhuman to the child. If one may judge from later accounts

of other parishes even up to 1834, usually it remained the same,

purposeless and unintelligent; and it can hardly be denied that,

generally speaking, only since the middle of the 19th century has any

serious attention been paid to the charitable side of parochial work.

Parallel to the parochial movement of the poor-law in England, in France

(about 1617) were established the _bureaux de bienfaisance_, at first

entirely voluntary institutions, then recognized by the state, and

during the Revolution made the central administration for relief in the

communes.

Charitable movements after 1601.

In the 17th century in England, as in France, opinion favoured the

establishment of large hospitals or _maisons Dieu_ for the reception of

the poor of different classes. In France throughout the century there

was a continuous struggle with mendicancy, and the hospitals were used

as places into which offenders were summarily driven. A new humanity

was, however, beginning its protest. The pitiful condition of abandoned

children attracted sympathy in both countries. St Vincent de Paul

established homes for the _enfants trouves_, followed in England by the

establishment of the Foundling hospital (1739). In both countries the

method was applied inconsiderately and pushed to excess, and it affected

family life most injuriously. Grants from parliament supported the

foundling movement in England, and homes were opened in many parts of

the country. The demand soon became overwhelming; the mortality was

enormous, and the cost so large that it outstripped all financial

expedients. The lesson of the experiment is the same as that of the

poor-law catastrophe before 1834; only, instead of the able-bodied poor

of another age, infants were made the object of a compassionate but

undiscerning philanthropy. With widespread relief there came widespread

abandonment of duty and economic bankruptcy. Had the poor-rates instead

of charitable relief been used in the same way, the moral injury would

have been as great, but the annual draft from the rates would have

concealed the moral and postponed the economic disaster. To amend the

evil, changes were made by which the relation between child and mother

was kept alive, and a personal application on her part was required; the

character of the mother and her circumstances were investigated, and

assistance was only given when it would be "the means of replacing the

mother in the course of virtue and the way of an honest livelihood."

General reforms were also made, especially through the instrumentality

of Jonas Hanway, to check infant mortality, and metropolitan parishes

were required to provide for their children outside London. A kindred

movement led to the establishment of penitentiaries (1758), of lock

hospitals and lying-in hospitals (1749-1752).

In Queen Anne's reign there was a new educational movement, "the charity

school"--"to teach poor children the alphabet and the principles of

religion," followed by the Sunday-school movement (1780), and about the

same time (1788) by "the school of industry"--to employ children and

teach them to be industrious. In 1844 the Ragged School Union was

established, and until the Education Act of 1870 continued its voluntary

educational work. As an outcome of these movements, through the efforts

of Miss Mary Carpenter and many others, in 1854-1855 industrial and

reformatory schools were established, to prevent crime and reform child

criminals. The orphanage movement, beginning in 1758, when the Orphan

Working Home was established, has been continued to the present day on a

vastly extended scale. In 1772 a society for the discharge of persons

imprisoned for small debts was established, and in 1773 Howard began his

prison reforms. This raised the standard of work in institutional

charities generally. After the civil wars the old hospital foundations

of St Bartholomew and St Thomas, municipalized by Edward VI., became

endowed charities partly supported by voluntary contributions. The same

fate befell Christ's Hospital, in connexion with which the voting

system, the admission of candidates by the vote of the whole body of

subscribers--that peculiarly English invention--first makes its

appearance.

A new interest in hospitals sprang up at the end of the 17th century. St

Thomas's was rebuilt (1693) and St Bartholomew's (1739); Guy's was

founded in 1724, and on the system of free "letters" obtainable in

exchange for donations, voluntary hospitals and infirmaries were

established in London (1733 and later) and in most of the large towns.

Towards the end of the 18th century the dispensary movement was

developed--a system of local dispensaries with fairly definite districts

and home visiting, a substitute for attendance at a hospital, where

"hospital fever" was dreaded, and an alternative to what was then a very

ill-administered system of poor-law medical relief. After 1840 the

provident dispensary was introduced, in order that the patients by small

contributions in the time of health might provide for illness without

having to meet large doctors' bills, and the doctor might receive some

sufficient remuneration for his attendance on poor patients. This

movement was largely extended after 1860. Three hospital funds for

collecting contributions for hospitals and making them grants, a

movement that originated in Birmingham in 1859, were established in

London in 1873 and 1897.

Since 1868 the poor-law medical system of Great Britain has been

immensely improved and extended, while at the same time the number of

persons in receipt of free medical relief in most of the large towns

has greatly increased. The following figures refer to London: at

hospitals, 97 in number, in-patients (1904) during the year, 118,536;

out-patients and casualty cases, 1,858,800; patients at free,

part-pay, or provident dispensaries, about 280,000; orders issued for

attendance at poor-law dispensaries and at home, 114,158. The number

of beds in poor-law infirmaries (1904) was 16,976. There are in London

12 general hospitals with, 18 without, medical schools, and 67

special hospitals. Thus the population in receipt of public and

voluntary medical relief is very large, indeed altogether excessive.

Each religious movement has brought with it its several charities. The

Society of Friends, the Wesleyans, the Baptists have large charities.

With the extension of the High Church movement there have been

established many sisterhoods which support penitentiaries, convalescent

homes and hospitals, schools, missions, &c.

The magnitude of this accumulating provision of charitable relief is

evident, though it cannot be summed up in any single total.

At the beginning of the 19th century anti-mendicity societies were

established; and later, about 1869, in England and Scotland a movement

began for the organization of charitable relief, in connexion with which

there are now societies and committees in most of the larger towns in

Great Britain, in the colonies, and in the United States of America.

More recently the movement for the establishment of settlements in poor

districts, initiated by Canon Barnett at Toynbee Hall--"to educate

citizens in the knowledge of one another, and to provide them with

teaching and recreation"--has spread to many towns in England and

America.

Progress of thought in 18th and 19th centuries.

These notes of charitable movements suggest an altogether new

development of thought. On behalf of the charity school of Queen Anne's

time were preached very formal sermons, which showed but little sympathy

with child life. After the first half of the century a new humanism with

which we connect the name of Rousseau, slowly superseded this formal

beneficence. Rousseau made the world open its eyes and see nature in the

child, the family and the community. He analysed social life, intent on

explaining it and discovering on what its well-being depended; and he

stimulated that desire to meet definite social needs which is apparent

in the charities of the century. Little as it may appear to be so at

first sight, it was a period of charitable reformation. Law revised the

religious conception of charity, though he was himself so strangely

devoid of social instinct that, like some of his successors, he linked

the utmost earnestness in belief to that form of almsgiving which most

effectually fosters beggardom. Howard introduced the era of inspection,

the ardent apostle of a new social sagacity; and Bentham, no less

sagacious, propounded opinions, plans and suggestions which, perhaps it

may be said, in due course moulded the principles and methods of the

poor-law of 1834. In the broader sense the turn of thought is religious,

for while usually stress is laid on the religious scepticism of the

century, the deeper, fervent, conscientious and evangelical charity in

which Nonconformists, and especially "the Friends," took so large a

part, is often forgotten. Sometimes, indeed, as often happens now, the

feeling of charity passed into the merest sentimentality. This is

evident, for instance, from so ill-considered a measure as Pitt's Bill

for the relief of the poor. On the other hand, during the 18th century

the poor-law was the object of constant criticism, though so long as the

labour statutes and the old law of settlement were in force, and the

relief of the labouring population as state "poor" prevailed, it was

impossible to reform it. Indeed, the criticism itself was generally

vitiated by a tacit acceptance of "the poor" as a class, a permanent and

irrevocable charge on the funds of the community; and at the end of the

18th century, when the labour statutes were abrogated, but the

conditions under which poor relief was administered remained the same,

serfdom in its later stage, the serfdom of the poor-law, asserted itself

in its extremest form in times of dearth and difficulty during the

Napoleonic War. In 1802-1803 it was calculated (Marshall's _Digest_)

that 28% of the population were in receipt of permanent or occasional

relief. Those in receipt of the former numbered 734,817, including

children--so real had this serfdom of the poor become.

In 1832 the expenditure on pauperism in England and Wales was

L7,036,968. In the early years of the 19th century the mendicity

societies, established in some of the larger towns, were a sign of the

general discontent with existing methods of administration. The Society

for Bettering the Condition of the Poor--representing a group of men

such as Patrick Colquhoun, Sir I. Bernard, Dr Lettsom, Dr Haygarth,

James Neald, Count Rumford and others--took a more positive line and

issued many useful publications (1796). After 1833 the very atmosphere

of thought seems changed. There was a general desire to be quit of the

serfdom of pauperism. The Poor-law Amendment Act was passed in 1834, and

since then male able-bodied pauperism has dwindled to a minimum. The bad

years of 1860-1870 revived the problem in England and Scotland, and the

old spirit of reform for a time prevailed. Improved administration

working with economic progress effected still further reductions of

pauperism, till on the 1st of January 1905 (exclusive of lunatics in

county asylums and casual paupers) the mean number of paupers stood at

764,589, or 22.6 per thousand of the population, instead of 41.8 per

thousand as in 1859 (see POOR-LAW).

Charity organization societies were formed after 1869, with the object

of "improving the condition of the poor," or, in other words, to promote

independence by an ordered and co-operative charity; and the Association

for Befriending Young Servants, and workhouse aid committees, in order

to prevent relapse into pauperism on the part of those who as children

or young women received relief from the poor-law. The Local Government

Board adopted a restricted out-door relief policy, and a new interest

was felt in all the chief problems of local administration. The movement

was general. The results of the Elberfeld system of municipal relief

administered by unpaid almoners, each dealing with but one or two cases,

influenced thought both in England and America. The experience gained by

Mr Joseph Tuckerman of Boston of the utility of registering applications

for relief, and the teaching of Miss Octavia Hill, led to the foundation

of the system of friendly visiting and associated charity at Boston

(1880) and elsewhere. Since that time the influence of Arnold Toynbee

and the investigations of Charles Booth have led to a better

appreciation of the conditions of labour; and to some extent, in London

and elsewhere, the spirit of charity has assumed the form of a new

devotion to the duties of citizenship. But perhaps, in regard to charity

in Great Britain, the most important change has been the revival of the

teaching of Dr Chalmers (1780-1847), who (1819) introduced a system of

parochial charity at St John's, Glasgow, on independent lines,

consistent with the best traditions of the Scottish church. In the

development of the theory of charitable relief on the economic side this

has been a main factor. His view, which he tested by experience, may be

summed up as follows: Society is a growing, self-supporting organism. It

has within it, as between family and family, neighbour and neighbour,

master and employee, endless links of sympathy and self-support. Poverty

is not an absolute, but a relative term. Naturally the members of one

class help one another; the poor help the poor. There is thus a large

invisible fund available and constantly used by those who, by their

proximity to one another, know best how to help. The philanthropist is

an alien to this life around him. Moved by a sense of contrast between

his own lot, as he understands it, and the lot of those about him, whom

he but little understands, he concludes that he should relieve them. But

his gift, unless it be given in such a way as to promote this

self-support, instead of weakening it, is really injurious. In the first

place, by his interference he puts a check on the charitable resources

of another class and lessens their social energy. What he gives they do

not give, though they might do so. But next, he does more harm than

this. He stimulates expectation, so that by a false arithmetic his gift

of a few shillings seems to those who receive it and to those who hear

of it a possible source of help in any difficulty. To them it represents

a large command of means; and where one has received what, though it be

little, is yet, relative to wage, a large sum to be acquired without

labour, many will seek more, and with that object will waste their time

and be put off their work, or even be tempted to lie and cheat. So

social energy is diverted from its proper use. Alms thus given weakens

social ties, diminishes the natural relief funds of mutual help, and

beggars a neighbour instead of benefiting him. By this argument a clear

and well-defined purpose is placed before charity. Charity becomes a

science based on social principles and observation. Not to give alms,

but to keep alive the saving health of the family, becomes its problem:

relief becomes altogether subordinate to this, and institutions or

societies are serviceable or the reverse according as they serve or fail

to serve this purpose. Not poverty, but distress is the plea for help;

not almsgiving, but charity the means. To charity is given a definite

social aim, and a desire to use consistently with this aim every method

that increasing knowledge and trained ability can devise.

Under such influences as these, joined with better economic conditions,

a great reform has been made. The poor-law, however, remains--the modern

_eleemosyna civica_. It now, indeed, absorbs a proportionately lesser

amount of the largely increased national income, but, excluding the

maintenance of lunatics, it costs Great Britain more than twelve

millions a year; and among the lower classes of the poor, directly or

indirectly, it serves as a bounty on dependence and is a permanent

obstacle to thrift and self-reliance. The number of those who are within

the circle of its more immediate attraction is now perhaps, in different

parts of the country or different districts in a town, not more than,

say, 20% of the population. Upon that population the statistics of a day

census would show a pauperism not of 2.63, the percentage of the mean

day pauperism on the population in 1908, but of 13.15%; and the

percentage would be much greater--twice as large, perhaps--if the total

number of those who in some way received poor relief in the course of a

year were taken into account. The English poor-law is thus among the

lower classes, those most tempted to dependence--say some six or seven

millions of the people--a very potent influence definitely antagonistic

to the good development of family life, unless it be limited to very

narrow proportions; as, for instance, to restricted indoor or

institutional relief for the sick, for the aged and infirm, who in

extreme old age require special care and nursing, and for the afflicted,

for whom no sufficient charitable provision is procurable. As ample

experience shows, only on these conditions can poor-law relief be

justified from the point of view of charity and the common good. In

marked contrast to this opinion is the English movement for Old Age

pensions, which came to its first fruition in 1908--a huge charity

started on the credit of the state, the extension of which might

ultimately involve a cost comparable with that of the army or the navy.

Schemes of the kind have been adopted in the Australasian colonies with

limitations and safeguards; and they seem likely to develop into a new

type of poor-relief organization for the aged and infirm (Report: Royal

Commission on Old Age Pensions, Commonwealth of Australia, 1906). In

England, partly to meet the demand for better state provision for the

aged, the Local Government Board in 1900 urged the boards of guardians

to give more adequate outdoor relief to aged deserving people, and laid

no stress on the test of destitution, or, in other words, the limitation

of relief to what was actually "necessary," the neglect of which has led

to new difficulties. History has proved that demoralization results from

the wholesale relief whether of the mass of the citizens, or of the

able-bodied, or of the children, and the proposal to limit the endowment

to the aged makes no substantial difference. The social results must be

similar; but social forces work slowly, and usually only the

unanswerable argument of financial bankruptcy suffices to convert a

people habituated to dependence, though the inward decay of vitality and

character may long before be manifest. Ultimately the distribution of

pensions by way of out-door relief, corrupting a far more independent

people, is calculated to work a far greater injury than the _annona

civica_. Such an endowment of old age might indeed be justified as part

of a system of regulated labour, which, as in earlier times, could not

be enforced without some such extraneous help, but it could not be

justified otherwise. It is naturally associated, therefore, with

socialistic proposals for the regulation of wage.

In the light of the principles of charity, which we have considered

historically, we have now to turn to two questions: charity and

economics, and charity and socialism.

The economics of charity.

The object of charity is to render to our neighbour the services and

duties of goodwill, friendship and love. To prevent distress charity

has for its further object to preserve and develop the manhood and

womanhood of individuals and their self-maintenance in and through the

family; and any form of state intervention is approved or disapproved by

the same standard. By self-maintenance is meant self-support throughout

life in its ordinary contingencies--sickness, widowhood, old age, &c.

Political economy we would define as the science of exchange and

exchange value. Here it has to be considered in relation to the purposes

of charity. By way of illustration we take, accordingly, three points:

distribution and use, supplementation of wage, and the standard of

well-being or comfort in relation to wage.

(1) _Distribution and Use._--Economy in the Greek sense begins at this

point--the administration and the use of means and resources.

Political economy generally ignores this part of the problem. Yet from

the point of view of charity it is cardinal to the whole issue. The

distribution of wage may or may not be largely influenced by trades

unions; but the variation of wage, as is generally the case, by the

increase or decrease of a few pence is of less importance than its

use. Comparing a careful and an unthrifty family, the difference in

use may amount to as much as a third on the total wage. Mere

abstention from alcohol may make, in a normal family, a difference of

6s. in a wage of 25s. On the other hand, membership of a friendly

society is at a time of sickness equivalent to the command of a large

sum of money, for the common stock of capital is by that means placed

at the disposal of each individual who has a share in it. Further,

even a small amount saved may place the holder in a position to get a

better market for his labour; he can wait when another man cannot.

Rent may be high, but by co-operation that too may be reduced. Other

points are obvious and need not be mentioned. It is evident that while

the amount of wage is important, still more important is its use. In

use it has a large expansive value. (2) _Supplementation of

Wage._--The exchange between skill and wage must be free if it is to

be valid. The less the skill the greater is the temptation to

philanthropists to supplement the lesser wage; and the more important

is non-supplementation, for the skilled can usually look after their

own interests in the market, while the less skilled, because their

labour is less marketable, have to make the greater effort to avoid

dependence. But the dole of endowed charities, outdoor relief, and any

constant giving, tend to reduce wage, and thus to deprive the

recipients of some part of the means of independence. The employer is

pressed by competition himself, and in return he presses for profit

through a reduced wage, if circumstances make it possible for the

workman to take it. And thus a few individuals may lower the wages of

a large class of poorly skilled or unskilled hands. In these

conditions unionism, even if it were likely to be advantageous, is not

feasible. Unionism can only create a coherent unit of workers where

there is a limited market and a definite saleable skill. Except for

the time, insufficient wage will not be remedied in the individual

case by supplementation in any form--doles, clothes, or other kinds of

relief; and in that case, too, the relief will probably produce

lessened energy after a short time, or in other words lessened ability

to live. An insufficient wage may be prevented by increasing the skill

of the worker, who will then have the advantage of a better series of

economic exchanges, but hardly otherwise. If the supplementation be

not immediate, but postponed, as in the case of old-age pensions, its

effect will be similar. To the extent of the prospective adventitious

gain the attraction to the friendly society and to mutual help and

saving will grow less. Necessity has been the inventor of these; and

where wage is small, a little that would otherwise be saved is quickly

spent if the necessity for saving it is removed. Only necessity

schools most men, especially the weak, to whom it makes most

difference ultimately, whether they are thrifty or whether or not they

save for the future in any way. (3) _The Standard of Well-being or

Comfort in Relation to Wage._--With an increase of income there has to

be an increase in the power to use income intelligently. Whatever is

not so used reacts on the family to its undoing. Constantly when the

wife can earn a few shillings a week, the husband will every week idle

for two or three days; so also if the husband finds that in a few days

he can earn enough to meet what he considers to be his requirements

for the week. In these circumstances the standard of well-being falls

below the standard of wage; the wage is in excess of the energy and

intelligence necessary to its economic use, and in these cases

ultimately pauperism often ensues. The family is demoralized. Thus,

with a view to the prevention of distress in good times, when there is

the less poverty there is the more need of charity, rightly

understood; for charity would strive to promote the right use of wage,

as the best means of preventing distress and preserving the economic

well-being of the family.

Charity and socialism.

The theory of charity separates it entirely from socialism, as that word

is commonly used. Strictly socialism means, in questions affecting the

community, a dominant regard for the common or social good in so far as

it is contrary to private or individual advantage. But even so the

antithesis is misleading, for the two need not be inconsistent. On the

contrary, the common good is really and ultimately only individual good

(not advantage) harmonized to a common end. The issue, indeed, is that

of old Greek days, and the conditions of a settlement of it are not

substantially different. Using modern terms one may say that charity is

"interventionist." It has sought to transform the world by the

transformation of the will and the inward life in the individual and in

society. It would intensify the spirit and feeling of membership in

society and would aim at improving social conditions, as science makes

clear what the lines of reform should be. So it has constantly

intervened in all kinds of ways, and, in the 19th century for instance,

it has initiated many movements afterwards taken up by public

authorities--such as prison reform, industrial schools, child

protection, housing, food reform, &c., and it has been a friendly ally

in many reforms that affect industry very closely, as, for instance, in

the introduction of the factory acts. But it has never aimed at

recasting society itself on a new economic plan, as does socialism.

Socialism indeed offers the people a new state of social security. It

recognizes that the _annona civica_ and the old poor-law may have been

bad, but it would meet the objection made against them by insisting on

the gradual creation of a new industrial society in which wage would be

regulated and all would be supported, some by wage in adult life, some

by allowance in old age, and others by maintenance in childhood.

Accordingly for it all schemes for the state maintenance of school

children, old age pensions, or state provision for the unemployed are,

like municipal trading, steps towards a final stage, in which none shall

want because all shall be supported by society or be dependent on it

industrially. To charity this position seems to exclude the ethical

element in life and to treat the people primarily or chiefly as human

animals. It seems also to exclude the motives for energy and endeavour

that come from self-maintenance. Against it, on the other hand,

socialism would urge, that only by close regulation and penalty will the

lowest classes be improved, and that only the society that maintains

them can control them. Charity from its experience doubts the

possibility of such control without a fatal loss of initiative on the

part of those controlled, and it believes both that there is constant

improvement on the present conditions of society and that there will be

constantly more as science grows and its conclusions are put in force.

Thus charity and socialism, in the usual meaning of the word, imply

ultimately two quite different theories of social life. The one would

re-found society industrially, the other would develop it and allow it

to develop.

The organization of charity.

The springs of charity lie in sympathy and religion, and, one would now

add, in science. To organize it is to give to it the "ordered nature" of

an organic whole, to give it a definite social purpose, and to associate

the members of the community for the fulfilment of that purpose. This in

turn depends on the recognition of common principles, the adoption of a

common method, self-discipline and training, and co-operation. In a mass

of people there may be a large variation in motives coincident with much

unity in action. Thus there may be acceptance of a common social purpose

in charity, while in one the impulse is similar to that which moved St

Francis or George Herbert, in another to that which moved Howard or Dr

Chalmers, or a modern poor-law reformer like Sir G. Nicholls or E.

Denison. Accepting, then, the principles of charity, we pass to the

method in relation to assistance and relief. Details may vary, but on

the following points there is general agreement among students and

workers:--

(1) _The Committee or Conference._--There are usually two kinds of

local relief: the public or poor-law relief, and relief connected with

religious agencies. Besides, there is the relief of endowments,

societies and charitable persons. Therefore, as a condition precedent

to all organization, there must be some local centre of association

for information and common help. A town should be divided for this

purpose into manageable areas coincident with parishes or poor-law

divisions, or other districts. Subject to an acceptance of general

principles, those engaged in charity should be members of a local

conference or committee, or allied to it. The committee would thus be

the rallying-point of a large and somewhat loosely knit association

of friends and workers. (2) _Inquiry, Aid and Registration_.--The

object of inquiry is to ascertain the actual causes of distress or

dependence, and to carry on the work there must usually be a staff of

several honorary and one or two paid workers. Two methods may be

adopted: to inquire in regard to applications for help with a view to

forming some plan of material help or friendly aid, or both, which

will lead to the ultimate self-support of the family and its members,

and, under certain conditions, in the case of the aged or sick, to

their continuous or their sufficient help; or to ascertain the facts

partly at once, partly by degrees, and then to form and carry out some

plan of help, or continue to befriend the family in need of help, in

the hope of bringing them to conditions of self-support, leaving the

work of relief entirely to other agencies. The committee in neither

case should be a relief committee--itself a direct source of relief.

On the former method it has usually no relief fund, but it raises from

relations, employers, charities and charitable persons the relief

required, according to the plan of help agreed upon, unless, indeed,

it is better not to relieve the case, or to leave it to the poor-law.

The committee thus makes itself responsible for endeavouring to the

best of its ability to raise the necessary relief, and acts as trustee

for those who co-operate without it, in such a way as to keep intact

and to give play to all the natural obligations that lie within the

inner circles of a self-supporting community. On the latter method the

work of relief is left to general charity, or to private persons, or

to the poor-law; and the effort is made to help the family to

self-support by a friendly visitor. This procedure is that adopted by

the associated charities in Boston, Mass., and other similar societies

in America and elsewhere. It is akin also to that adopted in the

municipal system of relief in Elberfeld--which has become with many

variations in detail the standard method of poor relief in Germany.

The method of associated help, combined with personal work, represents

the usual practice of charity organization societies. _Mutatis

mutandis_, the plan can be adopted on the simplest scale in parochial

or other relief committees, subject to the safeguards of sufficient

training and settled method. The inquiry should cover the following

points: names and address, and ages of family, previous addresses,

past employment and wages, present income, rent and liabilities,

membership of friendly or other society, and savings, relations,

relief (if any) from any source. These points should be verified, and

reference should be made to the clergy, the poor-law authorities, and

others, to ascertain if they know the applicant. The result should be

to show how the applicant has been living, and what are the sources of

possible help, and also what is his character. The problem, however,

is not whether the person is "deserving" or "undeserving," but

whether, granted the facts, the distress can be stayed and

self-support attained. If the help can be given privately from within

the circle of the family, so much the better. Often it may be best to

advise, but not to interfere. In some cases but little help may be

necessary; in others again the friendly relation between applicant and

friend may last for months and even years. Usually in charitable work

the question of the kind of relief available--money, tickets, clothes,

&c.--governs the decision how the case should be assisted. But this is

quite wrong: the opposite is the true rule. The wants of the case,

rightly understood, should govern the decision as to what charity

should do and what it should provide. Cases are overwhelming in

number, as at the out-patient and casualty departments of a hospital,

where the admissions are made without inquiry, and subject practically

to no restrictions; but when there is inquiry, and each case is

seriously considered and aided with a view to self-support, the

numbers will seldom be overwhelming. On this plan appeal is made to

the strength of the applicant, and requires an effort on his part.

Indiscriminate relief, on the other hand, attracts the applicant by an

appeal to his weakness, and it requires of him no effort. Hence, apart

even from the differentiating effect of inquiry, one method makes

applicants, the other limits their number, although on the latter plan

much more strenuous endeavours be made to assist the lesser number of

claimants. For the routine work of the office an extremely simple

system of records with card index, &c., has been devised. In some

cities, particularly in the United States of America, there is a

central registration of cases, notified by individual charities,

poor-relief authorities and private persons. The system of charity

organization or associated charity, it will be seen, allows of the

utmost variety of treatment, according to the difficulties in each

instance and the remedies available, and the utmost scope for personal

work. (3) _Training._--If charitable work is an art, those who

undertake it must needs be trained both in practice and method and in

judgment. It requires, too, that self-discipline which blends

intelligence with emotion, and so endows emotion with strength and

purpose. In times of distress a reserve of trained workers is of the

utmost service. At all times they do more and produce, socially,

better results; but when there is general distress of any kind they do

not lose their heads like new recruits, but prevent at least some of

the mischief that comes of the panic which often takes possession of a

community, when distress is apprehended, and leads to the wildest

distribution of relief. Also trained workers make the most useful

poor-law guardians, trustees of charities, secretaries of charitable

societies and district visitors. All clergy and ministers and all

medical men who have to be engaged in the administration of medical

relief should learn the art of charity. Poor-law guardians are

usually elected on political or general grounds, and have no special

knowledge of good methods of charity; and trustees are seldom

appointed on the score of their qualifications on this head. To

provide the necessary education in charity there should be competent

helpers and teachers at charity organization committees and elsewhere,

and an alliance for this purpose should be formed between them and

professors and teachers of moral science and economics and the

"settlements." Those who study social problems in connexion with what

a doctor would call "cases" or "practice" see the limits and the

falsity of schemes that on paper seem logical enough. This puts a

check on the influence of scheme-building and that literary

sensationalism which makes capital out of social conditions. (4)

_Co-operation._--Organization in charity depends on extensive

co-operation, and ultimately on the acceptance of common views. This

comes but slowly. But with much tribulation the goal may be reached,

if in case after case the effort is made to provide friendly help

through charities and private persons,--unless, as may well be, it

should seem best not to interfere, but to leave the applicant to apply

to the administrators of public relief. Experience of what is right

and wrong in charity is thus gained on both sides. Many sources may

have to be utilized for aid of different kinds even in a single case,

and for the prevention of distress co-operation with members of

friendly societies and with co-operative and thrift agencies is

indispensable.

The poor law.

Where there is accord between charity and the poor-law pauperism may be

largely reduced. The poor-law in most countries has at its disposal

certain institutional relief and out-door allowances, but it has no

means of devising plans of help which may prevent application to the

rates or "take" people "off the rates." Thus a widow in the first days

of widowhood applies and receives an allowance according to the number

of her children. Helped at the outset by charity on some definite plan,

she may become self-supporting; and if her family be large one or two of

her children may be placed in schools by the guardians, while she

maintains the remaining children and herself. As far as possible there

should be a division of labour between the poor-law and charity. Except

where some plan such as that just mentioned is adopted, one or the other

should take whole charge of the case relieved. There should be no

supplementation of poor-law relief by charity. This will weaken the

strength and dissipate the resources of charity without adding to the

efficiency of the poor-law. Unless the guardians adopt a restrictive

out-door relief policy, there is no scope for any useful division of

labour between them and charity; for the many cases which, taken in

time, charity might save from pauperism, they will draw into chronic

dependence by their allowances a very much larger number. But if there

is a restrictive out-door policy, so far as relief is necessary, charity

may undertake to meet on its own lines distress which the poor-law would

otherwise have met by allowances, and, subject to the assistance of

urgent cases, poor-law relief may thus by degrees become institutional

only. Then, in the main, natural social forces would come into play, and

dependence on any form of _annona civica_ would cease.

Hospitals.

Open-handed hospitality always creates mendicants. This is what the

hospitals offer in the out-patient and casualty departments, and they

have created a class of hospital mendicants. The cases are quickly dealt

with, without inquiry and without regard to home conditions. The medical

man in the hospital does not co-operate with any fellow-workers outside

the hospital. Where his physic or advice ceases to operate his

usefulness ceases. He regards no conditions of morality. In a large

number of cases drink or vice is the cause of application, and the cure

of the patient is dependent on moral conditions; but he returns home,

drinks and may beat his wife, and then on another visit to the hospital

he will again be physicked and so on. The man is not even referred to

the poor-law infirmary for relief. Nor are conditions of home sanitation

regarded. One cause of constant sickness is thus entirely overlooked,

while drugs, otherwise unnecessary, are constantly given at the

hospital. The hospitals are thus large isolated relief stations which

are creating a new kind of pauperism. So far as the patients can

pay--and many can do so--the general practitioners, to whom they would

otherwise go, are deprived of their gains. Still worse is it when the

hospital itself charges a fee in its out-patient department. The relief

is then claimed even more absolutely as a right, and the general

practitioners are still further injured. The doctors, as a medical

staff, are not only medical men, but whether they recognize the fact or

not, they are also almsgivers or almoners; what they give is relief. Yet

few or none of them have ever been trained for that work, and

consequently they do not realize how very advantageous, even for the

cure of their own patients, would be a thorough treatment of each case

both at the hospital and outside it. Nor can they understand how their

methods at present protract sickness and promote habitual dependence.

Were this side of their work studied by them in any way they would be

the first, probably, to press upon the governors of their hospitals the

necessity for a change. Unfortunately, at present the governors are

themselves untrained, and to finance the hospital and to make it a good

institution is their sole object. Hospitals, however, are, after all,

only a part of the general administration of charity, though as they are

now managed they have seldom any systematic connexion with that

administration. Nor is there any co-ordination between the several

hospitals and dispensaries. If one rightly refuses further treatment to

certain applicants, they have only to wander to some other hospital,

there to be admitted with little or no scrutiny. For usually

out-patients and casualty patients are not even registered, nor can they

be identified if they apply again. Practically they come and go at will.

The definite limitation of cases, according to some standard of

effectual work, association with general charity, trained almonership

and inquiry, and a just regard for the interests of general

practitioners, are stepping-stones to reform. In towns where medical

charities are numerous a representative board would promote mutual help

and organization.

Endowed charities.

Like the poor-law, endowed charities may be permanent institutions

established to meet what should be passing and decreasing needs (cf. the

arguments in _The State and Charity_, by T. Mackay). Administered as

they usually are in isolation--apart from the living voluntary charities

of the generation, and consisting often of small trusts difficult to

utilize satisfactorily, they tend to create a permanent demand which

they meet by fixed quantities of relief. Also, as a rule, they make no

systematic inquiries with a view to the verification of the statements

of the applicants, for they have no staff for these purposes; nor have

they the assistance of almoners or friendly visitors. Nor does the

relief which they give form part of any plan of help in conjunction with

other aid from without; nor is the administration subject to frequent

inspection, as in the case of the poor-law. All these conditions have

led to a want of progress in the actual administration of endowed

charities, in regard to which it is often very difficult to prevent the

exercise of an undue patronage. But there is no reason why these

charities should not become a responsible part of the country's

administration, aiding it to reduce outdoor pauperism. It was never

intended that the poor-law should extinguish the endowed charities,

still less, as statistics now prove, that where endowments abound the

rate of pauperism should be considerably above the average of the rest

of the country. This shows that these charities often foster pauperism

instead of preventing it. As a step to reform, the publication of an

annual register of endowed charities in England and Wales is greatly

needed. The consolidating schemes of the charity commissioners have done

much good; still more may be done in some counties by extending to the

county the benefits of the charities of well-endowed towns, as has been

accomplished by the extension of the eleemosynary endowments of the city

of London to the metropolitan police area. Nor, again, until quite

lately, and that as yet only in a few schemes, has the principle been

adopted that pensions or other relief should be given only in

supplementation of the relief of relations, former employers and

friends, and not in substitution of it. This, coupled with good methods

of inquiry and supervision, has proved very beneficial. Hitherto,

however, to a large extent, endowed charities, it must be admitted, have

tended to weaken the family and to pauperize.

Relief to children at school.

In many places funds are raised for the relief of school children by the

supply of meals during the winter and spring; and an act has now been

passed in England (1906) enabling the cost to be put upon the rates.

Usually a very large number of children are said to be underfed, but

inquiry shows that such statements may be taken as altogether excessive.

They are sometimes based on information drawn from the children at

school; or sometimes on general deductions; they are seldom founded on

any systematic and competent inquiry at the homes. When this has been

made, the numbers dwindle to very small proportions. Teachers of

experience have noted the effect of the meals in weakening the

independence of the family. While they are forthcoming women sometimes

give up cooking meals at home, use their money for other things, and

tell the child he can get his meal at school. Great temptations are put

before a parent to neglect her family, and very much distress is due to

this. The meals--just at a time when, owing to the age of her children,

the mother's care is most needed, and just in those families where the

temptation is greatest, and where the family instinct should be

strengthened--stimulate this neglect. Considered from the point of view

of meeting by eleemosynary provision a normal economic demand for food,

intervention can only have one result. The demand must continue to

outstrip the supply, so long as there are resources available on the one

side, and until on the other side the desire of the social class that is

chiefly exposed to the temptations of dependence in relation to such

relief has been satisfied. If the provision be made from the resources

of local or general taxation the largeness of the fund available will

allow practically of an unlimited expansion of the supply of food. If

the provision be made from voluntary sources, in some measure limited

therefore and less certain, this very fact will tend to circumscribe

demand and limit the offer of relief. It is indeed the problem of

poor-law relief in 1832 over again. The relief provided by local

taxation practically unlimited will create a mass of constant claimants,

with a kind of assumed right to aid based on the payment of rates; while

voluntary relief, whatever its short-comings, will be less injurious

because it is less amply endowed. In Paris the municipal subvention for

meals rose from 545,900 francs in 1892 to 1,000,000 in 1904. Between

1894 and 1904 there was an increase of 9% in the school population; and

an increase of 28% in the municipal grant. In that period the

contributions from the local school funds (_caisses des ecoles_)

decreased 36%; while the voluntary contributions otherwise received were

insignificant; and the payments for meals increased 2%.

The subject has been lately considered from a somewhat different

standpoint (cf. the reports of the Scottish Royal Commission on Physical

Education, 1903; of the Inter-departmental committees on Physical

Deterioration, 1905, and on Medical Inspection and the Feeding of School

Children, 1905; also the report of the special committee of the Charity

Organization Society on "the assistance of school children," 1893).

After careful investigations medical officers especially have drawn

attention to the low physical condition of children in schools in the

poorer parts of large English towns, their low stature, their physical

defects, the improper food supplied to them at home, their

uncleanliness, and their want of decent bringing-up, and sometimes their

want of food. Other inquiries have shown that, as women more usually

become breadwinners their children receive less attention, and the home

and its duties are neglected, while in the lowest sections of the poorer

classes social irresponsibility reaches its maximum. Cheap but often

quite improper food is provided, and infant mortality, which is largely

preventable, remains as high as ever, though adult life is longer. This

with a marked decrease in the birth-rate in recent years, has, it may be

said, opened out a new field for charitable effort and social work.

Science is at each revision of the problem making its task more

definite. Actually the mere demand for meals stands for less; the reform

of home conditions for more. So it was hoped that instead of making

school meals a charge on taxation, as parliament has done, it would be

content to leave it a voluntary charge, while the medical inspection of

elementary Schools will be made universal; representative relief

committees formed for schools or groups of schools; the cases of want or

distress among the school children dealt with individually in connexion

with their families, and, where necessary, day schools established on

the lines of day industrial schools.

Exceptional distress.

At a time of exceptional distress the following suggestions founded on

much English experience may be of service (cf. Report of special

committee of the Charity Organization Society on the best means of

dealing with exceptional distress, 1886). Usually at such a time

proposals are made to establish special funds, and to provide employment

to men and women out of work. But it is best, if possible and as long as

possible, to rely on existing agencies, and to strengthen them. Round

them there are usually workers more or less trained. A new fund usually

draws to it new people, many of whom may not have had any special

experience at all. If a new fund is inevitable, it is best that it

should make its grants to existing agencies after consultation with

them. In any case, a clear policy should be adopted, and people should

keep their heads. The exaggeration of feeling at a time of apprehended

or actual distress is sometimes extraordinary, and the unwise action

which it prompts is often a cause of continuing pauperism afterwards.

Where there is public or poor-law relief the following plan may be

adopted:--In any large town there are usually different recognized

poor-law, charitable or other areas. The local people already at work in

these areas should be formed into local committees. In each case a quick

inquiry should be made, and the relieving officer communicated with,

some central facts verified, and the home visited. Roughly, cases may be

divided into three classes: the irresponsible casual labouring class, a

middle class of men with decent homes, who have made no provision for

the future, and are not members of either friendly society or trades

union; and a third class, who have made some provision. These usually

are affected last of all; at all hazards they should be kept from

receiving public relief, and should be helped, as far as possible,

privately and personally. If there are public works, the second class

might be referred to them; if there are not, probably some should be

left to the poor-law, some assisted in the same way as members of class

three. Much would turn upon the family and the home. The first class

should be left to the poor-law. If there is no poor-law system at work

they should be put on public works. Working men of independent position,

not the creatures of any political club, but such as are respected

members of a friendly society, or are otherwise well qualified for the

task, should be called into consultation. The relief should be settled

according to the requirements of each case, but if the pressure is

great, at first at least it may be necessary to make grants according to

some generally sufficient scale. There should be as constant a revision

of cases as time permits. Great care should be taken to stop the relief

as soon as possible, and to do nothing to make it the stepping-stone to

permanent dependence.

If employment be provided it should be work within the skill of all; it

should be fairly remunerated, so that at least the scantiness of the pay

may not be an excuse for neglect; and it should be paid for according to

measured or piece work. The discipline should be strict, though due

regard should be paid at first to those unaccustomed to digging or

earthwork. In England and Wales the guardians have power to open labour

yards. These, like charities which provide work, tend to attract and

keep in employment a low class of labourer or workman, who finds it pays

him to use the institution as a convenience. It is best, therefore, to

avoid the opening of a labour yard if possible. If it is opened, the

discipline should be very strict, and when there is laziness or

insubordination, relief in the workhouse should at once be offered. The

relief furnished to men employed in a labour yard, of which in England

at least half has to be given ih kind, should, it has been said, be

dealt out from day to day. This leads to the men giving up the work

sooner than they otherwise would. They have less to spend.

Unemployment.

In Great Britain a great change has taken place in regard to the

provision of employment in connexion with the state. Since about 1890

there has been a feeling that men in distress from want of employment

should not be dealt with by the poor-law. A circular letter issued by

the Local Government Board in 1886, and subsequently in 1895, coincided

with this feeling. It was addressed to town councils and other local

authorities, asking them to provide work (1) which will not involve the

stigma of pauperism, (2) which all can perform whatever may have been

their previous avocations, and (3) which does not compete with that of

other labourers at present in employment. This circular led to the

vestries and subsequently the borough councils in many districts

becoming partially recognized relief authorities for the unemployed,

concurrently with the poor-law. Much confusion resulted. The local

authorities had seldom any suitable organization for the investigation

of applications. It was difficult to supply work on the terms required;

and the work was often ill-done and costly. Also it was found that the

same set of people would apply year after year, unskilled labourers

usually out of work part of the winter, or men habitually "unemployed."

As on other occasions when public work was provided, very few of the

applicants were found to be artisans, or members of trades unions or of

friendly societies. In 1904 Mr Long, then president of the Local

Government Board, proposed that local voluntary distress committees

should be established in London consisting of poor-law guardians and

town councillors and others, more or less supervised by a central

committee and ultimately by the Local Government Board. This

organization was set on foot and large sums were subscribed for its

work. The report on the results of the movement was somewhat doubtful

(Report, London Unemployed Fund, 1904-1905, p. 101, &c.), but in 1905

the Unemployed Workmen's Act was passed, and in London and elsewhere

distress committees like the voluntary committees of the previous year

were established by statute. It was enacted that for establishment

expenses, emigration and removal, labour exchanges, and the acquisition

of land a halfpenny rate might be levied, but that the rate would not be

available for the remuneration of men employed. For this purpose

(1905-1906) a large charitable fund was raised. A training farm at

Hollesley Bay was acquired, and it was hoped to train Londoners there to

become fit for agricultural work. It is impossible to judge this

experiment properly, on the evidence available up to 1908. But one or

two points are important: (1) something very like the "right to labour"

has been granted by the legislature; (2) this has been done apart from

the conditions required by the poor-laws and orders of the Local

Government Board on poor relief and without imposing disfranchisement on

the men employed; (3) a labour rate has not been levied, but a rate has

been levied in aid of the provision of employment; (4) if the line of

development that the act suggests were to be followed (as the renewed

Labour agitation in 1908-1909 made probable) it must tend to create a

class of "unemployed," unskilled labourers of varying grades of industry

who may become the dependent and state-supported proletariat of modern

urban life. Thus, unless the administration be extremely rigorous, once

more will a kind of serfdom be established, to be, as some would say,

taken over hereafter by the socialist state.

Vagrancy.

In some of the English colonies Homeric hospitality still prevails, but

by degrees the station-house or some refuge is established in the towns

as they grow more populous. Finally, some system of labour in exchange

for relief is evolved. At first this is voluntary, afterwards it is

officially recognized, and finally it may become part of the system of

public relief. As bad years come, these changes are made step by step.

In England the vagrant or wayfarer is tolerated and discouraged, but not

kept employed. He should be under greater pressure to maintain himself,

it is thought. The provision made for him in different parts of the

country is far from uniform, and now, usually, at least in the larger

towns, after he has had a bath and food, he is admitted to a separate

room or cell in a casual ward. Before he leaves he has to do a task of

work, and, subject to the discretion of the master, he is detained two

nights. This plan has reduced vagrancy, and if it were universally

adopted clean accommodation would everywhere be provided for the vagrant

without the attractions of a common or "associated" ward; and probably

vagrancy would diminish still further. It seems almost needless to say

that, in these circumstances at any rate, casual alms should not be

given to vagrants. They know much better how to provide for themselves

than the almsgiver imagines, for vagrancy is in the main a mode of life

not the result of any casual difficulty. Vagrancy and criminality are

also nearly allied. The magistrate, therefore, rather than the

almsgiver, should usually interfere; and, as a rule, where the

magistrates are strict, vagrancy in a county diminishes. An

inter-departmental committee (1906) taking generally this line, reported

in favour of vagrants being placed entirely under police control, and it

recommended a system of wayfarers' tickets for men on the roads who are

not habitual vagrants, and the committal of men likely to become

habitual vagrants to certified labour colonies for not less than six

months. Still undoubtedly vagrancy has its economic side. In a bad year

the number of tramps is increased by the addition of unskilled and

irresponsible labourers, who are soonest discharged when work is slack.

As a part-voluntary system under official recognition the German

_Arbeiter-colonien_ are of interest. This in a measure has led to the

introduction of labour homes in England, the justification of which

should be that they recruit the energy of the men who find their way to

them, and enable them to earn a living which they could not do

otherwise. In a small percentage of cases their result may be achieved.

Charitable refuges or philanthropic common lodging-houses, usually

established in districts where this class already congregate, only

aggravate the difficulty. They give additional attractions to a vagrant

and casual life, and make it more endurable. They also make a

comfortable avoidance of the responsibilities of family life

comparatively easy, and in so far as they do this they are clearly

injurious to the community.

American conditions and methods.

The English colonists of the New England states and Pennsylvania

introduced the disciplinary religious and relief system of Protestantism

and the Elizabethan poor-law. To the former reference has already been

made. With an appreciation of the fact that the cause of distress is not

usually poverty, but weakness of character and want of judgment, and

that relief is in itself no remedy, those who have inherited the old

Puritan traditions have, in the light of toleration and a larger social

experience, organized the method of friendly visiting, the object of

which is illustrated by the motto, "Not alms, but a friend." To the

friendship of charity is thus given a disciplinary force, capable of

immense expansion and usefulness, if the friendship on the side of those

who would help is sincere and guided by practical knowledge and

sagacity, and if on the side of those in distress there is awakened a

reciprocal regard and a willingness to change their way of life by

degrees. Visiting by "districts" is set aside, for "friendliness" is not

a quality easily diffused over a wide area. To be real it must be

limited as time and ability allow. Consequently, a friendly visitor

usually befriends but one or two, or in any case only a few, families.

The friendly visitor is the outcome of the movement for "associated

charities," but in America charity organization societies have also

adopted the term, and to a certain extent the method. Between the two

movements there is the closest affinity. The registration of applicants

for relief is much more complete in American cities than in England,

where the plan meets with comparatively little support. At the office of

the associated charities in Boston there is a central and practically a

complete register of all the applications made to the public authority

for poor relief, to the associated charities, and to many other

voluntary bodies.

The Elizabethan poor-law system, with the machinery of overseers,

poor-houses and out-door relief, is still maintained in New England, New

York state and Pennsylvania, but with many modifications, especially in

New York. A chief factor in these changes has been immigration. While

the County or town remained the administrative area for local poor

relief, the large number of immigrant and "unsettled" poor, and the

business connected with their removal from the state, entailed the

establishment of a secondary or state system of administration and aid,

with special classes of institutions to which the counties or towns

could send their poor, as, for instance, state reform schools, farms,

almshouses, &c. For the oversight of these institutions, and often of

prisons also and lunatic asylums, in many states there have been

established state boards of "charity or corrections and charity." The

members of these boards are selected by the state for a term of years,

and give their services honorarily. There are state boards in

Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, Minnesota,

Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Colorado, North Carolina and elsewhere. There

is also a district board of charities in the district of Columbia. These

boards publish most useful and detailed reports. Besides the state board

there is sometimes also, as in New York, a State Charities Aid

Association, whose members, in the counties in which they reside, have a

legal right of entry to visit and inspect any public or charitable

institution owned by the state, and any county and other poor-house. A

large association of visitors accustomed to inspect and report on

institutions has thus been created. Further, the counties and towns in

New York state, for instance, and Massachusetts, and the almshouse

districts in Pennsylvania, are under boards of supervision. Usually the

overseers give out-door relief, and the pauperism of some areas is as

high as that in some English unions, 3, 4 and 5%. On the whole

population of the United States, however, and of individual states,

consisting to a great extent of comparatively young and energetic

immigrants, the pauperism is insignificant. In Massachusetts "it has

been the general policy of the state to order the removal to the state

almshouse of unsettled residents of the several cities and towns in need

of temporary aid, thus avoiding some of the abuses incident to out-door

relief." In New York state, in the city of New York, including Brooklyn,

the distribution of out-door relief by the department of charities is

forbidden, except for purposes of transportation and for the adult

blind. Most counties in the state have an almshouse, and the county

superintendents and overseers of the poor "furnish necessary relief to

such of the county poor as may require only temporary assistance, or are

so disabled that they cannot be safely removed to the almshouse." Public

attention is in many cases being drawn to the inutility and injury of

out-door relief.

In some states and cities the system of subsidizing voluntary

institutions is in full force, and it is in force also in many English

colonies. At first sight it has the advantage of providing relief for

public purposes without the creation of a new staff or establishment.

There is thus an apparent economy. But the evils are many. Political

partisanship and favour may influence the amount and disposition of the

grants. The grants act as a bounty on the establishment and continuance

of charitable institutions, homes for children, hospitals, &c., but not

on the expansion of the voluntary charitable funds and efforts that

should maintain them; and thus charitable homes exist in which charity

in its truer sense may have little part, but in which the chief motive

of the administration may be to support sectarian interests by public

subsidies. Claimants for relief have little scruple in turning such

institutions to their own account; and the institutions, being

financially irresponsible, are not in these circumstances scrupulous on

their side to prevent a misdirection of their bounties. "Parents unload

their children upon the community more recklessly when they know that

such children will be provided for in private orphan asylums and

protectories, where the religious training that the parents prefer will

be given them" (Amos G. Warner, in _International Congress: Charities

and Correction_, 1893). Past history in New York city illustrates the

same evil. The admission was entirely in the hands of the managers. They

admitted; the city paid. In New York city the population between 1870

and 1890 increased about 80%; the subsidies for prisoners and public

paupers increased by 43%, but those for paupers in private institutions

increased from $334,828 to $1,845,872, or about 461%. The total was at

that time $3,794,972; in 1898 it was rather less, $3,132,786. The

alternative to this system is either the establishment of state or

municipal institutions, and possibly in special cases payments to

voluntary homes for the maintenance of inmates admitted at the request

of a state authority, as at certified and other homes in England, with

grants made conditional on the work being conducted on specified lines,

and subject to a certain increasing amount of voluntary financial

support; or a close general and financial inspection of charitable

institutions--the method of reform adopted in New York; or payment for

only those inmates who are sent by public authorities and admitted on

their request.

The enormous extent to which children's aid societies have been

increased in the United States, sometimes with the help of considerable

public grants, suggests the greatest need for caution from the point of

the preservation of the family as the central element of social strength

in the community. The problem of charity in relation to medical relief

in the large towns of the United States is similar to that of England;

its difficulties are alike.

LITERATURE.--As good translations of the classics become accessible it

is easy for the general reader or student to combine a study of the

principles of charity in relation to the community with a study of

history. Thus, and in connexion with special investigations and the

conditions of practical charity, social economics may best be studied.

In N. Masterman, _Chalmers on Charity_ (1900); T. Mackay, _Methods of

Social Reform_ (1896); B. Bosanquet and others, _Some Aspects of the

Social Problem_ (1894); and C.S. Loch, _Methods of Social Advance_

(1904), this point of view is generally assumed. Special

investigations of importance may be found in the reports of medical

officers of health. See Report of Committee on Physical Deterioration

referred to above, and, for instance, Dr Newsholme's _Vital

Statistics_ and Charles Booth's _Labour and Life in London_. For the

history of charity there is no good single work. On details there are

many good articles in Daremberg's _Dictionary of Classical

Antiquities_, and similar works. _Modern Methods of Charity_, by C.H.

Henderson and others (1904), supplies much general information in

regard to poor relief and charity in different countries. Apart from

books and official documents mentioned in the text as indicating the

present state of charitable and public relief, or as aids to practical

work, the following may be of service. England:--_Annual Charities'

Register and Digest, with Introduction on "How to help Cases of

Distress"_; the _Charity Organization Review; Occasional Papers_ (3

vols.), published by the London Charity Organization Society

(1896-1906); _Reports of Proceedings of Conferences of Poor-Law

Guardians; The Strength of the People_, by Helen Bosanquet; _Homes of

the London Poor_ and _Our Common Land_, by Miss Octavia Hill; _The

Queen's Poor_, by M. Loane. United States of America:--_The

Proceedings of the International Conference on Charities and

Correction_ (1894), and the proceedings of the annual conferences;

_Friendly Visiting among the Poor_, by Mary E. Richmond (1899);

_American Charities_, by Amos G. Warner (1908); _The Practice of

Charity_, by E.T. Devine; _Handworterbuch der Staatswissenschaften_,

by Dr J. Conrad, &c., vol. ii.; _Das Armenwesen in den Vereinigten

Staaten von America_, by Dr Francis G. Peabody (1897); the _Charities

Review_, published monthly by the New York Charity Organization

Society; the Papers and Reports of the Boston and Baltimore societies.

France:--_La Bibliographie charitable_, by Camille Granier (1891); _La

Charite avant et depuis 1789_, by P. Hubert Valleroux; Fascicules of

the _Conseil superieur de l'assistance publique, Revue d'assistance_,

published by the _Societe Internationale pour l'etude des questions

d'assistance_. Germany:--Reports and Proceedings of the _Deutsche

Vereine fur Armenpflege und Wohltatigkeit; Die Armenpflege_, a

practical handbook, by Dr E. Munsterberg (1897).

Austria:--_Osterreichs Wohlfahrtseinrichtungen, 1848-1898_, by Dr

Ernest Mischler (1899). (C. S. L.)

CHARIVARI, a French term of uncertain origin, but probably onomatopoeic,

for a mock serenade "rough music," made by beating on kettles,

fire-irons, tea-trays or what not. The charivari was anciently in France

a regular wedding custom, all bridal couples being thus serenaded. Later

it was reserved for ill-assorted and unpopular marriages, for widows or

widowers who remarried too soon, and generally as a mockery for all who

were unpopular. At the beginning of the 17th century, wedding charivaris

were forbidden by the Council of Tours under pain of excommunication,

but the custom still lingers in rural districts. The French of Louisiana

and Canada introduced the charivari into America, where it became known

under the corrupted name of "shivaree."

CHARKHARI, a native state in the Bundelkhand agency of Central India.

Area, 745 sq. m.; pop. (1901) 123,594; estimated revenue L33,000. It is

surrounded on all sides by other states of Central India, except near

Charkhari town, where it meets the United Provinces. It was founded by

Bijai Bahadur (vikramaditya), a _sanad_ being granted him in 1804 and

another in 1811. The chief, whose title is maharaja, is a Rajput of the

Bundela clan, descended from Chhatar Sal, the champion of the

independence of Bundelkhand in the 18th century. In 1857 Raja Ratan

Singh received a hereditary salute of 11 guns, a _khilat_ and a

perpetual _jagir_ of L1300 a year in recognition of his services during

the Mutiny. The town of Charkhari (locally _Maharajnagar_) is 40 m. W.

of Banda; pop. (1901) 11,718.