and hardly then admitting of a remedy, but becoming apparent in the progress of events and of experience.
To these evils and their proposed remedies it is now our task to direct the attention of our readers, referring them to the publications at the head of this article for fuller information upon the subject of the management of our dependent poor,—a subject strangely neglected by the public till a very recent period, considering that the well-being of more than 600,000 of our fellow- creatures is involved in the management of the workhouses of England.
The existence of a poor law, or a national provision for the poor, has been an established fact in England ever since the reign of Queen Elizabeth. It was called into existence when the system of providing for the helpless poor was done away with by the abolition of the monastic institutions of the country. Other countries have continued to manage their poor without the aid of a law, and we believe there are some persons who think these plans are preferable to our own, and hold out less encouragement to pauperism. They believe that such a state is not a necessary and unavoidable one, but the invariable consequence of improvidence and vice, and that with regard to these undesirable qualities our country is pre-eminent amongst the nations of Europe. This fact is taken as a proof that the existence of a poor law does not work favourably on the national character, but tends to lower its independence and energy. How far this is in reality the case we are not prepared to say. The poor law is at all events an acknowledged necessity in England, and without it we should find ourselves in a state of great perplexity at the present day. We will assume it to have been originally established for the relief of what we may call unavoidable misfortune, and as long as every class of society occasionally claims the assistance of its more fortunate members, the lowest class alone is not to be blamed for requiring aid. In our large and overcrowded towns especially, the numerous causes which produce loss of health, and the temporary or permanent failure of wages from that and other causes, may surely account for a large proportion of misery which may be called unavoidable; and if so, we can hardly deny that it is the duty of a Christian state to provide help for it. That prudence and foresight are to be encouraged by every means in our power (especially by the more careful education of the young of both sexes) cannot be denied; but to wait till such a consummation is attained, which would result in the absence of all poverty requiring the systematic help of the more fortunate classes, were as hopeless as to wait for the day when sanitary measures and the progress of medical science for the prevention of disease should render the erection of hospitals unnecessary, and as unreasonable as to
