“Public charities,” said the late Lord Lytton, “are too often merely a bonus to public indolence and vice.  What a dark lesson of the fallacy of human wisdom does this knowledge strike into the heart!  What a waste of the materials of kindly sympathies!  What a perversion individual mistakes can cause, even in the virtues of a nation!  Charity is a feeling dear to the pride of the human heart—­it is an aristocratic emotion!  Mahomet testified his deep knowledge of his kind when he allowed the vice hardest to control,—­sexual licentiousness; and encouraged the virtue easiest to practise,—­charity."[1]

[Footnote 1:  LORD LYTTON—­England and the English, p. 124.]

There are clergymen in London who say that charity acts against the extension of religion amongst the people.  The Rev. Mr. Stone says, “He is an unwelcome visitor to the poor who brings the Bible in one hand, without a loaf, a blanket, or a shilling in the other.  And no wonder.  By the prevailing system of charitable relief they have been nursed in this carnal spirit; they have been justified in those selfish expectations.  Instead of being allowed to learn the great and salutary lesson of providence, that there is a necessary connection between their conduct and their condition, they have, by this artificial system, been taught that indigence is of itself sufficient to constitute a claim to relief.  They have been thus encouraged in improvidence, immorality, fraud, and hypocrisy.”

The truest philanthropists are those who endeavour to prevent misery, dependence, and destitution; and especially those who diligently help the poor to help themselves.  This is the great advantage of the “Parochial Mission-Women Association."[1] They bring themselves into close communication with the people in the several parishes of London, and endeavour to assist them in many ways.  But they avoid giving indiscriminate alms.  Their objects are “to help the poor to help themselves, and to raise them by making them feel that they can help themselves.”  There is abundant room for philanthropy amongst all classes; and it is most gratifying to find ladies of high distinction taking part in this noble work.

[Footnote 1:  See East and West, edited by the Countess Spencer.]

There are numerous other societies established of late years, which afford gratifying instances of the higher and more rational, as well as really more Christian, forms of charity.  The societies for improving the dwellings of the industrial classes,—­for building baths and washhouses,—­for establishing workmen’s, seamen’s, and servants’ homes,—­for cultivating habits of providence and frugality amongst the working-classes,—­and for extending the advantages of knowledge amongst the people,—­are important agencies of this kind.  These, instead of sapping the foundations of self-reliance, are really and truly helping the people to help themselves, and are deserving of every approbation and encouragement.  They tend to elevate the condition of the mass; they are embodiments of philanthropy in its highest form; and are calculated to bear good fruit through all time.