26 FEBRUARY 1876, Page 11

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

THE NEW CRUSADE.

[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPROTATOR:1 Sin,—It might greatly assist the work of the Charity Organisation Society, if you would allow the readers of the Spectator to be told how urgently that work requires the services of thoughtful and stedfast men.

To many, the Society is known only as occasionally prosecuting an impostor ; and the public generally are, perhaps, scarcely aware that by far its first object is to deal adequately with cases of distress. Offices have been established in different parts of London for dealing with such eases ; and the goal aimed at is that, after careful examination, the right thing shall be done for them, however hard or costly the right thing may be to do.

It is obvious that this goal cannot be even approached, unless there is present in each office some one determined to give the best of his heart and of his brain to the work,—some one who comes to the work convinced that the service of the poor is the most exalted service to which he can be called, and who is yet aware that many difficulties surround that service, difficulties requiring the most patient study, and not easily solved even by the highest intelligence. The daily routine of the office—the face-to-face examination of applicants—is a task of no mean order; and much depends upon the accuracy of the first diagnosis. As the office-door opens there is no one to tell us who is coming in, or what fresh combination of circumstances we have to en- counter. It may be the trained impostor, ready with his skilfully- prepared story, and pleading the extremest urgency. It may be the ordinary case, so hard to deal with or to let alone, the condi- tions of which may be summed up in the three words,—poverty, prolificacy, improvidence. It may ba the beggar-nomadic, or tramp, who, if he has a sense of humour, may enjoy wasting the time of a society instituted for his repression ; or the beggar- resident, not differing essentially from the preceding, and de- praved by a long course of doles obtained by practised and im- partial importunity from parochial charities, district visitors, and ministers of all denominations. Bat, on the other hand, we may have to listen to a tale of deep and genuine distress,—a tale which, if told aloud, would stir the compassion of the land ; or some foolish prodigal may come in, willing to return if any door were open to him ; or fallen woman, driven in by hopelessness, and yet but half-willing to be saved. There is no phase of dis- tress, real or simulated, capable or incapable of treatment, that may not, at any moment, come before us.

Moreover, we want men of energy and discernment in our offices, not only for the correct apprehension of the cases in the first instance, but because immediate action is sometimes necessary. It does not do always to wait for the meeting of a Committee. We also want them because the laborious following-up of the investigation by inquiry and correspondence, and the still more laborious task of obtaining suitable relief, require no small amount of skilful and conscientious effort. The daily work in a Charity Organisation office, to be well done, demands an intelligence that shall not slumber, an earnestness that shall not tire, a patience not to be overcome, a sympathy that will not suffer itself to be chilled,—and none know better than those of us who have at- tempted the work, how miserably easy it is in these respects to fail, and how miserably certain we are, when we fail, to err.

It is not uncommon to find young men giving themselves up, in a spirit of devotion and self-abnegation, to the work of the Church ; and it is not, perhaps, too much to expect that a few will be ready, in the same spirit, to give themselves up to work for the poor. The Society has no large salaries to offer, but the men the work wants will not be deterred by this consideration.