CHRISTIANITY AND CHARITY ORGANISATION.
AVERY sensible and admirable little book has just been published called "The Practice of Charity." Its author is the secretary of the Charity Organisation Society of New York, Mr. E. T. Devine. Apparently the social con- ditions at present existing in great American cities closely resemble those on this side of the Atlantic, for the principles for the organisation of charity laid down by the Societies of London and New York do not essentially differ. Briefly stated, they are nothing whatever but the principles of common- sense, by which these Societies believe that the efficacy of benevolence can be increased fourfold. They urge the duty of charity coupled with the duty of discrimination, and uphold the doctrine that discrimination without investigation is im- possible. Further, they seek to impress on all who desire to raise the condition of the poor that without co-operation, that is, without some attempt on the part of benevolent institutions and benevolent persons to pull together, they will not be strong enough for their task. As to investigation, they maintain that (we quote from Mr. Devine's book) "it is not undertaken primarily for the purpose of thwarting the expectations of impostors, nor to enable the investigating agent to affix a label of worthy or unworthy, but to determine what help can be given, from what source it should come, and how these agencies may be brought into definite and hearty co-operation." Supposing that after investigation the applicant turns out to be of unworthy character, he is not necessarily, we understand, excluded from the benefits of charity. "Moral, and even criminal, shortcomings" (we read in a' pamphlet before us published by the Charity Organisation Society of London) "should not of themselves exclude an applicant from assistance if there is a possibility of giving such help as may enable him to make a fresh start. The test is not whether he is deserving, but whether he is helpable."
It would seem labour wasted to defend such a sys- tem of charity as the one we have endeavoured to sketch were it not that there does undoubtedly exist in the minds of many people a feeling that reason and charity have nothing to do with one another,—a feeling which springs, we believe, from a secret belief that on the subject of charity Christianity and common-sense are at variance. Our Lord Himself, they fancy, was on the side of indiscriminate almsgiving. What else did He mean, they argue, when He said, "Give to him that asketh of thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not away" P But our Lord did not say give money to him that asketh. His Disciples, to whom He spoke, had no money to give. He must have meant give help. The fact that He left the nature of the help vague is in accordance with the whole method of His teaching. He never gave minute rules to His followers,—such rules must inevitably have become obsolete with changing circumstances. The sentence we have quoted above is not a direction for almsgiving, but a principle of charity on which to found such directions as circumstances might make expedient. His words proclaim the universal obligation of neighbourliness, and preclude alike the ready excuse of the uncharitable, "Am I my brother's keeper ? " and the perfunctory practice of offering an inadequate gift, such as Berms only to soothe the conscience of a giver who desires
to tern away.
In fact, our Lord's words mean that we must never be indifferent, never blind and deaf, to the claims of those who suffer from want and misery.
Christ gives us an illustration of the right spirit of neigh- bourliness in the parable of the Good Samaritan; and so far as we know, no money actually passed between him and "the man fallen among thieves." But he
who "was neighbour unto" the unfortunate man gave him all the personal help and attention of which his cir- cumstances admitted, and then made the best arrange- ment he could devise for his welfare. "He set him on his own beast and brought him to an inn," and we do not find that his contract with the innkeeper by any means excluded ordinary prudence. He paid what he thought likely to be the cost of the man's re-establishment to health, adding, in case of accident, "whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come again I will repay thee,"—at which time, of course, the circumstances of the extra expenditure could be explained to him. When he came that way again he would ascertain if the innkeeper had done his duty and how the case ended; his inquiries might even lead to future opportunities of usefulness. But we shall be told by the upholders of indiscriminate charity that he made no inquiries before he gave his help. Cer- tainly not, we would reply, and neither, under like circum- stances, would a member of the Charity Organisation Society. Such inquiries were impossible. The man was bleeding to death. It was a clear ease for immediate help,—or" interim relief," as we believe such assistance is technically called.
It is a great mistake to think that there is anything new in the idea of systematised charity. Evidently some sort of sys- tem for the organisation of alms was part of the "care of the Churches" which St. Paul found so heavy upon him towards the end of his life. In his pastoral letter to Timothy he gives many directions on the subject. It seems that indigent widows then as now were a source of much consideration and diffi- culty to the charitable. Apparently St. Paul deemed it in- advisable, or perhaps it was impossible, that all such should be relieved or supported out of church funds. "Let none be enrolled a widow under three-score years old," he advises, "having been the wife of one man; well reported for good works; if she have brought up children; if she have used hospitality to strangers ; if she have relieved the afflicted; but the younger widows refuse." These latter are in St. Paul's eyes fitter objects for private charity, and he adds that "if any man or woman that believeth have widows, let them relieve them, but let not the Church be burdened." St. Paul's ideal is that every family should be self- supporting. "He that provideth not for his own, and specially for those of his own household, bath denied the faith," he declares. Of loafing the Apostle had a righteous horror. "I hear," he writes, " that some among you walk dis- orderly, working not at all." Such men he commands and exhorts "by the Lord Jesus Christ that with quietness they work and eat their own bread." It is evident that these drones were a great affliction to the early Church, and finally drew from St. Paul the stern sentence, "If a man will not work neither shall he eat." Many preachers in the Church of Eng- land of unimpeachable orthodoxy upheld the necessity for charity organisation long before such a system received a name. George Herbert in "A Priest of the Temple," wherein he sets forth the whole duty of a country parson,. devotes a chapter to the administration of charity. The parson is to use his best endeavours "that there be not a single idle person or beggar in his parish, but that all be in a com- petent way to get their living." In times of scarcity and distress he is to give to the utmost of his power, but even then not to forego discrimination, "giving corn to some outright, and selling to others under rates," always "working those that are able to the same charity." In all almsgiving, we are told, the conscientious parson " distinguisheth, giving them most that live the best, take the most pains, and are the most charged—so is his charity in effect a sermon." Beggars at the door he is not to help "without some testimony—except the evidence of the misery bring testimony with it, for evident miseries have a natural privilege and exemption from all law." Jeremy Taylor's rules for the organisation of relief are sensible and extraordinarily well put. He begins with this somewhat startling warning: "He that gives to the poor what is not his own makes himself a thief and the poor to be receivers." Nothing is to be given to vicious or drunken persons "if such alms will support their sin." Every man who gives alms "should do it in mercy out of a true sense of the calamity of his brother. Against this rule he offends who gives out of custom, or to upbraid the poverty of another, or to make him mercenary, or obliged, or with any unhandsome circumstance." Jeremy Taylor is quite in
faVOur Of investigation; and bids hie readers "search into. the needs" of such "as have nothing left them but misery and modesty.", If charity is nothing but a meritorious sacrifice on the part of the charitable, its administration need, of course, have nothing to do with reason. In this case, however, it is nothing more than a kind of pious selfishness, and no selfish. peas can surely be part of the two great commandments on which Christianity hangs. Of "the first and greatest of these our .Lord gave us no precise explanation—no doubt because such an explanation is outside the power of language —but, according to His custom, He threw a light upon His words by means of a similitude. 4. The second is like unto it," He said. If these two ideals—the service of God and the service of man—are alike, they must be pursued in like manner,—that is, with all the strength of the pursuer's mind, as well as of his heart and of his souL
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