The Express.
London, England, 1862-10-20 00:00:00

.. ,
I'HE EXPRESS; -' MONDAY EVENING, OCTOBER 20, 1862.

expressed his intention of . nadertaking this
task when his mill is stopped ; at present
he is doing his beet for the community
by finding work for a large population, and is
meanwhile a subscriber to the general fund. I
inquired in vain for boilers set up in the mill yards,
for a generous distribution of food among the
unemployed. Of the subscription list it is difficult
to speak. In justice to some manufacturers it
should be said that they have from the first advo-
cated the plan of a periodical gift ; that they have
already subscribed twice, and are ready to subscribe
again when called upon. But it is impossible to
see what circumstances can justify such a gift as
251. or 501. from large employers of labour ; while of
the men who can live in the midst of such silent dis-
tress as now reigns inPreston, and give nothing, the
lees said the better. If their meanness be proof to
the appeal which the very aspect of every cottage
they see makes to them my words will be all
powerless to sting them to generosity. I fear that
as a body Lancashire has no reason to be proud of
Preston manufacturers.

To make my statement complete, I must allude
to the existence in Preston of a certain amount of
denominational liberality, the extent of which it is
impossible to estimate, but which crosses the track
and perplexes the efforts of the central committee.
Of the general inexpediency of meeting by sectarian
efforts a calamity which is confined to no sect or
church I need say nothing ; and I have observed
with regret that the Wesleyan Conference and the
Baptist Union are putting their church machinery
to work in the collection, and I fear in the distribu•
tion, of funds. The only cases in which such
interference with the principles which regulate pub-
lic charity is justifiable are those of persons who,
though not absolutely reduced to the pauper level,
may need aid to enable them to preserve a position
of respectability. If a minister, or a congregation,
can thus interpose to save any of their poorer friends
from application to the parish, or to a relief board,
no one has any right to complain of a mode of
action which aims to preserve a little island of self-
respect, in the midst of the overwhelming flood of
pauperism. There can be no clash of interests, for
the men thus helped do not draw from any of the
public fountains of beneficence. There is little
danger of weakening the feeling of self-dependence,
for the aid is accepted as a gift passes from
friend to friend. But, except in such cases as
these, I have nothing good to say for sectarian bene-
volence. In the presence of such a misfortune
as this, if ever, men ought to forget the
unhappy differences which part Christian churches ;
at the call of such a duty all jealousies and animo-
sities should hide their heads. I suppose that there
are those who are always watching for an opportu-
nity of turning the free-flowing stream of public
benevolence into the stagnant pools of their own
ecclesiastical sympathies, such as in old days would
have left the wounded traveller (if he did not go to
the right place of worship) to the care of the heretic
from Samaria, or, if they poured any oil or wine into
his hurts, would not have let slip the opportunity
of converting him from the error of his ways.
lam nut sure, however, that in Preston there
may not be something to be said on the other side
also. The relief committee includes no minister of
religion except the vicar, who with great courtesy
and impartiality acts as chairman ; as a not
unnatural consequenco, the clergy of all
decominations, shut out from the management of
the common benevolence, apply themselves to the
organization of private efforts of usefulness. Ido
not defend such a course, but I cannot profess to
be surprised at it. No clean of men is likely to
submit tamely and without remonstrance to be thus
excluded as a class from performing a duty which
rests equally upon them and all other citizens,
much less a class to whom, if I may so speak,
benevolence is a professional as well as a personal
obligation. Upon whomever else public opinion
makes demands, it will not fail to look to them :
even if moved by no inner sense of duty, they
rouse themselves to meet the outer call. I have
myself stated in a previous letter, in pretty strong
terms, the objections which are justly made to mi-
nisters of religion as administrators of publicfunds
in a time of difficulty like this ; and no doubt
the number of them in any town who can take a
useful part in the management of business is not very
large. But this is not • question of all or none,
any more than is the case of manufacturers, or
attorneys, or shoemakers. Let the clergy be treated
as you would treat any other body : select the
competent men, and reject the incompetent. If
any man be notoriously bad tempered, or fanatical,
or partial, or inefficient, keep him off the commit-
tee, whatever his church or his position in it, and
honestly confess (if need is) the reason why he is so
kept off ; but do not on that account refuse the
services of a man who may be the very opposite of
all this ; still more, do not affix to an entire class
the stigma of utter untrustworthiness. To exclude
all ministers, under all circumstances, from a
relief committee, is not to destroy, but ouly to evade,
the dangers of sectarianism ; and the partial sym-
pathies, the petty jealousies, the small suspicions
which would not dare to show themselves in a
general board, or if they showed themselves would
soon be shamed into silence, are left to flourish and
to clash in every church and chapel and Sunday
school throughout the town.