Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-09-17 00:00:00

SEPTEMBER 17, 1859,

°irtue and respectability

in society ? We are
../43rrY to say it, but we verily think not. There

is a- most deplorable remissness among us as to
e moral and spiritual interests, of those classes
of the population. Not that there is no anxiety
about them,—no commiseration for them, in their
ti ePravitY and wretchedness,—no concern for
thou, happiness and welfare. Among the reli-
,_.

.011
S portion of the community, at any rate, we
154" no doubt there is all this. But unhappily

It is
too much allowed to remain a mere mat-
ter of
eeling, -without being applied to any really
energetic and practical effort for the remedy of
the
terrible vices that they deplore. Take, for
hist
allee, the single subject of prostitution. Is
ans
thing commensurate and effectual being
attempted for the diminution of its enormous
whole
in this town ? Are there, throughout a
401 e y
uur, a hundred out of the two thousand

lie
hundred prostitutes that infest our streets,
11444 Pollute our population, that are ever addressed
anY words of affectionate remonstrance, or
6°ls reproof, or friendly expostulation,
:l. Who are the objects, in any wise, of really
a
and serious practical endeavours to rescue
them
Lora their life of degradation, and misery,
am
,t 4 Pollution ? We are not forgetting, that
there are such laudable institutions amongst us
as Female Penitentiaries ; nor would we in any
degree disparage their most praiseworthy opera-
ti
is behalf of those depraved and fallen

oth
-ell. But what arc such slight efforts as

amongst so many of that infamous and

""gable class of our townswomen ?
1:1°' nlany and various as are the means which,
p; aclinit are so laudably employed for the sup-
liessinn of vice, and the reclamation of the
they yet fall far, very far, short of the re-
tVrenients of the case. When we compare
a eallindeecl, with the enormous amount of vice,
'unnorality; and crime, that abounds, it al-
to seems like trifling with such a fearful matter,
ii:vserve how slight, how very slight, are the in-
Yet es which, by all the means put together, are
tiCeing exerted. And even those means are con-
ted to, and cared about, by but a very, very
Il
mall fraction of even our professing Christian
ra
1114.1111-itY• We question if there is more than one
aas th‘ll°llBand amongst us that really contribute,
they
"ght to do, their assistance, and of

weir
uh.+-
_
atut to any of the institutions, or
of the efforts that are in operation, pr
the
suppression of vice and crime, and the reform-
ation of
the 'vicious and the criminal. Even the
Th2lrell, We cannot but think, is very remiss in this
;4ter, not only amongst the degraded, but
ttl"gst the poor generally, and even those raised
cliciegl'ee or two above the poor. The fact of the
ureh's portals being closed all the week, save
only on one day of the seven,—and her system
-Ordinarily being so inadequately and inefficiently
applied, to bring her into personal contact with

--v6e large bodies of the people who most need her
'care and concern, to go no further, a sad anom-
-449 to say the least of it, whilst we go on
deploring the existence, and the growth of

i3llell a condition of vice and crime as exists in

the midst of us, and meets us in the face, whether
by (lay or by night, as we pass along the leading
thoroughfares of our town. But, for the present,

We must desist. We venture to throw out these
hints for the consideration of at least the benevo-
lent. The subject is one that requires a thorough
-- ation ; and painful and distressing, and
even disgusting

though it may be, such an ex-

amination is not to be shrunk from by the
'Christian philanthropist, or the virtuous citizen.