The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1855-09-02
The wan or Abbott Lawrence-Intcuigent |
Chur

certain conditions in the erection of model
lodging houses. According to the provisions
Of the WILL this sum must be spent in the build
ing of model lodging houses on the most prac
teal and best esteemed plan. Each dwelling
when complete must be leased at a low but re-
munerative rent to respectable mechanics or
laborer's family. 1t is calculated that all the
lodgings will be occupied permanently as on
no other plan can SO much comfort and well
being be secured to the tenant for the same
amount of money Proper persons are APP
pointed to receive the rents one-half they are
allowed to expend in keeping the lodging
houses in repair and building others the other
half is to be laid out in judicious charities.
Such is the scheme.
Now let us see how much good Mr.. Lawrence
intends to do with his fifty thousand dollars.
If the ground is carefully selected, and large
economy practised in building the model lodg-
ing house, it will accommodate one hundred
and twenty-five families or five hundred per-
sons for the next fifty years. These people will
enjoy the great blessings of,cleanliness health,
examples of morality, andfrespectable society.
They will not be taught idleness or depen-
dense, for they will have to pay their rent just
as if they lived in the vilest dens in Boston
but their landlord will not regard them as mere
money paying machines, they will not be al
lowed to starve in case of illness, and they will
be encouraged to respect themselves. 1t is
quite certain that the two children whom we
have allowed as an average to each family will
have every incentive to industry, order, clean
illness and virtue, and none to vice and ruin.
Allowing that each lodging changes its tenant
every ten years, which is probably only half as
often as would really be the case, the lodging
house will have been the saving, physically and
morally, Of twenty-five hundred persons. Twen-
ty-fve hundred souls, we say, will have been
rescued from the fangs Of vice and crime by
this house; twenty-five hundred bodies will
have been lifted out Of the gutter and cleansed
and made whole by the same cause This is
just twenty dollars a head-for soul and body
together.
But the good intended by Mr. Lawrence does
not stop here. In the first place, the repairs
to the lodging house will not absorb fifty per
cent of the rent The latter will probably ave.
rage 5000 year of this, perhaps thousand
dollars may be laid aside every year for the
purpose of rebuilding or charging the house.
In twenty-five years. this fund will be large
enough to build another lodging house like the
first, and before the end of the fifty years two
others on the same scale may be built. For as
there will be no one to live on the interest of
the deposit it will accumulate at compound
interest, and the first lodging house will in
course of time be the mother Of village.
The other half Of the rent-say two thousand
five hundred dollars--may be given in chart
ties. If the distributors of this sum are judi
cious, it may be a godsend to no less than
FIVE hundred persons There exists class
Of people-each of us can call to mind some
representatives Of it--who hardly ever spend
three consecutive years without undergoing
the extreme of human misery. They are the
thoughtless, who live from hand to mouth.
Either they fall i'll, or they lose their work.
or they happen bodily accident, or some such
mishap befalls them and as they have made
no provision for such disasters, misfortune
takes them unawares, and strikes them down
at once. For time the pawnbroker and the
small auctioneer come to their aid, but these
resources last but a short while, and then they
stare hunger in the face Now it is not
quarter of dollar or few cents or loaf of
bread these sufferers want. Such aims would
cost them more in establishment than any
temporary bodily relief could repay. They
need small loan, five or ten dollars, which
will give bread to the family while the father
is recovering, or seeking work. Such loan
they can only get from charitable institu.
ton, for they can offer no security, and the
chances Of its being repaid depend entirely on
the character Of the borrower. That it would
be repaid, and gratefully, in many cases. no one
who has studied human nature can question. In
some cases, of course the managers would be
deceived by plausible rogues but very large
proportion of the recipients of such bounty
would lay 10y their very first earnings to pay
SO sacred debt.
This appear to be very proper and likely
manner for the $4,000 year to be distributed.
If it is so disposed of-or on any-analogous
PLAN something like five hundred heads of
families will be relieved every year, and in all
probability fund of large amount will be col
lected from the sums returned by those who
have received aid in hard times.
Should some such plan as this be adopted,
Mr.. Lawrence's fifty thousand dollars will be
the means of rendering vital service to one
thousand persons every year. One thousand
persons each year will have cause to bless his
name.
Now, compare this system Of charity with
that which is practised by so many Of our rich
soup kitchens, or charity concerts, or calico
balls, or this or that religious society. The
point of the latter order Of charity appears
to be the principle that benevolence is a dis
graceful propensity, of which a man should
be ashamed, and which he should endeavor to
conceal under a cloak of some kindly call
In q Il a hall or a concert for instance The