New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1870-10-28
UORK VERSVS AIMS.


There ia q mc1e individual way OF looking
nc Work and Wealth than that given us in
such strong and apt words By Mr.. Hughes the
other evening and one which just now
comes perhaps more directly home to us. The
larger classes Of the lowest poor lie outside
of and below the reach of the Trades Unions
ard Cooperative Societies; but it is from these
closes that the aggregate Of want and crime
assails lis. On the other hand, very few Of us
are Peter CO0peTs or Ezra COrnells, but
every educated man and woman employs or
helps during the year one or two other men
and women of this lower, dangerous class.
As the cold weather comes on, the
lmcs between them in the cities become more
strongly marked crime increases Oh the one
hand, and charity on the other begins to bestir
herself. Now, we would like to suggest before
the usual opening of Winter aid societies, fairs
and benevolent balls, that charity implies quite
as false relation between the poor and the
rich as crime. Soup and coal societies, as
everybody knows, are mere plasters to stop
the gaping of an incurable wound. They
put it out of sight for the time, but
never heal it. A long experience in aims
giving is very apt to harden the heart and
sharpen the eyesight Of the giver, and cause
him to doubt whether the quality of mercy
blesses either him that gives or him that
takes; it is much moro likely to beget i'm
patience ON one hand and conteDtmont with
degradation on the other
in another week or two, we shall be adj
jured from every pulpit to remember the
"poor," and the hackneyed appeal will be
echoed from every secular press. This is all
very praisewOrthy, no doubt but docs it
reach the root of the evilf If one half OF the
money which will be given IN New York this
Winter to supply the immediate needs OF
the poor was expended with the same
amount Of system and earnesiness of effort in
providing them with work here, or sending
chem where they would find it, the amount of
relief would be incredibly greater, while the
good accomplished would be permanent. An
other point worth consideration is the univer-
sal habit in this country of underpaying the
very class to whom aims are given. The
American and his wife are almsgivers from a
sort of animal, generous instinct; from in
stinct also they are over-shrewd in business,
fearful of being imposed on. Brown keeps
his bookkeeDer hanging over tho verge of
starvation or theft on a salary of 81 900, while he
subscribes double that amount to the Home
for Orphans, which will some day take the
fellows children in as paupers: Mrs. Brown
haggles with her laundress over n shilling and
throws double the sum to the drunken beg2ar
at the door. Charity would begin at home
most elfectually if it would spur each man in
New-York this Winter into paying living
prices to the two or three people he employs,
and if with the surplus which he has hitherto
laid aside for purblind, indiscriminate aims
giving he would help some other man
into the way of honestly earn
ing his own living. Trades Unions and Co
operative Societies achieve great results, but
the cooperation Of every individual employer
with his hands, Of every woman with her
servant, if genial, hearty, and helpful, would
accomplish wider and grander ends. In the
first settlement of the country the aid ex-
tended by the richer to the poorer class was
to educate their hands; the farmer had his APP
prenti'cs the Housewife her " bound girls" TO
train in.O useful, sClf-htlping citizens; now