MISCHIEVOUS PHILANTHROPY. 



471 



Dr. Fairlie Clark, on the subject: "An inquiry 

 lately instituted at the Royal Free Hospital 

 showed that 49 per cent, of the out-patients were 

 in a position to contribute toward their own med- 

 ical relief; and the same has been proved by in- 

 vestigations carried on at the Children's Hospital 

 during the last two years. For practical pur- 

 poses, we may say that half the applicants at 

 London hospitals could afford a few shillings a 

 year for what they are now seeking in formd 

 pauperum." Philanthropists of the George 

 Moore type cannot too soon take facts of this 

 kind to heart. In their eagerness to do good, 

 they appear to be entirely forgetful of the fact 

 that every fresh charity adds to the power of 

 draw ; that, besides lowering the self-dependence 

 of residents who take advantage of the offered 

 beneficence, it attracts, as if by gravitation, idly- 

 inclined families from distant quarters, and so 

 aids in filling the town with a pauperized and dis- 

 solute population. If not actually demoralized on 

 arrival, these strangers are made so by the in- 

 numerable contrivances to render them thriftless 

 and abandoned. Nothing is left undone to pol- 

 lute their moral sensibilities ; nor can all the ef- 

 forts of clerical ministration do more than mit- 

 igate the evils which well-meaning people are 

 habitually and unintentionally cultivating. Very 

 hard is it that the industriously disposed inhabi- 

 tants in our large cities are to be embarrassed by 

 crowds of paupers and ne'er-do-weels through 

 a headlong course of mischievous philanthropy, 

 which, to give it its proper name, is a system of 

 wanton cruelty. 



According to late accounts, twenty-eight hos- 

 pitals in the metropolis are urgently in want of 

 funds. This will not create surprise. The free 

 admission to hospitals is overdone. A reform in 

 the system is clearly required, in the interests of 

 society. Let the benevolently disposed begin to 

 encourage frugality and self-exertion among the 

 classes who are at present indiscriminately pau- 

 perized by accepting medical assistance gratui- 

 tously. Instead of attracting many of these 

 classes to free hospitals and free dispensaries 

 that are supported with difficulty, they should 

 make a reasonable effort to induce them to co- 

 operate in establishing institutions on the provi- 

 dent principle, by which, at a comparatively tri- 

 fling cost per annum, they would be entitled to 

 insure medical assistance for themselves on all 

 needful occasions. Sanatoria, or medical board- 

 ing establishments, of different classes, somewhat 

 on the plan of the Parisian maiso?is de sante, 

 would, we think, be a useful appendage to all our 



large towns. The promotion of such institutions, 

 however, would hardly meet the approval of that 

 wild order of philanthropists who are bent on 

 pauperizing everybody and everything. 



In the Times of May 2d, a correspondent (C. 

 E. Trevelyan) pointedly calls attention to the im- 

 propriety of indiscriminate free medical treat- 

 ment, as exemplified in the metropolis. He says : 

 "The central fact is, that we have hitherto at- 

 tempted to provide medical treatment on a purely 

 eleemosynary footing for the entire working-class, 

 and a considerable portion of the lower middle- 

 class, population of London, and that this is a 

 greater burden than private charity can bear. A 

 vast multitude is encouraged to throw itself for 

 medical aid on a few central points. Hence over- 

 crowded waiting-rooms ; the exhaustion of the 

 strength of the patients by delay ; mutual infec- 

 tion among large numbers of persons brought 

 into close contact in a susceptible state ; the viti- 

 ation of the air of the hospitals themselves ; and, 

 more than all, the mockery of medical relief, ow- 

 ing to the impossibility of giving sufficient time 

 to each case. There is also a great misdirection 

 and waste of charitable funds from the notorious 

 fact that the out-patient departments are largely 

 used by persons who can well afford to pay some- 

 thing for their medical treatment. The medical 

 profession is deprived of its just and necessary 

 remuneration, and our people are educated to im- 

 provident and mendicant habits, being entirely 

 relieved, as regards this requirement of civilized 

 life, from all necessity for forethought and thrift." 

 This is exactly the argument we have here and 

 elsewhere been trying to bring under public at- 

 tention. 



There is another view of the matter. Has it 

 never .occurred to persons of a reflective turn of 

 mind, that the profuse and reckless dispensation 

 of charity on very many who rely on this mode 

 of existence, is contrary to the clear demands of 

 moral retribution ? Every departure from recti- 

 tude is destined by an imprescriptive natural law 

 to bring its own punishment. A want of thrift is 

 followed by poverty. A shameful neglect of du- 

 ties brings remorse, if not some more expressive 

 visitation. In the ancient classic superstition, 

 that there is a Nemesis which executes the decrees 

 of a strict retributive Providence, there is a glim- 

 mering of divine truth. We can no more escape 

 from the effects of wrong-doing than we can from 

 the sickness and pain resulting from a neglect of 

 the laws of health. Inconsiderate philanthropists 

 have set themselves to overturn or neutralize this 

 expiatory principle in the moral world. The 



