RELATIONS OF HOSPITALS TO PAUPERISM. 739 



private charities annually in the city of New York, a city of 1,000,- 

 000 inhabitants. A considerable portion of this sura is expended on 

 the hospitals, which alone contain more than 6,000 beds, not includ- 

 ing insane or other asylums, but only institutions known by the 

 name of hospitals. About 4,000 of the 0,000 beds are in public 

 city or State hospitals, the remaining 2,000 being in hospitals sup- 

 ported by voluntary charity. The official reports of the thirty-odd 

 free dispensaries give 307,060 as the number of patients applying for 

 and receiving treatment in 1875 at the dispensaries, against 20,631 

 treated at their homes. 



To say that $10,000,000 are expended in charities, that there 

 are 6,000 free beds in the hospitals, and that over 300,000 persons 

 receive medicine and medical advice free of cost at the dispensa- 

 ries, is certainly evidence of the generosity and Christian spirit of 

 charity that prevail. But, when looked at in a direct, practical 

 way, these figures show something else. If these official reports are 

 to be relied upon, then, in a population of 1,000,000, over 300,000 per-, 

 sons receive alms every year. We doubt if the number of individuals 

 is so large, for it is the custom of some dispensaries to count each 

 visit a patient makes as a patient treated. But the actual number is 

 immense, and increasing out of all proportion to the increase of popu- 

 lation. The truth is, the majority of our hospitals, as they are at 

 present managed, are liable to do more harm than good. Apparently 

 they do much good, and for the time do relieve suffering and want, 

 but in the end may do much harm. Giving help too readily even 

 during sickness is hurtful, and when it is offered freely without the 

 certain knowledge that it is really needed, it very naturally removes 

 the healthful stimulus of necessity, the dread of which prompts every 

 individual to provide for the misfortune of sickness. 



The dispensaries as they are now managed are nothing less than 

 a promiscuous charity, exactly similar to the notorious " soup-kitch- 

 en " medicine being substituted for soup. They offer to the 

 ignorant and poor an easy and ever-ready inducement to take alms. 

 They are the first stepping-stones to the degradation of pauperism. 

 The self-respect of an individual is injured the moment he accepts 

 alms, and a habit of taking alms invariably tends to a complete loss 

 of self-respect and consequent degradation. It matters but little 

 whether alms be medicine or food, the principle remains the same. 

 The hungry must be fed ; but we know that, instead of continuing to 

 feed the hungry, and gradually destroying their power to help them- 

 selves, it is infinitely better to teach them how to help themselves and 

 seek out and remove the cause that induced the miserable condition 

 of helplessness. For exactly the same reason, would it not be better 

 to teach the poor how to avoid getting sick, and by every means in 

 our power remove the causes that induce disease among them, rather 

 than to offer them the best care and attention without being sure that 



