t 218 ] 



tainty of a new national regulation continues as 

 great as ever; while, notwithflranding the flourilh- 

 ing (late of moll manufadtures, the poors-rates are 

 making a conftant advance. The laft circum- 

 ibnce muft prove, either that population has 

 been rapidly increafing, or that ' the fyftem of l¥ia- 

 naging the poor is daily beconning worffe^ The 

 former of thefe may be true; the latter cannot be 

 the cafe, without a national degeneracy in the morals 

 and habits of the poor. To obviate fuch a pro- 

 bable evil, as well as to lighten the general burden, 

 it has been a favourite theory of feveral intelligent 

 writers, that the poor may be made to maintain 

 themfelves. Under the preflure of infufHcient mil- 

 lions of expenditure, this fhould feem a paradox; 

 and yet fo plaufible, and indeed rational, h^ve been 

 fome calculations, that the poflibiiity of almoft real- 

 izing fuch a fcheme, is not v6id of hope. 



Among the moft ingenious of thofe fchemes may 

 be confidered that of Mr. Pew, late of Welling- 

 borough, but now of Shaftefbury. His treatife, 

 which is intitled 'Twenty Minutes Obfervations on a 

 better Mode of 'providing for the Poory feems to have 

 been long undefervedly out of print, and not to 

 have been known in proportion to its merit. As 

 containing fadls, refpe6ting an aflbciation in one 

 place, attended with remarkable fuccefs, and rea- 



fpning 



