CH. IV.] AGED AND INFIRM POOR. 16? 



circumstances of Ireland and England are different, and 

 therefore it does not follow that the evils produced in the 

 one should necessarily be the consequence of the intro- 

 duction of a legal provision for the poor in the other. I 

 allude (and I do so without meaning offensive contro- 

 versy) to the religious feelings of both nations regarding 

 certain points of morality. Where the horror entertained 

 of any vice will not be great, it is not to be supposed 

 that it will be so scrupulously avoided as when it is looked 

 upon as productive of the greatest imaginable misery. 

 Now, it is a matter of notoriety that incontinence is re- 

 garded by the Catholic peasantry of Ireland with tenfold 

 horror to what it is by the Protestant people of England ; 

 and therefore, though in one country the system of Poor- 

 laws might tend to increase that crime, it does not follow 

 that it would be productive of similar consequences in the 

 other. As to the second objection, it is well founded, 

 since it has been uniformly found that the pressure of the 

 taxes in Ireland generally fell upon the middle classes. 



It is in vain to make a provision for the poor, unless 

 the property of the absentees and the church lands are 

 almost exclusively taxed with the amount ; otherwise such 

 a provision would be no relief. All that would be gained 

 by taxing the industrious classes would be to make that 

 compulsory which is now voluntary, to create unthankful- 

 ness in the minds of those in whom now there is grati- 

 tude, and to make those give with grudging hearts who 

 now give with the grace of a free voluntary offering. Such 

 an exchange would be a serious loss ; but if the proper- 

 ties of the absentees are taxed, and the church lands be 

 re-appropriated to their original destination, the relief of 

 the poor, the feelings of gratitude on the one hand, and 



