IDO AGRICULTURAL SURVEY OF chap. r. 



number of the indigent is not diminishing : the 

 price of provisions is on the increase : and al- 

 though an honest pride, or a spirit of independ- 

 ence, may produce a disinclination to be indebt- 

 ed to public charity for support ; yet urgent 

 necessity must finally triumph over these con- 

 siderations ; and even humanity will consider it 

 as a duty to search out and relieve those, whose 

 modesty may endeavour to conceal their ex- 

 treme want from the public eye. If therefore, 

 the present funds shall cease to be adequate to 

 the real necessities of the poor, in consequence 

 -of the public liberality not keeping pace with 

 their increasing number or their increasing ne- 

 cessities, Poor's rates will become unavoidable, 

 the bad effects of which are numerous, and have 

 been severely felt by our sister kingdom. These 

 I will not pretend to enumerate. I shall only 

 observe, that a scheme which teaches men to 

 consider supplies of this kind, not as a charitable 

 contribution, but as a legal provision, and not 

 to receive them as alms, but to demand them as 

 a right, must inevitably increase the number of 

 claimants, by extinguishing that feeling of shame 

 and dishonour, which is usually attached to a 

 state of depend'ance on public charity, and which 

 hath so strong a tendency to prevent improper 

 applications. A scheme which entirely removes 

 all apprehensions of want, and holds out the 

 prospect of an abundant and indiscriminate sup- 

 ply, must surely be an enemy to industry and 

 frugality, and a powerful encouragement to idle- 

 ness, dissipation, and intemperance. Tell a man 

 that he has a legal right to support from the 

 parish, when he comes to be in want, and it 



