1809.] Observations on 
For the Monthly Magazine. 
OBSERVATIONS on the POOR LAWs, and on 
the most effectual MEANS of providing 
for the poor. 
O many endeavours have been made 
by eminent mento amend and im- 
prove the Poor Laws, with a view to the 
better regulation, and less expensive 
maintenance, of the paupers of this king- 
dom, that the public are pretty gene- 
rally discouraged, by past disappoint- 
ments, from attending to pamphlets es- 
pecially treating about the Poor. Under 
this impression I have preferred the chan- 
nel of your widely circulated Magazine, 
fer submitting my opinion on this sub- 
ject to public consideration. It is buta 
few years ago, that a late eminent States- 
man failed in his project on this part of 
national policy; and another emment 
Senator has in the last year no less dis- 
appointed the public expectation. The 
fact seems to have been, that these gen- 
tlemen took a wider range of investiga- 
tion, and were desirous of embracing re- 
medies which appeared to people, who 
had thought less on the subject, as too 
complicated for successful execution.— 
But it is not only of late, that men of 
great talents have worked in this vine- 
yard, without producing fruit worthy of 
their Jabours. Numerous others, in past 
as well as in modern times, have medi- 
tated anxiously on the state of the Poor, 
and in their writings reprobated the mis- 
conduct of our parochial management ; 
the laws, notwithstanding, have still 
continued to be inefficient ; the manage- 
ment of the poor more dificult and com- 
plicated; and the charge of their main- 
tenance progressively and more grievous- 
ly expensive. Since matters are thus 
circumstanced, it is no wonder, that the 
whole people should be united in opinion, 
however differences may continue to ex- 
ist on particular points, that the poor. 
laws, as they now operate, are at variance 
with the welfare of the community. 
The Legislature too appears to have 
participated in this public sentiment, and 
an act was passed in the 43d year of his 
present Majesty, for procuring returns 
from all the parishes of England and 
Wales, relative to the expence and 
maintenance of their poor respectively, 
for the purpose of forming from them 
the best,judgment; and an abstract of 
these returns was printed, by order of 
the House of Commons, July 10, 1804. 
By this public document it appears, that 
the poor’s rate, for the year ending at 
Faster, 1803, amounted to the enormous 
the Poor-Laws. 349 
sum of 5,348,205!. and that 4,077,3911. 
of the money, so collected, was ex- 
pended in the maintenance and relief of 
the parish poon; a sum more than com-_ 
petent, one would suppose, to satisfy 
every demand which their real. necessi- 
ties could require, or the public be ex. 
pected to fulfil, and yet it does not ap- 
pear to have atforded correspondent be- 
nefits, either then, or since, to the con- 
tributors or partakers; these remaining 
disgusted with the restraint, and. those 
with the irregularity with which the 
whole system is conducted. The in. 
crease of this parochial tax had been gra- 
dual till of late years, but latterly it has 
advanced with rapid strides, having in- 
creased, within the last twenty years, 
8-5ths; and within twenty-seven years 
2-3ds. Is this sudden augmentation of 
the claims of the poor, with the mass of 
wretchedness in its train, any substan 
tial proof of the prosperity of the king- 
dom, when so much of the rentai of the 
land is required to sustain those persons 
who cannot, or will not, in so industrious 
anation earn a subsistence for them- 
selves and families? The true criterion 
of a nation’s prosperity is not to be 
taken from the glare which surrounds 
the great and the wealthy, from the dis- 
sipation of those a little below them, nor 
from the too common ostentation and ex- 
travagance of the middling people ; but 
from that infallible index, the manifest 
comfort amongst the community at large, 
every where to beseen, felt, and under- 
stood, national prosperity being truly 
an ageregate of individual happiness, 
each class having wherewithal to obtain, 
enjoy, and communicate the things suited 
to its station, and the poor, in particular, 
able to procure all the necessaries of 
life, with a little more for exigencies, by 
the current wages of their labour. But 
this cannot be the case, whilst a poor 
man’s pair ef shces absorbs his whole 
week’s wages; whilst wholesome meat 
and beer, and, in short, whilst all the 
articles of food and raiment, are at their 
present high prices. It is most certain, 
that to these ligh prices of all the ne- 
cessaries of life, most of them doubled 
within $0 years, is chiefly owing the 
rapid increase of the poor’s rate, not 
only as having multiplied and enlarged the’ 
direct claims on this fund, but also as 
having reduced, from extended poverty, 
the number of contributors towards it. 
The wages of husbandry work are with- 
out doubt, in general, below their just 
standard accarding to the times; and , so 
ar 
