In Darkest England and The Way Out [141]
on that higher level of respectability they once occupied, some relative, or friend, or employer, who occasionally thinks of them, and who, if only satisfied that a real change has taken place in the prodigal, will not only be willing, but delighted, to help them once more.
By this Scheme, we believe we shall be able to teach habits of economy, household management, thrift, and the like. There are numbers of men who, although suffering the direst pangs of poverty, know little or nothing about the value of money, or the prudent use of it; and there are hundreds of poor women who do not know what a decently-managed home is, and who could not make one if they had the most ample means and tried ever so hard to accomplish it, having never seen anything but dirt, disorder, and misery in their domestic history. They could not cook a dinner or prepare a meal decently if their lives were dependent on it, never having had a chance of learning how to do it. But by this Scheme hope to teach these things.
By this Plan, habits of cleanliness will be created, and some knowledge of sanitary questions in general will be imparted. This Scheme changes the circumstances of those whose poverty is caused by their misfortune. To begin with, it finds work for the unemployed. This is the chief need. The great problem that has for ages been puzzling the brains of the political economist and philanthropist has been "How can we find these people work?" No matter what other helps are discovered, without work there is no real ground for hope. Charity and all the other ten thousand devices are only temporary expedients, altogether insufficient to meet the necessity. Work, apart from the fact that it is God's method of supplying the wants of man's composite nature, is an essential to his well-being in every way-- and on this Plan there is work, honourable work--none of your demoralising stone-breaking, or oakum-picking business, which tantalises and insults poverty, Every worker will feel that he is not only occupied for his own benefit, but that any advantage reaped over and above that which he gains himself will serve to lift some other poor wretch out of the gutter.
There would be work within the capacity of all. Every gift could be employed. For instance, take five persons on the Farm--a baker, a tailor, a shoemaker, a cook, and an agriculturist. The baker would make bread for all, the tailor garments for all, the shoemaker shoes for all, the cook would cook for all, and the agriculturist dig for all. Those who know anything which would be useful to the inhabitants of the Colony will be set to do it, and those who are ignorant of any trade or profession will be taught one.
This Scheme removes the vicious and criminal classes out of the sphere of those temptations before which they have invariably fallen in the past. Our experience goes to show that when you have, by Divine grace, or by any consideration of the advantages of a good life, or the disadvantages of a bad one, produced in a man circumstanced as those whom we have been describing, the resolution to turn over a new leaf, the temptations and difficulties he has to encounter will ordinarily master him, and undo all that has been done, if he still continues to be surrounded by old companions and allurements to sin.
Now, look at the force of the temptations this class has to fight against. What is it that leads people to do wrong--people of all classes, rich as well as poor? Not the desire to sin. They do not want to sin; many of them do not know what sin is, but they have certain appetites or natural likings, the indulgence of which is pleasant to them, and when the desire for their unlawful gratification is aroused, regardless of the claims of God, their own highest interests, or the well-being of their fellows, they are carried away by them; and thus all the good resolutions they have made in the past come to grief.
For instance, take the temptation which comes through the natural appetite, hunger. Here is a man who has been at a religious meeting, or received
By this Scheme, we believe we shall be able to teach habits of economy, household management, thrift, and the like. There are numbers of men who, although suffering the direst pangs of poverty, know little or nothing about the value of money, or the prudent use of it; and there are hundreds of poor women who do not know what a decently-managed home is, and who could not make one if they had the most ample means and tried ever so hard to accomplish it, having never seen anything but dirt, disorder, and misery in their domestic history. They could not cook a dinner or prepare a meal decently if their lives were dependent on it, never having had a chance of learning how to do it. But by this Scheme hope to teach these things.
By this Plan, habits of cleanliness will be created, and some knowledge of sanitary questions in general will be imparted. This Scheme changes the circumstances of those whose poverty is caused by their misfortune. To begin with, it finds work for the unemployed. This is the chief need. The great problem that has for ages been puzzling the brains of the political economist and philanthropist has been "How can we find these people work?" No matter what other helps are discovered, without work there is no real ground for hope. Charity and all the other ten thousand devices are only temporary expedients, altogether insufficient to meet the necessity. Work, apart from the fact that it is God's method of supplying the wants of man's composite nature, is an essential to his well-being in every way-- and on this Plan there is work, honourable work--none of your demoralising stone-breaking, or oakum-picking business, which tantalises and insults poverty, Every worker will feel that he is not only occupied for his own benefit, but that any advantage reaped over and above that which he gains himself will serve to lift some other poor wretch out of the gutter.
There would be work within the capacity of all. Every gift could be employed. For instance, take five persons on the Farm--a baker, a tailor, a shoemaker, a cook, and an agriculturist. The baker would make bread for all, the tailor garments for all, the shoemaker shoes for all, the cook would cook for all, and the agriculturist dig for all. Those who know anything which would be useful to the inhabitants of the Colony will be set to do it, and those who are ignorant of any trade or profession will be taught one.
This Scheme removes the vicious and criminal classes out of the sphere of those temptations before which they have invariably fallen in the past. Our experience goes to show that when you have, by Divine grace, or by any consideration of the advantages of a good life, or the disadvantages of a bad one, produced in a man circumstanced as those whom we have been describing, the resolution to turn over a new leaf, the temptations and difficulties he has to encounter will ordinarily master him, and undo all that has been done, if he still continues to be surrounded by old companions and allurements to sin.
Now, look at the force of the temptations this class has to fight against. What is it that leads people to do wrong--people of all classes, rich as well as poor? Not the desire to sin. They do not want to sin; many of them do not know what sin is, but they have certain appetites or natural likings, the indulgence of which is pleasant to them, and when the desire for their unlawful gratification is aroused, regardless of the claims of God, their own highest interests, or the well-being of their fellows, they are carried away by them; and thus all the good resolutions they have made in the past come to grief.
For instance, take the temptation which comes through the natural appetite, hunger. Here is a man who has been at a religious meeting, or received