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that law which declares it to be the duty of the people at large, and not of the clergy alone,* to support the poor, for the beggars alluded to in the above Statute were still to live by beggary, and if the towns would not permit them to remain, they were to return to their "native," as the phrase is in Norfolk, there to be maintained by charity, spontaneous on the part of the giver, but such as the law permitted the poor and needy to solicit. This Statute alone would go far to disprove the notion that the clergy once maintained the poor, or that the poor claimed a third part of their tithes, no allusion being made to them in this place; it was the towns, and after them the native villages, but especially the former, which were indicated as sources of aid for the impotent.

"This fact," argues Mr. Hale, a great authority on this point, "viewed in combination with the Acts, above recited, of Henry VIII., prior to the dissolution, the latter of which directs a public collection of alms from the laity to be made for the use of the poor, but commands the clergy to do this, together with the total silence of those Statutes on the subject of any clerical duty of almsgiving, appeared to me distinctly to prove that as no alteration has really been made by the Reformation in the duties of the clergy to the poor, so neither is the Reformation of religion to be charged as the source of a new duty being thrown upon the laity -that of maintaining the poor. The destruction of the monasteries, the want of public credit, and the uncertainty which harassed every man's mind during the struggle between the Churches of Rome and England, these and other causes of a character purely political, must have contributed very materially to the increase of poverty and accumulation of distress. The progress of pauperism was, indeed, accelerated by these events; but the evil had commenced with the dawn of liberty in England, long before any prospect was opened of a change of religion. Had it been possible for public liberty to attain anything like the present extent under the dominion of the Papal Church, the same evils would still have ensued, and the endowed alms of the monasteries

"The poor of England," says Mr. Justice Blackstone, "till the time of Henry VIII., subsisted entirely upon private benevolence, and the charity of well-disposed Christians. For though it appears by the Mirrour that by the Common Law the poor were to be 'sustained by parsons, rectors of the Church, and parishioners, so that none of them dye for default of sustenance,' and though by the Statutes 12 Rich. II. c. 7 and 19 Henry VIII. c. 12, the poor were directed to abide in the cities and towns wherein they were born, or such wherein they had dwelt for three years (which seems to be the first rudiments of parish settlement), yet, till the Statute 26 Henry VIII. c. 26, I find no compulsory method chalked out for this purpose; but the poor seem to have been left to such relief as the humanity of their neighbours would afford them. The monasteries were, in particular, their principal resource."-Vol. i. pp. 359, 360.

would have been found equally* inadequate to meet the exigency of the case, unless the papal clergy, waiting upon the fears and hopes of men, had been enabled to draw from the laity, by voluntary gifts and offerings, sums as great as those which the Overseers of the Poor were enabled to raise when, by the 14 Elizabeth c. iv. 3, the hitherto half-voluntary, half-compulsory contribution to the poor was converted into a general and equal rate upon all the inhabitants of a parish."

It must be borne in mind that, even if the Church had never been robbed of her property, it would have been, if so charged, totally inadequate to the relief of the poor in these days, seeing that the population has so largely increased, the number of the unemployed is so much greater, the competition of the present day is so much keener, and that the amount required for that purpose from the rates is greater than the whole income of the Church put together. It must also be borne in mind that, of all the parishioners in any parish, no one is so heavily rated for the relief of the poor as its incumbent or parson. The poor, therefore, have no legal claim on the tithe, either tripartite or any other proportion; they stand completely outside, and have no foot in, the present controversy as to tithes, which has been raised by the Liberationists, to excite hopes of possible plunder which can never be realised, so long as justice and equity are supreme in the councils of the nation. The problem, then, "What is to be done with the poor?" is a very practical one, and must be settled, as it has been in Christian England, on its own merits. It must also be discussed on an equitable and Christian basis, for the whole body politic, and not by setting class against class, or filching from one part of the community to enrich another.

The following table will exhibit the course of legislation on the subject of vagrancy and maintenance of the poor from the time. of Edward III. to 43 Elizabeth :

1349. 23 Edward III. c. 7. None under colour of pity or alms to give anything to a beggar that is able to labour.

1388. 12 Richard II. c. 7. Persons going begging, to be punished. Beggars impotent to serve, ordered to return to the towns where they were born.

1495. 11 Henry VII. c. 2. Beggars not able to work to return to their hundred, and not to beg out of their hundred. 1503. 19 Henry VII. c. 12. Similar enactments, but punishment of vagrancy mitigated.

was,

* Preface to Tanner's Notitia Monastica, p. xxxii.: "Before the Reformation there in fact, no assessment for the relief of the poor. But I cannot think this to be so much owing to the relief received at the religious houses (as some have done) as to the great difference between the state of the nation now and then.”

1530. 22 Henry VIII. c. 25. Impotent beggars not to wander about, but to be maintained by the parishes, by way of voluntary and charitable alms. Valiant beggars to be set to work for their own maintenance. Officers and churchwardens to collect alms for the impotent, and for the employment of sturdy beggars. The clergy to exhort the people to give alms for the purpose of this Act. Alms by tenure to be added to the common stock. The parson to

keep account of the produce and application of the alms. The giving of alms not compulsory.

1547. 1 Edward VI. c. 3. Idle persons leaving their work to be accounted vagabond. May be apprehended and marked with a V, and adjudged a slave for two years. Slaves running away, on conviction to be marked with S, and become a slave for ever; afterwards running away to become a felon. Impotent persons to be maintained at the costs and charges of cities, towns, boroughs, and villages, and not suffered to beg. Weekly collection at Church on Sunday for the poor. 1549-50. 3 & 4 Edward VI. c. 16.

and revival of 32 Henry VIII.
punishment of vagabonds.

Repeal of 1 Edward VI. c. 3, c. 12, as to relief of poor and Sick and aged poor to be

relieved by the parishes where they were born, and not suffered to beg.

1551-52. 5 & 6 Edward VI. c. 2. Collectors of alms to be

:

chosen "which collectors, the Sundaye next after theyr election (or the Sundaye following iff nede require), when the people is at the Churche, and hath hardde Godde's holie worde, shall gentillie aske and demande of everie man woman what they, of their charitie, wil be contented to give wekelie towards the relief of the poor, and the same to be written in the said register or booke." And if "anny parsone or parsons being able to further this charitable worke, doe obstinatelie and frowardlie refuse to give towards the helppe of the poore, or doo wilfullie discourage others from so charitable a dede, the parsone, vicar, or curate, and churchwardens of the parishe where he dwelleth, shall gentillie exhorte him or them towardes the relief of the poore, and iff he or they will not be so persuaded, then, uppon the certificate of the parson, vicar, or curate of the parishe to the busshoppe of the diocesse, the same bishoppe shall send for him or them to induce and persuade him or them by charitable wayes and means, and so, according to his discretion, to take orders for the reformation thereof."

1555. 2 & 3 Philip and Mary c. 5. Where poor are numerous,

some may be licensed to beg.
badges.

1562-63. 5 Elizabeth c. 3.

Licensed beggars to wear

Persons refusing to contribute voluntary to be admonished by their ordinary; but refusing, and after this admonition, to be bound to appear before the justices at the next general sessions such justices to tax the obstinate person in some sum, to be paid weekly to the relief of the poor. In case of still refusing to pay the sum taxed, the person to be committed to prison. Licences to beg continued in some cases. 1572. 14 Elizabeth c. 4, 5. Justices of the Peace to assess all and any of the inhabitants to the relief of the poor; an overseer appointed.

1601. 43 Elizabeth c. 2. Churchwardens and overseers to be united with Justices of the Peace in taking orders for making rates, &c. for the relief of the poor.

MORRIS FULLER.

CHARITY IN TALMUDIC TIMES.

OR, ANCIENT SOLVINGS OF A MODERN PROBLEM.

"WHAT have we reaped from all the wisdom sown of ages?” asks Lord Lytton in one of his earlier poems. A large query, even for so questioning an age as this, an age which, discarding catechisms, and rejecting the omniscient Magnall's Questions as a classic for its children, yet seems to be more interrogative than of old, even if a thought less ready in its responses. Possibly, we are all in too great a hurry now-a-days, too eager in search to be patient to find, for certain it is that the world's already large stock of hows and whys seems to get bigger every day. We catch the echoes in poetry and in prose, in all sorts of tones and from all sorts of people, and Lord Lytton's question sounds only like another of the hopeless Pilate series. His is such a large interrogation too-all the wisdom sown of all the ages suggests such an enormous crop! And then as to what " we," who have neither planted nor watered, have "reaped" from it! An answer, if it were attempted, might certainly be found to hinge on the "we" as well as on the "wisdom," for whereas untaught instinct may "reap" honey from a rose, trained reason in gathering the flower may only succeed in running a thorn into the finger. What has been the general effect of inherited wisdom on the general world may, however, very well be left for a possible solution to prize competitors to puzzle over. But to a tiny corner of the tremendous subject it is just possible that we may find some sort of suggestive reply; and from seed sown ages since, and garnered as harvest, by men whose place knows them no more, we may likely light on some shadowy aftermath worth, perhaps, our reaping.

The gospel of duty to one's neighbour, which, long languishing as a creed, seems now reviving as a fashion, has always been, amongst that race which taught "love thy neighbour as thyself," not only of the very essence of religion, but an ordinary social form of it. It is "law" in the "family chronicle" of the race, as Heine calls the Bible; it is "law" and legend both in those curious national archives known as Talmud. Foremost in the ranks of livres incompris stand those portentous volumes, the one work of the world which

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