To the Executive Committee of the AMERICAN UNITARIAN ASSOCIATION. GENTLEMEN, In addressing to you my last semiannual report, I anticipated a winter of more than usual suffering among the poor of our city. My expectations on this subject have been fully realized. Nothing, indeed, short of a sudden, and very great change from the state of things as they then were, of a change which should have given employment at once to several hundreds of laboring men, to hundreds of journeymen mechanics, and to a number at least equally great of females, who depend for their own, and the support of their families, on the work with which they can be supplied from shops, or from the families of their more opulent neighbors, could have prevented an extraordinary demand either upon public, or private charity. No change, however, occurred, either in the state of commerce, or in demand for our manufactures, or in any of the departments of mechanical labor, which was favorable to the employment, or to the wants, of the poor. A consequence of this has been, as I suppose is well known in every family which has had anything to bestow, that the beggary of the past winter has very far exceeded anything of the kind, that has been known among us for many past years. Yet this is by no means the only, nor is it the strong est evidence, of the extent of the want and suffering that have been felt around us. Nor, in truth, have the keenest sufferings of want been felt in the habitations of beggars. On the contrary, some of this class have lived circumstance of having an opportunity for an hour or two of labor. This is indeed the hair-breadth division between partial self-support, and constant and absolute dependence. My heart has been ready to sink within me, while I have been sitting in an upper chamber, and have looked upon one bed, which is the resting-place of a husband and wife, and two children; and upon another, in the opposite corner, where a husband and wife, and four children, sleep; and to which the wife was then confined by so severe an illness, as seemed to require all that quiet, and kindness, and the tenderest nursing could do for her. Suppose, then, that the wife, in one of these families, should die. The family, in this case, is generally broken up. The husband provides for himself, and his children are either sent to the House of Industry, or to one of our asylums, or are scattered among their friends. But, should one of the husbands die, or, which is not an uncommon occurrence, should one of these husbands desert his family, this family, deprived of the little that was earned in it, must, and will, fall into absolute dependence. And how are this mother and her children to be provided for? She probably knows not how to read; and her children, kept from school, are growing up in almost equal ignorance. In the present state of our institutions for the poor, therefore, they are compelled to beg. how are these children employed, when they are not begging? They are either loitering about their houses, or they are playing in the streets, or they are in corners in which they feel themselves to be safe while practising their petty gambling; or they are endeavoring to find something, which they may sell for a few cents, with which they will purchase for themselves indulgences, that cannot be obtained by begging. The question is a very solemn one, what is the duty of society in regard to these And children? Their moral capacities have no developement, compared with that even of their intellectual powers. They have, in truth, sometimes a marvellous shrewdness and ingenuity in evil. And not only do they early become deceivers, profane, lewd, and dishonest, but even accustomed to the use of ardent spirits. Should any of them even escape a prison, which is not very probable, they will be degraded and miserable for life. — The families to which I here refer are the least generally known of any among us; and they are far from being the greatest sufferers among the poor. They are considered, too, by most of those who take any thought for them, as beyond remedial influence; and the language concerning them is, for their absolute necessities, leave them to get their bread as they may; and, when they fall into crime, let the law take its course with them.' This, however, is an unchristian and a wicked sentiment; and its prevalence is doing much to perpetuate the evil, which, by a wise and christian policy, to a considerable extent might be obviated. But these alone do not comprehend the whole of the constantly and absolutely poor. There are families of mechanics, which have fallen into this condition, even from a state of very comfortable competency. There are husbands and wives of this class, now far advanced in life, who literally have nothing but their little stock of poor furniture, and who are incapable of labor. Some of them are very virtuous; and all of them, in an important sense, are respectable. They have, perhaps, been inefficient, and not as provident as they should have been for a time of weakness, or of sickness, or of old age. But they were not wholly, and perhaps not at all, dependent on charity, till they were past the time of labor. There are also single women, both widows, and those who never were married, of exemplary characters, who, by different causes, have been brought to a state of entire reliance on others for support. I know those in this condition, who have been nurses, and who, when their strength was broken down, soon expended all that they had been able to save from their earnings. In some instances, even years of dependence have followed. Here, too, is an aged and enfeebled mother, who has been confined to her room for a year or two, by the charge of a sick son. These two constitute the family. This son may yet linger in the state in which he now is, for years; and the utmost which this mother can do, is, to minister to the comfort of her child. I long visited a venerable woman, now in heaven, who was past seventy years of age, and who for years had the sole care of a deranged daughter. Except her poor household stuff, and her clothing, which was as poor, she literally had nothing. But poor as she was, human life furnishes few examples of a higher order of piety, or virtue, than hers. And I visit another, whose husband is incapable of labor, and who has two idiot sons living with her, one twelve, and the other twenty years of age. Here, also, are aged sisters, living together, and bowed down by years and infirmities. There is no service by which they could earn even a dollar in a year. And here are widows without children, living alone, and past all labor, who must either be supported by charity, or perish. All these, I repeat, and I might easily add to their number, are virtuous poor, notwithstanding their absolute dependence on kindness for subsistence. Nay, some of them, in moral and religious worth, and, I believe, in the sight of God, are among the purest and best of this world. They are poor in earthly possessions; but they are already rich in that, which is the best good even of this life, — in a mind at peace with - God and with itself; and, as surely as there is a life beyond the grave, they will soon find themselves to be heirs of eternal happiness. I go also into one family, where is an aged father, who cannot earn a shilling. He is living with his feeble daughters, who can scarcely do more than their father. And I go into another, where an aged wife is doing all that she can do, in the charge of a totally blind and helpless husband. In one family is a husband, who is passing to the grave by a lingering decline. If he were well, and even without employment, his wife could do something for their support. But she can now leave neither him, nor her children, for an hour; nor could she do anything as a seamstress, even if she could be supplied with work. And in another family is a mother, who has long been confined by sickness, and who has supported herself and her children by living at service, till the loss of her health brought her to poverty. She is now nursed by these children, and has no resource for support but charity. I refer to these examples of absolute and entire dependence, because it is important to realize, that even this dependence by no means necessarily implies, or supposes, peculiar vice. There are indeed families, which avail themselves even of the food that is obtained by begging, to obtain the means of living in intoxication, and riot, and all possible debasement. And there are beggars, who employ every mode of imposture to obtain their objects. But let us understand also, that there are those who are sometimes compelled to beg, because they are wholly unable to work, or because they cannot obtain the work by which they might support themselves, who yet deliberately choose to suffer much, rather than ask for assistance; and who never ask for it, while they can subsist without it. To some of these families, the past winter has been a season of very |