is unknown even to their neigh bours and immediate connexions. Nay, I have known a person, who was daily reeling under the effects of intemperance, who fondly believed, that the surrounding family were ignorant of the true cause. Nothing can be more absurd, than to suppose, that a vice, whose effects are more obvious than those of any other, on the countenance, the speech, the limbs, and indeed the whole person, can long be concealed from universal notoriety. That any, who are, in other respects, people of good understanding, should be left to cherish the contrary opinion, affords a woful proof of the delusion, which this sin practises upon the mind.

To suppose the frequent use, and even morning draughts of ardent spirits to be favourable to health, is another delusion, which deserves to be exposed and reprobated. That there are instances, in which spiritous liquors, taken in composition with medicine, are salutary, many physicians have maintained. But this is a prescription, which is often and shamefully abused. It has led persons of the firmest constitutions, who wished only for a pretext, to indulge their love of strong drink without control. Accordingly, how many have been heard to complain of sudden indisposition, as a mere apology for excessive or unseasonable drinking? How many have infirmities, perhaps the effects of intemperance alone, which can be relieved only by repetition of the intoxicating potion? How many "rise early in the morning,

that they may follow strong drink," with no better a plea, than that they find it necessary thus to guard against disease? Alas! what shallow reasonings satisfy the mind, when inclination comes in aid of sophistry!

Another way, in which the intemperate egregiously deceive themselves, is in respect of the facility, with which, in their opinion, their habits may be reformed. They imagine, that they have only to resolve, and the business is effected. But what lessons does observation give us upon this subject? That nothing is more common, than the most solemn resolutions to renounce intemperance, and nothing more rare, than to find them carried into complete effect.

Few, it is believed, have become confirmed in the habit, without often determining to amend it. The expostulations of friends, the frowns of the public the loss of health, the impediments to success in business, the failure of property, the degraded state of reputation, and now and then the sudden dissolution of a miserable victim to drunkenness, often co-operate with the remonstrances of conscience, to induce the intemperate to resolve upon reformation.

But how rarely is this the happy result? Every one may easily enumerate the few instances, which have come within his knowledge, of reformation from this vice.

That there are so few, considering the numberless evils resulting from the habit, clearly iilustrates the, difficulty of the undertaking.

In face of all these nearly insuperable obstacles, the intemperate still persist in practising the arts of self-deception. They sometimes abandon some kinds of intoxicating liquors for others. But this is only to divert the stream from one channel to another. They do not sufficiently consider the inefficacy and the absurdity of partial reformations. It may be safely asserted, that no instance can be produced of a person, who has completely reformed from a habit of intemperance, while he has retained the use of any one liquor capable of producing inebriation. If he renounce the use of ardent spirits, he may be easily intoxicated with wine. Or if this also be abjured, while cider is retained, it will require only to to take this liquor in larger quantities; and while the cause of intoxication is removed, the habit will still remain. How dangerous then, and yet how common, the reliance for reformation from intemperance, on a merely partial renunciation of inebriating liquors ?

A further proof of the delusion, to which the intemperate are subject, is the circumstance that, though they often break their most solemn resolutions, they still continue to form them with sanguine hopes of success. Long

after their friends have lost the expectation of their recovery, they, notwithstanding,

"Resolve, and re-resolve, and die the same."

Another delusion, to which they are prone, is, that the sin of intemperance will be forgiven them, on the ground of the strength of appetite, or of temptation. But what argument can they find from scripture or reason to support such a miserable hope? This conclusion involves the absurd principle, that whenever we have made the calls of appetite or of passion strong by indulgence, we are completely jus tified in obeying them. is no enormity, which such a principle might not be forced to justify.

There

The intemperate, in fine, often find comfort in the delusive expectation, that they shall reform before they die. But what rational ground have they for this hope, unless they have already begun the work of reformation?\ No truths are more firmly established than these, that the inveteracy of habits is increased by repetition; and that no purposes of amendment afford any good prospect of success, unless they are already in a train of execution.

THE PHILANTHROPIST for October, 1812, contains an able and interesting article, "On the poor, and the poor laws." This article

discloses some facts which are but little known or thought of in our country. The article is thus divided. 1. The extent of

pauperism." "2. Causes." "3. Effects." "4. Remedies." The extracts now to be given will be from the two first heads.

The extent of pauperism in England and Wales is represented as enormous, as will be evident from the following passages:

"In consequence of the distress and alarms in 1800 and 1801, a more than ordinary degree of attention was called to the state of the poor. An act of the legislature was passed for making a census of the poor: for obtaining a statement from each parish of the number of persons obtaining parochial relief, and of the sum annually expended.”

"The annual expenditure on account of the poor, according to the returns in 1776, was 1,523,163l.: according to those in 1785, was 1,943,6497. In the year 1803, it is stated in the abstract, at 4,113,1647. The abstract, 1803, exhibits 1,039,716, as the existing number of paupers."

"An account of the population of England and Wales was taken by act of Parliament in 1801. The resident population was found to be 8,872,980. The paupers 1,039,716-an eighth part of the whole population."

"It is the glory of this country, that the proportion of its people who may be ranked in the middle and upper classes is very great; we should think it not less than one fourth. If we deduct one fourth from the resident population, there remains 6,654,635 for the numerical amount of the labouring population-of which a sixth part nearVol. IV. No. 7.

ly are paupers. It is the fact in England, the extraordinary fact, that of her industrious population, not much less than one in every six is in the condition of a beggar-is supported by charitable contributions."

Under the head of "CAUSES," this question is proposed, "What is the cause that pauperism has increased so very rapidly during the last thirty years?" The following are some of the observations in answer to the question.

"The increase of pauperism is of necessity owing to one or other of two very deplorable causes: either to the diminution of the wealth and capital of the country; or to the corruption and degeneracy of the great body of the people.'

"If the increase of pauperism is not owing to the diminishing of the wealth of the country, it must be owing to the diminution of good, and the growth of bad qualities, in the character of the great body of the people."

"Where the government is good, the people are virtuous : where the government is bad, the people are vicious. The qualities of the people may always be taken as a criterion, and that an exact one, of the practical operation of the political system."

"If we follow the opinion of those who maintain the increase of the national wealth-In what particular manner has the government, within the last thirty years, been operating malignant ly on the character of the peo ple?"

"One thing is obvious to all men. The nation has during

war: and during the period of the war, we believe it may be proved, that the whole, or about the whole of the increase of pauperism has taken place. Now the change from a state of peace to a state of war, in our opinion, never takes place-without the most deleterious effects upon the character of the people. War directs the minds of men to violent and irregular proceedings. The operations of war are the very reverse of the operations of industry, sobriety, and the ordinary virtues of the poor.-A long continuance of war, therefore, has always a tendency to make the people more idle, thoughtless, dissipated, shameless, and vicious; in fact, to give them all those qualities, which most naturally lead to the gibbet or the work-house."

"Governments, generally, by their operations, add to the vitiating effects of war upon the character of the people. They industriously work upon their minds, to keep them in good humour with the war. This is done by praising every thing warlike-by perpetual railing against the enemy, by ascribing to him every bad and hateful quality by boasting extravagantly of the nation's own qualities, ascribing to it the highest virtues, copious resources, invincible strength.The vice of lying is taught the people, and taught them most impressively, by the highest example and the highest authority. No vice more deeply taints the character than mendacity. Under the shape of a cloak it acts as

Among the common people, not a family that has a member of the balloting age, ever lives in peace. Their minds are by necessity turned from the thoughts of regular industry; because no man of the balloting age can answer for his lot for a year. To what end serves it to lay a scheme for life, when the ballot can hardly fail to interfere and destroy it?-Its efficacy in increasing the evil of pauperism cannot fail to be immense."

"Another of the effects of war, which falls with a most hostile operation upon the virtuous and industrious habits of the people, is the weight of taxation. The motive to industry, as all the world acknowledges, is the enjoyment of the fruits of that industry. The motive to industry then, must be greater or less in proportion as the fruit which is the object of industry, is left more or less entirely to the enjoyment of the earner. Whatever share of a man's earnings he is obliged to part with in the shape of a tax, is so much deducted from the strength of the motive, by which he would otherwise be impelled to industry. By this operation, the influence of war in impairing the force of industry is pretty evident."

The "extent of pauperism" in this article is given as it stood in 1803, but not as it was in 1812. In the next number of the Philanthropist the subject was taken up by another writer, and a calculation was made for five distinct periods, to show the increase

The calculation for 1803 appears to have been made from parliamentary documents; that for 1812 was made from the price of bread in 1812 compared with the price in 1803. It may therefore be incorrect; but the writer excludes, in his calculation, the "beggars," the "hospital patients," and the "alms-house inhabitants," which, if included, would, in his opinion, swell the amount of pauperism far beyond the estimate he has given.

War has unquestionably been the principal source of this terrible amount of pauperism in England. By their warring character, that people have brought on themselves an enormous national debt, which we may presume will never be paid, so long as they continue to glory in their military enterprises. In addition to this, they have probably reduced more than one eighth of the whole population of England to the condition of paupers, who cannot obtain a subsistence without parochial aid, and a vast

multitude to a state of absolute beggary. These are some of the concomitants of military glory, and the genuine fruits of supporting an anti-christian custom.

Is it not probable that one fifth of the property which that nation has expended and destroyed within a century, in their warring career-had it been judiciously appropriated to pacifick and benevolent purposes-would have been sufficient to have preserved peace with every country, to have extinguished their national debt, to have saved a million of paupers from that unhapPy condition, and to have made Great Britain the admiration of the world!

Shall not then, the people of our country learn wisdom from what they know of the effects of war on other nations, and be more ready to contribute of their property for the diffusion of benevolent and pacifick principles, than for the support of a horrible custom, which involves guilt and wo, in proportion to the celebrity it acquires !

But in Great Britain I behold "much that I love," as well as "all that I abhor." In the midst of her military career, the seeds of peace have been sown in that country, by the establishment of a multitude of religious, benevo lent, and humane societies, which are supported with astonishing zeal and liberality-which promise a renovation of the British character, and to give to that nation a kind of pre-eminence and glory far more worthy of admiration, than that for which she is