sanction to, into facts and existing circumstances—this has never yet been fairly and fully made. For a period of more than two centuries, the attention of the nation has been engaged by a succession of projects, for the management of the poor;—almost all of them originating in benevolence; and every one of them received in a manner, and with an interest, that distinctly marked the public anxiety upon the subject. The good effects however, as to the poor, have been limited and uncertain:—the project having originated not in them, but in the projector;—not in fact, but in speculation.
We all feel how far we can be led by encouragement—by kindness[1]—by management, and while we retain the idea of choice and freewill. We all know, in our own instances, how little is to be effected by compulsion;—that, where force begins inclination ceases.—Give then its full effect to the master-spring of action, on
- ↑ See Count Rumford's Essays: passim.
