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Untitled Article
things have little right to suppose they should be faithful in many . Greater opportunities will bring greater temptations . As to those who , from being Dorn * n easy an (^ affluent circumstances , are placed above the necessity of labouring for their own support , they should
think themselves particularly called upon to every useful and spirited exertion . These should consider themselves as deeply in debt to their country , a debt which began at their birth , and is accumulating every hour . The poor man is not in arrears to his country ; on the contrary , his country is in arrears to him : he has earned his bread before he eats it ; he has
deserved his shelter ; his narrow comforts and slender fare are all due to him in strictest justice . Not so the rich man . He inherits privileges which nature never gave him , artificial power which his own strength could not have acquired , and he is protected in the enjoyment of an unequal share of property , which the first sturdy peasant he meets with might wrest from him in a moment , if not restrained by a regard to the fences and barriers of civil polity . He ought , therefore , to consider himself as under a strict moral obligation to pay off this great debt by every attention to the interests
of the community , which leisure , an enlightened mind , and a command of property , can enable him to give . It has been said , and not without truth , that the King is the servant of the community ; but , by a parity of reason , every man invested with hereditary honours or fortune , which set him above the necessity of the common employments of life , should consider himself as the servant of the public ; paid by it and answerable to it for the disposition of his time and fortune . To such as these it belongs to execute
burdensome and expensive offices , to inspect public charities and trusts , and to look with a scrutinizing eye into those abuses which men of less leisure have not time to explore , and men less independent dare not lift their voice against . What extensive good may be done in such kind of exertions without any public character , and within the limits of a very moderate fortune , by an ardent and heavenly spirit , deeply smitten with
the love of God and of mankind , we have an instance in our age and nation much too brilliant to require being pointed out to you ; and though the superior excellence of such an example seems almost to preclude imitation , to look up to it , even from a distance , cannot but warm our hearts and strengthen our feeble virtue . But , alas ! while we admire , it is taken from us . In our memories , I trust , it will be ever consecrated . *
Men of property and leisure owe a portion of their time to study the laws and spirit of the constitution ; they owe a portion to instructing the poor ; it belongs to them to see that justice ( for it were an abuse of the word to call it charity ) be exercised towards that useful body of citizens when , after a life of hard and humble industry , they are incapacitated by age or sickness from earning their support ; and to see that it be done with judgment , and
economy of the public money . Nor ought they in all this to seek or expect any emolument to themselves ; their salary is already received ; their reward has preceded their services . But if , instead of this , every degree of fortune or rank is only made a ladder to still higher elevations , and every delicate and difficult department is left to those who are exposed to the temptations of narrow circumstances , and the pressure of necessary business , the public interests will be ill served , and abuses will prevail .
* The death of the excellent John Howard , at Cherson , in 1790 , marks the date of thin discourse . C . ft . A .
Untitled Article
364 A t > Ucoursey by Mr& . Barbauld ,
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1828, page 364, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2561/page/4/
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