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important machinery which will be committed to their charge . This mission will also be different from all others that have preceded it , because it will extend its attention to the temporal necessities as well as the spiritual wants of mankind .
It will regard man in all his faculties . It will seek to dissipate his physical wretchedness as well as his mental misery . But though it has thus much of uovelty about it , it cannot be said that the scheme is altogether untried ; for , thanks to the zeal of our brethren in
America , Dr . Tuckerman ' s report gives ample demonstration , that if the plan fails in this country , it may be owing to the want of skill on the part of the originators of the scheme—or to want of zeal on the part of its supporters—or to . want of aptitude on the part of its agents ; but at all events , it will not be
owing to any fault in the thing itself ; for it appears from the contents of the reports , which probably many who hear me have had an opportunity of reading , that great good has been actually realized in the town and neighbourhood where the attempt has been made . There are cases on record there of those who have
been raised from the most abject condition to fresh hopes of prosperity in the world , and who have been stimulated to begin a new career with a prospect of losing in success the misery that had previously overhung their existe n ce ; instances also are given of children who bad been gradually practising a course of petty fraud , such as must finally lead to the more grievous inflictions of the law , but who by the influence of these domestic missions have been turned aside
from the wickedness of their pursuits , and now afford every hope of passing through life with respect and esteem , and of becoming the teachers of others , thus not only being saved themselves , but being the means of salvation to their fellow-creatures : cases , too , are on record there of the grossly ignorant who
qave been instructed and enlightenedof families which were on the verge of being scattered over the surface of the country to obtain a miserable pittance either by plunder or by beggary , but who have been enabled to strengthen one another , and help each other forward in a course of honest and united industry : cases are there of the victims of
habitual intoxication , and the commission of other vices , being released from the bondage of sin , and enabled to walk in the spirit and holiness of the gospel . If these things theu can be accomplished in Boston , why may they not also in Lon-
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don , and in Liverpool , and in Manchester , and in Bristol , and in other populous districts , where surely there is not a less proportion of ignorance , vice , and wretchedness , thau in America ? And that there is not less of beneficent zeal for mitigating these inflictions on the'
human race , I trust this meeting will shew . In this metropolis it is estimated that seventy thousand persons rise every morning who have no resource whatever for the coming day , and whose only prospect for passing through it is either by means of beggary or robbery—of fraud or violence : to this there is to be
added a proportionate number of children who are training gradually to a course which will end in the loss of theit * services as good citizens to the State , or perhaps through the means of vice , early learned and datigerously followed , to the direfnl expiation of blood . With such considerations as these pressing upon us , shall we rest contented and do nothing ? It may be said that whatever we can do will be but little . It is true that it will
be but little ; all good efforts at the out " set are but little , but they grow and expand till at length they overshadow the misery to which they have been opposed ; and thus where sin has abounded , grace superabounds . Little was the grain of mustard-seed of which we read in the parable ; and it seemed as though it were not worth the ground it
was to occupy : but there it was put ; and presently its root struck out , its stem arose , its branches expanded , and the shade of them spread over the place that had first fostered the seed , and the birds of heaven sang among the branches : so this tree shall grow , and prosper , and flourish , in spite of the insignificance of its origin ; and the poor , the afflicted ,
and the wretched , shall rejoice in its shade , and its leaves shall be for the healing of the nations . But still it ia said that it is little i So , too , were the paltry vessels of Columbus that carried him across the great waters of the ocean ; and yet they were sufficient to discover that mighty continent where conscience found her asylum , and independence won her victories , and freedom reared
her banner , calling on the whole earth to rejoice in the resources of safety and of promise which that continent affords to the human race : and thus may our mission discover regions yet unexplored of beneficent exertion , conferring benefits and enjoyments which are yet unanticipated ana unimagined . It is not merely as a charity that I advocate this plan . I advocate it as an appropriate
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A 2 $ Intelli gence . ' —Unitarian Association .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1831, page 424, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2598/page/64/
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