the poor are our brothers and sisters; and
on the ground of our common humanity we owe them our help and
sympathy.+--It is easier to sympathize with the worthy than with the
unworthy poor. Yet the poor who are poor as the result of their own
fault are really the more in need of our pity and help. The work of
lifting them up to the level of self-respect and self-support is much
harder than the mere giving them material relief. Yet nothing less than
this is our duty. The mere tossing of pennies to the tramp and the
beggar is not by any means the fulfillment of their claim upon us.
Indeed, such indiscriminate giving does more harm than good. It
increases rather than relieves pauperism. So that the first duty of
charity is to refuse to give in this indiscriminate way. Either we must
give more than food and clothes and money; or else we must give nothing
at all. Indiscriminate giving merely adds fuel to the flame.

THE VIRTUE.

+The special form which love takes when its object is the poor is called
benevolence or charity.+--True benevolence, like love, of which it is a
special application, makes the well-being of its object its own. In what
then does the well-being of the poor consist? Is it bread and beef, a
coat on the back, a roof over the head, and a bed to sleep in? These are
conditions of well-being, but not the whole of it. A man cannot be well
off without these things. But it is by no means sure that he will be
well off with them.

What a man thinks; how he feels; what he loves; what he hopes for; what
he is trying to do; what he means to be;--these are quite as essential
elements in his well-being as what he has to eat and wear. True
benevolence therefore must include these things in its efforts.
Benevolence must aim to improve the man together with his condition or
its gifts will be worse than wasted.

There are three principles which all wise benevolence must observe.

+First: Know all that can be known about the man you help.+--Unless we
are willing to find out all we can about a poor man, we have no business
to indulge our sympathy or ease our conscience by giving him money or
food. It is often easier to give than to withhold. But it is far more
harmful. When Bishop Potter says that "It is far better,--better for him
and better for us,--to give a beggar a kick than to give him a
half-dollar," it sounds like a hard saying, yet it is the strict truth.
In a civilized and Christian community any really dese