annel.

_The second relief principle is that we should seek the most natural
and least official sources of relief, bearing in mind the ties of
kinship, friendship, and neighborliness, and that we should avoid the
multiplication of sources._

III. In deciding to give or to withhold relief, we should be guided by
its probable effect upon the future of the applicant. When it is {154}
conceded that we should discriminate at all in giving, the popular
notion is that we should give to the worthy poor, and refuse aid to the
unworthy. The words "worthy" and "unworthy" mean very little; they are
mere catchwords to save us from thinking. When we say that people are
"worthy," we mean, I suppose, that they are worthy of material relief,
but no one is so worthy as to be absolutely relief-proof. If relief is
given without plan or purpose, it will injure the worthiest recipient.
On the other hand, an intelligent visitor can often see his way clear
to effect very great improvement in what are called "unworthy" cases,
and may find material relief a necessary means to this end. Better
than any hard and fast classification, is the principle that our relief
should always have a future to it, should be given as part of a
carefully devised plan for making the recipient permanently better off.
The only excuse for giving relief without a plan is that it is
sometimes necessary to give what is called "interim relief," to prevent
present suffering, until we can learn all the facts and a plan can be
devised. In this, relief work is very much like doctoring a sick {155}
patient. We have very little use for a doctor who does not alleviate
suffering promptly, but, on the other hand, we naturally mistrust the
doctor who does not ask a great many questions, or who fails to make a
plan for getting his patient beyond the need of medicine as soon as
possible. Our relief work is often nothing but aimless dosing. Like
the doctor, too, we should stand ready to change our plan of treatment
when conditions change. "In one family, where a pension was given on
account of the breadwinner's illness, and continued for six weeks after
his death, the daughters have been unwilling to take work offered at
wages they thought too low, because they were not thrown upon their own
resources at once." [3]

A plan that is not based upon the actual facts is, of course, worse
than useless. Sometimes a charitable person will call at a home for
the first time, will