Nearly two centuries and a half have passed since the principle of public charity was accepted by our neighbors; one can now judge the fatal consequences that have flowed from the adoption of this principle. Let us examine them one by one.
The poor man, having an absolute right to society's help, and finding everywhere a public administration whose duty it is to give it to him, one sees, reborn and generalized after a short time, the abuses with which the Reformation rightly reproached some of the Catholic countries.
Man, like any other organism, has a natural passion for idleness. There are, however, two motivations that induce him to work: the need to live and the desire to improve the conditions of his existence. Experience has shown that the majority of men can only be sufficiently interested enough to work by the first of these motivations, and that the second only works on a small number. But a charitable organization, open indiscriminately to all in need, or a law that gives to all the poor, regardless of the reasons behind their poverty, a right to public support, weakens or destroys the first stimulus, leaving only the second intact. The English peasant, like the Spanish one, if he does not feel a strong desire to improve the lot into which he was born and to rise above his situation, a weak desire easily abandoned by most--the peasant of these two countries, I say, has no interest in work, or if he oes work, he has no interest in saving; he either remains idle, or spends the precious fruit of his labor carelessly. In both countries, one gets to the same result by different cuases, which is that it is the most generous, active, hardworking part of the nation that dedicates its help to provide a livelihood to those who do not work, or who make a bad use of their labor.
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