THURSDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1904. STATUTORY AND CHRISTIAN CHARITY.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXII, Issue 50, 15 December 1904, Page 17

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1904. STATUTORY AND CHRISTIAN CHARITY.

W^fSp T 1' c opening of the Little Sisters' home for the aged ipoor in D>unedi'n on the Faast of OvJlm/ *' he imma( *ulate Uotoceptiop, a non-C,atholic _J!J(oq|^v speaker, Mr. J. M. Gallaw&y, saijd : ' There "^—T^r-* is aniQng us a great i de lal1 al ,of k wiiat may "be called statutory oharity. A^nid this is rig,ht J&2faMf* an d P rc *P &r - I*ut nothing can take, the nl;ace *> of tjiat chatity wjiic'h proceeds from the heart, a<nd it is that the Little Sistars of the P'oior stove tb provide.' The one is the outcome of jutilitaxiajiism or of a laudable but purely inatural sympathy, Pqople by eomnwi consent give it the name philanthropy. The other— that of Dhe consecrated da/ughters of the Church— is the sweet dharity which sees Christ lUjrOder the rags of the stricken beggar apd the fioetid ulcers of the leper a,iul wills to be anathema for tiho sake of the least of (iod's poor. The difference between statutory and Christian charity is tihus a radical one. It is not merely something external amid accidental. It lies i,n the very mainspring of action— t!he motive— and thus gLves a different character and complexion to the whole substance of the gooti dee,ds Hhat are done to •Uheit neigsibois by, say, h'a'iUhers Damien /and Viand^ervuide and dven the highest type of philanthropist. Worlds apart were, for instance, tjhe mjotiives which tpriomlpted the Sister of Mercy, in the weir"d and pitiful story of ' Uirwc's Baby,' to rescue the lit/tie one on London Bridge, and those of the philantihuQpists who s^iatoheW t^lic waif from her sheltering arms, wasted m;oney dn secretaries' salaries, etc., a ( njd let the lilttle wanderer drift to the ohilling depths of a workhouse and fimally end its days in the dark waters of the Ruver Thames.

A rr;ulf separates C'liriS'Uan teaching and practice from bio t Si Vie old paganism ol Greece and R/ome a*id the noo-/paganism of Masndeville, Hobbes, Tingjot, Rousseau, Prioiidhon, a,nid their later echoes. I'Chrisitifanity,' gays tlhc nationalist Lecky, 1 ' for txhe flrsrt! time made dh'critj a tudimentary virtue, giving it a leading (place in the mo/al type. < . Besides its general influence in sitimulatimg the attentions, it eilectdd a oomplete revolution in tHuJs sphere, by regarding the pqor as the special reipjrcscinbativcs of the Christian Founder, and thus making the lo\e of Christ the principle of charity.' The same wtitetti aiders : ' Wh<Sn, the victory "o,f Ghrrstia.Tiity • was achieved, the enthusiasm for charity displayed itlself in t|he erection of numerous institutions that were altogether unknown t,o the pagan world.' The charity of Cihnsti urges it. It is ever in the rank green loaf. It kti»ows no decay. It is trammelled by no boundary line: its field is the whole circle of hjumah ills and woes, from tiho f(ooj,ndling infant on LoYidcn Bridge to tihe dying lciper on lone Molokai, &ikl its erasitic and energising eagerness adapts itself to every fresih form, of misery tlfoat altered times or climes or social conditions brimg in their train.

There was no such elevating sentiment of charity t 0 soften the asperities of existence in ancient' pagan dlays.

Julian the Apostate tried in vain to pr.od.ucq its counterfeit presentment among the pagan Romans of his time. Cemtfuries ago a ruler of Japan took thought for the ftoori lepers of his land. It was a generous spasm, but it tyisised speeldily, and to this hdur— save where the Catholic missionary comes to his aid— the leper is an agonisuig outcast in Nippon, and ' the mwst anciemt and m|os.li human of all diseases ' is regarded as the worst stofcLal disgrace that can befall a home among the most cultivated paga.n people of our day. Nor has charity any part m the neo-paganism that is invading some western lands. The French Revolution— tihe outcome of French philos.Qphism— dragged through tihe streets and scourged at t,he cart's tail noble ladies who, as EHm-und BJurke &aid in tjie British Hoiise of Commons, were ' deK/oielA to the most stublime duties of religion.' It cl'oseti orphanages a»nd refuges for the aged and mi.sajppr,opnated legacies left for the po.or. The bloiodless FrencJi Revolution of our day is in great part a war agpiinst the n>aor and tihose whose lives are consecrated to tyheir service. Statutory and persbnal philamthropy, arisi|ng r as it generally does, from natural human giqodness "a^nd synip,at|liy, nw.y, even in pagan lands, effect a qqnsfderable range of goo>d. This form of philanthropy is, ,perhapt>, in LThrnstian countries, seldom fo-und in w.hat we may term the crulde state. Even where philanthropists of till is class are not professed believers in Christ, they live in an atmosphere of tihiought, feehme;, tradition, and sentiment which has beern created by Christianity. COiiiscio-usly or they must, to some extent at least, be gmddd in their actions by motives or principles which are distinctively Christian In this case philanthropy may be merely Christian chanty in disgjuise, or adulterated. Mere p/nlajnthropy, in itself, (proceeding ooi rip,ht lines, is good a»s far as it goes. But it docs n,ot go far. It has its own little ypheie. But, judged by its roots or by its ftfuitss when compared with t-,ue Christian charity, it is as the gilded coiuntexfeit compared wi.th the mtnt-nurked gold piece