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at the reform of the individual prisoner. Their memories have been perpetuated and their work continued by societies bearing their names.

Inspired also by the Evangelical sentiment, and one of the foremost pillars of that branch of the Church of England throughout the middle half of last century, was Anthony Ashley Cooper, seventh earl of Shaftesbury (q.v.), of whom Professor Blaikie has remarked, " The lives of Howard, Mrs. Fry, Wilberforce, and other great philanthropists are associated mainly with a single cause-Shaftesbury's with half a score." Like Wilberforce, he stood for the ideal of philanthropy in the stormy cross-seas of politics. His sympathies for the suffering were first attracted to the insane by an inquiry instituted in parliament into the condition and treatment of that unfortunate class. Thenceforward he continued throughout his life a member of a permanent commission charged with the supervision of asylums for lunatics. In 1833 he proceeded to engage in the amelioration of the lot of industrial workers, particularly of women and children, at that time employed not only in factories but also in collieries. Not content with knowledge at second hand, he ascertained the conditions under which they worked by personal visitation. And here it seems permissible to observe that the charity of one generation is apt to become the oppression of its successors. One of the abuses against which Shaftesbury strove was the exploitation of young children in the textile trades. Yet this very practise had been fostered, if not inaugurated, in those schools for imparting instruction in manual crafts as well as in book-learning and conduct, set up by the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, and carried still further in schools connected with the workhouses of those days. Of course there was always this marked difference that the factories were run for private profit, while the receipts from the school-children's handiwork went to support the schools, and not into the pockets of the managers.

To return to Lord Shaftesbury. In the "hungry forties" he took up the cause of the uncared-for boys in the streets, and promoted the organization of

the so-called Ragged Schools for their

Schools; movements directly traceable to religYoung ious impulse. Rather than oppose,

Laws, he vacated his seat in the house of commons. By this time he had acquired a definite influence among the working classes, who were beginning to appreciate his disinterested efforts on their behalf. When the wave of discontent, which had been gathering mass and moment through a long series of years, threatened in 1848 to catch infection from Paris and to break forth into active revolt, he was besought to exercise that influence in favor of peace and order, and afterward received the thanks of the home secretary for his efforts in that direction. Another cause which enlisted his aid was that of the improvement of working-class dwellings. Lord Shaftesbury was also a supporter of the Young Men's Christian Association (see YouNe PEopLz's Soc=TIEB). This

society was set on foot in 1844 with the primary object of evangelizing the masses of young men engaged in trade and business in the metropolis, many of them living at a distance from their families and friends, and left to their own resources to avoid or to succumb to the varied temptations surrounding them in so vast a city. In time it added to its original program by establishing libraries and reading-rooms, classes in various branches of study, and employment bureaus. Sir George Will'ams (q.v.), himself head of a large drapery firm in St. Paul's Churchyard, was identified with this effort from its commencement, and was its treasurer until his death, when the association included 7,229 branches scattered throughout the United States as well as the British Empire. A sister society for young women followed in 1855. Reference has been made to the Ragged School movement. Connected with it as regards the class to be benefited was the Reformatory and Refuge Union, founded in 1856 to supply a center of information and encouragement for the already numerous local and isolated efforts to meet the needs of the various classes of delinquents -e.g., youthful offenders, unfortunate women, and discharged prisoners.

It has been pointed out above that the last two centuries have been the age of associated benevolence. But this is not to say that individual beneficence has been superseded. On the

g. Move- contrary, during the past half-cenments under tury, as much at least as during any