The Dominion in 1983 by Ralph Centennius
page 32 of 39 (82%)
page 32 of 39 (82%)
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opinions, two physicians, two lawyers, several wealthy merchants,
and several working men who were good speakers and had influence among their fellows. His capacity for organization was great, and his success in gaining over to his side young men of means, remarkable. From the very beginning the committee never lacked money. Though they were actuated by purely philanthropic motives, it was one of their first principles never to sink large sums of money in any undertaking that would not pay its own expenses ultimately. There was, therefore, a healthy business-like tone about whatever they did, that distinguished their efforts from many well-intentioned, but sickly, undertakings of the same day, which one after another came to grief, doing nearly as much harm as good. One of their first works was to buy up lots and dwellings in the worst districts of Toronto, where miserable shanties and hovels stood in fetid slums, as foul as any in London or Glasgow. The hovels and shanties were then torn down, and respectable dwellings erected in their stead. The unfortunate wretches, the victims of drink, crime, or thriftlessness, who inhabited such places, were not turned away to seek a fouler footing elsewhere, but were taken in hand by the working-men on the committee, and were started afresh in life with every encouragement. They were generally permanently rescued from degradation, but if some fell back their children were saved, and so the next generation was spared a family of criminals. Montreal was next visited and the same thing done there; attention was then turned to Quebec and Winnipeg. Successful attempts were afterwards made to control the liquor traffic, not by sudden prohibition, which always increased the evil, but by common sense methods, necessarily somewhat slow, but sure. When the Society had been at work ten years, there was a very perceptible diminution in the amount of crime and smaller offences in all their |
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