" That legend is one which the author has many a time
heard from the lips of the people, by whom it was implicitly believed.
A man who may have committed a murder overnight, will the next day
endeavor to wipe away his guilt by alms given for the purpose of getting
the benefit of "the poor man's prayer." The principle of assisting our
distressed fellow-creatures, when rationally exercised, is one of the
best in society; but here it becomes entangled with error, superstition,
and even with crime--acts as a bounty upon imposture, and in some degree
predisposes to guilt, from an erroneous belief that sin may be cancelled
by alms and the prayers of mendicant impostors. The second point, in
connection with pauperism, is the immoral influence that I proceeds
from the relation in which the begging poor in Ireland stand towards the
class by whom they are supported. These, as we have already said,
are the poorest, least educated, and consequently the most ignorant
description of the people. They are also the most numerous. There have
been for centuries, probably since the Reformation itself, certain
opinions floating among the lower classes in Ireland, all tending to
prepare them for some great change in their favor, arising from
the discomfiture of heresy, the overthrow of their enemies, and the
exaltation of themselves and their religion.
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