Page:A protest against the extension of railways in the Lake District - Somervell (1876).djvu/17

Rh —my benevolent friend, you are prepared to take out your twopence, and to give them to the hosts here in Cumberland, saying—'Take care of him, and whatsoever thou spendest more, I will repay thee when I come to Cumberland myself:' on these terms—oh my benevolent friends I am with you, hand and glove, in every effort you wish to make for the enlightenment of poor men's eyes. But if your motive is, on the contrary, to put twopence into your own purse, stolen between the Jerusalem and Jericho of Keswick and Ambleside—out of the poor drunken traveller's pocket;—if your real object, in your charitable offering, is—not even to lend unto the Lord by giving to the poor, but to lend unto the Lord by making a dividend out of the poor;—then, my pious friends, enthusiastic Ananias, pitiful Judas, and sanctified Korah,—I will do my best, in God's name, to stay your hands, and stop your tongues.

JOHN RUSKIN.