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 ORPHANS

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ORPHANS

His bounty was to be shared with them. Luxury and paganism introduced more selfish considerations. Neglect of the destitute orphan is only to be expected in a world where the unwelcome infant is exposed to any fate. The Romans apparently did not provide for widows and orphans. The Athenians viewed the duty as economic and patriotic, and ordained that children of citizens killed in war were to be educated up to eighteen years of age by the State. Plato (Laws, 927) says: — "Orphans should be placed under the care of pubhc guardians. Men should have a fear of the loneliness of orphans and of the souls of their departed parents. A man should love the unfortimate orphan of whom he is guardian as if he were his own child. He should be as careful and as diUgent in the manage- ment of the orphan's property as of his own or even more careful still."

When Christianity began to affect Roman life, the best fruit of the new order was charity, and special solicitude was manifested towards the orphan. An- toninus Pius had established relief agencies for children. The Christians founded hospitals, and children's asy- lums were established in the East. St. Ephraem, St. Basil, and St. John Chrysostom built a great number of hospitals. Those for the sick were known as nosocomia, those for poor children were known as eupholrophia, and those for orphans, orphariotrophia. Justinian released from other civic duties those who undertook the care of orphans. In the Apostolic Constitutions, "Orphans as well as widows are always commended to Christian love. The bishop is to have them brought up at the expense of the Church and to take care that the girls be given, when of marriageable age, to Christian husbands, and that the boys should learn some art or handicraft and then be provided with tools and placed in a condition to earn their own living, so that they may be no longer than necessary a burden to the Church" (.4post. Const., IV, ii, tr. Uhlhorn, p. 185). St. Augustine says: "The bishop protects the orphans that they may not be oppressed by strangers after the death of the parents." Also epistles 25*2- 255: "Your piety knows what care the Church and the bishops should take for the protection of all men but especially of orphan children." The rise of mo- nastic institutions following upon this period was accel- erated by the fruit of charitable work for the poor, chief amongst which was the care of children. During the Middle Ages the monasteries preserved to modern times the notion of the duty of the Church to care for its orphans. They were the shelters where the orphans were taught learning and trade avocations. The laity also were exhorted to perform their share of this charge.

No one figure stands out so prominently in the his- tory of the care of orphans as that of St. Vincent de Paul (1576-1660). To this work he attracted the gentlemen of the court, noble ladies, and simple peas- ants. In his distracted country he found the orphan the most appealing victim, and he met the situation with the skill of a general. No cUstinction was ob- served between foundlings and orphans in the begin- ning of his work with the Association of Charity; nor was there any distinction as to the condition of the children that were aided, other than that they were orphans, or abandoned, or the children of the poor. Seventeen years or more after that he established amongst noble women the "Ladies of Charity". When the war between France and Austria had made orphans the most acute sufferers, St. Vincent de Paul secured as many as possible from the provinces, and had them cared for in Paris by Mile le Gras and the Sisters of Charity then fully established. Three towns alone furnished no less than 1000 orphans under the age of seven years. The Sisters of Charity spread over the world, and ever since have been looked to for the protection of the orphan, or have been the inspiration for other orders seeking to perform the same work.

When the Revolution broke out in France there were 426 houses of benevolence conducted in that country by the Sisters of Charit}', and of these a large major- ity cared for orphans. They were suppressed, but many were reopened by Napoleon.

In more modern times a similar enlistment of women to serve the orphan has been observed all over Europe. In England, Ireland, and Scotland fifty-one houses of Sisters of Charity had been established between 1855 and 1898; and in all, except in a few hospitals, the work of an orphanage is conducted to a greater or less ex- tent. On the American Continent, however, the first orphan asylum antedated St. Vincent de Paul's in- fluence by a century, and was due not to French but to Spanish inspiration. This was an orphanage for girls, which was established in 1548 in Mexico by a Spanish order and was called La Caridad (Steelman, "Chari- ties for Children in Mexico"). The first orphanage in the territory now comprised in the United States was that of the Ursulines, founded in New Orleans in 1727 under the auspices of Louis XV.

Whenever in Europe, following the reUgious changes of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the care of orphans was not committed to ecclesiastical oversight, it was considered to be a public duty. Under the English poor law it was the duty of the parish to sup- port the indigent so that none should die. It is prob- able that destitute orphans were cared for under this principle, but apprenticing and indenturing were the only solutions of the difficulties arising from the pres- ence of orphans or dependent children. In later years, if children were too young or too numerous for this they were kept in the workhouse, one of the pro- visions being as follows: "Children under seven are placed in such of the wards appropriated to female paupers as may be deemed ex-pedient." The so-called orphanage movement began in England in 1758 by the estabhshment of the Orphan Working Home. In the next century the exposures, principally by Charles Dickens, of the evils bred by the workhouse and the indenturing system led to many reforms. Numerous private asylums were founded in the reign of Queen Victoria under royal patronage, and with considerable official oversight and solicitude. In Colonial America the influence of the English poor law was felt, with the same absence of distinction as to child and adult, and as to care of the child. All paupers were the charges of the towns or counties. Almshouses were estab- lished, and later, in most States of the Union, orphan children were cared for in these. Indenturing was practised as often as possible. In New York State children were removed from almshouses following the passage of a law directing this in 1875. It provided that all children over three years of age, not defective in mind or body, be removed from poorhouses and be placed in families or orphan asylums. It has since been amended by reducing the age to two years and not excepting the defectives. The first orphan asy- lum in New York City, a Protestant institution, now located at Hastings-on-Hudson, N. Y., was estab- lished in 1806 largely through the efforts of Mrs. Alexander Hamilton. The first Catholic orphan asy- lum in New York City was founded in 1817 by the Sisters of Charity in Prince Street, and is now main- tained in two large buildings at Kingsbridge, N. Y.

Of the seventy-seven charities for children, mostly orphanages, established in America before the middle of the nineteenth century as listed by Folks, twenty- one were Catholic and all of these were orphanages. One of the mo.st interesting of the others is Girard College, founded by the merchant prince of Phila- delphia, Stephen Girard, with an endowment of $6,- 000,000 which has since increased nearly fivefold. By the terms of Girard's will no minister of the Gospel is permitted to cross the threshold. Neither the educa- tional results nor the philanthropy to orphan boys seem to be adequate to the fortune involved. An