Читать книгу The Story of a Peninsular Veteran. Sergeant in the Forty-Third Light Infantry, during the Peninsular War онлайн

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These questions scarcely wait for reply. The affirmation is written either on the mind or heart of all; and upon principles exactly similar, the work of juvenile education, combined as it is in the Military Asylum with the sustenance of the children, and through that with the moral improvement of one of the finest armies in the world, amounts to an expression of English liberality and discrimination, the suppression of which would be a common calamity.

It has been affirmed, and is frequently the subject of sore complaint, that in some charitable foundations now in existence for the gratuitous guardianship and instruction of youth, admissions are procured by favouritism and a species of implied purchase; so that while the gate of reception is closed upon the hapless orphan, who cannot find an advocate, the entrance is invitingly open to those whose influence is sufficiently powerful to command the omnipotent ‘vote and interest.’ By this means the pious intent, nourished during the life of many a noble benefactor, is defeated; and, while he sleeps in the dust, the benefits of his endowment are diverted into channels altogether at variance with those in which the wealth bequeathed was intended to flow. Not so in the Military Asylum. It was built in order to promote the prosperity of the children of English soldiers; none but such are received, nor can admission be procured in any other form, than that projected by the impartial and even-handed rules of the institution. It is the widow and the fatherless whose cause is heard, and whose pleadings win the day. Another proof of the superiority of the institution arises from the order observed within doors: this has for years excited the admiration of visitors, numbers of whom have inspected the school at various periods. Great and persevering efforts are also made to improve and elevate the morals of the children: they are taught to fear God and honour the king, to be grateful to their benefactors, and kind to all. The services of religion are, in fact, so interwoven with the daily practices of the school, that serious impressions, unless in instances of peculiar depravity, can scarcely fail of being made.