[Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe by Thaddeus Mason Harris]@TWC D-Link bookBiographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe CHAPTER III 6/10
"They who can make life tolerable here, are willing to stay at home, as it is indeed best for the kingdom that they should.
But they who are oppressed with poverty and misfortunes, are unable to be at the charges of removing from their miseries, and these are the persons intended to be relieved.
And let us cast our eyes on the multitude of unfortunate individuals in the kingdom, of reputable families, and of liberal, or at least easy education, some undone by guardians, some by lawsuits, some by accidents in commerce, some by stocks and bubbles, and some by suretyship; but all agree in this one circumstance, that they must either be burdensome to their relations, or betake themselves to little shifts for sustenance, which, it is ten to one do not answer their purposes, and to which a well-educated person descends with the utmost constraint.
What various misfortunes may reduce the rich, the industrious, to danger of a prison,--to a moral certainty of starving!--These are the persons that may relieve themselves, and strengthen Georgia by resorting thither, and Great Britain by their departure. "With a view to the relief of people in the condition I have described, his Majesty has, this present year, incorporated a considerable number of persons of quality and distinction, and invested a large tract of South Carolina in them, by the name of Georgia, in trust, to be distributed among the necessitous.
Those Trustees not only give land to the unhappy, who go thither, but are also empowered to receive the voluntary contributions of charitable persons to enable them to furnish the poor adventurers with all necessaries for the expense of the voyage, occupying the land, and supporting them, until they find themselves settled.
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