provide for their wants, and in the exercise of such compassion we should find an abundant reward.  If there were those who because of idleness and vice were indisposed to provide for themselves, we should find a way of inspiring them with a better mind.  But, if this were a thoroughly Christian country, there would be no willing workers dwelling anywhere near the borders of want.  There are resources here which are ample for the abundant supply of all human needs; if ours were a completely Christianized society, the needs of those who were able and willing to work would be abundantly supplied.

We are often told that this is already done; that there are no poor in this country save those who are either incompetent or indolent or vicious.  If that could be proved, the question would still remain whether the incompetency and the indolence and the viciousness may not, to a considerable degree, be the effects of causes for which society is responsible, and which, in a thoroughly Christianized society, would not be permitted to exist.  But it cannot be proved that poverty is wholly the fault of the poor.  The fact is that a very large number of those who are doing the world’s work to-day are receiving less than their fair share of the wealth they produce.

It is true that there are many laborers who earn large wages.  Compactly organized labor unions have been able to secure a favorable distribution of the product of their industry.  But we are often reminded that but a small percentage of the laborers of this country are organized; and the wages of those thus unprotected are often lamentably small.  Many attempts have been made to find out what is the average wage of the average workman; our census reports contain very carefully prepared statistics.  I have taken pains to go over some of these, and here are the results.

In the textile trades, with 661,451 workers, the average weekly wage of all workers is $6.07; of men over sixteen, $7.63; of women, $5.18; of children under sixteen, $2.15.

In the iron workers’ trades, with 222,607 workers, the average weekly wage is $10.46.

In the boot and shoe trades, with 142,922 workers, the average for all is $7.96; for men over sixteen, $9.11; for women, $6.13; for children under sixteen, $3.40.

In the men’s clothing trades, with 120,950 workers, the average for all is $7.06; for men, $10.90; for women, $4.88; for children, $2.61.

These weekly wages are obtained by dividing the annual wage by 52.  Often the weekly rate is much higher, but for many weeks the workers are unemployed; the only fair estimate is that which is based upon the annual wage.