I accordingly went about from house to house among ladies whom I had known, and, representing the condition of the Ward, induced them to attend a meeting of ladies to be held at the house of a prominent physician, whose wife had kindly offered her rooms.
For some months I had attempted to prepare the public mind for these labors by incessant writing for the daily papers, by lectures and by sermons in various pulpits. Experience soon showed that the most effective mode of making real the condition of the poorest class, was by relating incidents from real life which continually presented themselves.
The rich and fortunate had hardly conceived the histories of poverty, suffering, and loneliness which were constantly passing around them.
The hope and effort of the writer was to connect the two extremes of society in sympathy, and carry the forces of one class down to lift up the other. For this two things were necessary—one to show the duty which Christ especially teaches of sacrifice to the poor for His sake, and the value which He attaches to each human soul; and the other to free the whole, as much as possible, from any sectarian or dogmatic character. Nothing but "the enthusiasm of humanity" inspired by Christ could lead the comfortable and the fastidious to such disagreeable scenes and hard labors as would meet them here. It was necessary to feel that many comforts most be foregone, and much leisure given up, for this important work. Very unpleasant sights were to be met with, coarse people to be encountered, and rude children managed; the stern facts of filth, vice, and crime to be dealt with.
It was not to be a mere holiday-work, or a sudden gush of sentiment; but, to be of use, it must be patiently continued, week by week, and month by month, and year by year, with some faint resemblance to that patience and love which we believed a Higher One had exercised towards us. But, with this inspiration, as carefully as possible, all dogmatic limitation must be avoided. All sects were invited to take a share in the work, and, as the efforts were necessarily directed to the most palpable and terrible evils, the means used by all would be essentially the same. Even those of no defined religious belief were gladly welcomed if they were ready to do the offices of humanity. The fact that ninety-nine hundredths of these poor people were Roman Catholics compelled us also to confine ourselves to the most simple and fundamental instructions, and to avoid, in any way, arousing religious bigotry.
In the meeting, gathered at the house of Dr. P., were prominent ladies from all the leading sects.
An address was delivered by the writer, and then a constitution presented, of the simplest nature, and an association organized and officers appointed by the ladies present. This was the foundation of the
"FOURTH WARD INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL."
In the meanwhile, we went forth through the slums of the ward, and let it be widely known that a School to teach work, and where food was given daily, and clothes were bestowed to the well-behaved, was just forming.
Our room was in the basement of a church in Roosevelt Street. Hither gathered, on a morning in December, 1853, our ladies and a flock of the most ill-clad and wildest little street-girls that could be collected anywhere in New York. They flew over the benches, they swore and fought with one another, they bandied vile language, and could hardly be tamed down sufficiently to allow the school to be opened.