REASONS Humbly Offered to this Honourable House, why a Bill pretended to give further Powers to the Corporation for setting the Poor of the City of London and Liberties thereof to Work, should not pass into a Law.  
IT authorizes the President, Governours, and Assistants, or any authorised by them, to apprehended all Idle Persons and Vagrants, asking Alms in the said City and Liberties, to sand them to their last Abode; or if they concealed the same, then to the House of Correction.  
This is a strange Power to be lodged in such Persons as now do, or hereafter may compose this Corporation.  
'Tis larger than either the Aldermen or Justices of the Peace are entrusted with by any Law, and 'tis in effect making a new Magistracy; and 'tis making them Masters of the Liberty of the People, without Proof or Conviction of any Crime.  
It empowers the President, &c. on complaint( of too small an Allowance) made by any poor Person, to summons the Church-Wardens, Overseers, and Collectors to appear before them, and to administer Oaths, and on Examination to order such Weekly Allowance to the Person complaining, as the President, &c. shall think fit, and the Church-Wardens, Overseers, and Collectors are to pay the same.  
It is humbly conceived, That 'tis hard and unreasonable, that these Men, who are Strangers to the Poor of a Parish, and to the means they have of sustaining their Poor, on complaint of those who are always craving and never satisfied, shall have power to augment their Allowance, and to order the Officers of the Parish to pay it, who certainly are the best Judges of the Necessities of their Poor, and their own Abilities, and ought not to be liable to make good, and pay out of their own Pockets, all that they cannot legally raise out of their Parish, especially when the Persons who are to judge in these Matters are to administer Oaths; and many of those thus empowered are Dissenters, and divers of them Quakers.  
The next Clause gives the President, &c. Power to call the Church-Wardens, Overseers, and Collectors to Account for all Moneys received and paid by them, and to allow, or disallow their Accounts, as they shall see fit.  
'Tis humbly conceived, that no Person of Credit or Value will undertake the Office of Church-warden Overseer, or Collector, if this Bill passes into a Law: For, besides the Oaths they are already subject to, and the accounts they must by Law undergo; if they are to be traveled into a new or other Examination at the Pleasure or Prejudice of the Corporation, no Man of Estate or Integrity will undergo those Offices, which at present are thought to be burdensome by all honest and sufficient Men; and nothing but the public Good can engage those that are fit, to undertake this Trust: Therefore by no means these Men ought to be discouraged.  
'Tis humbly also conceived, that should this Bill pass, Charity will be greatly obstructed: For thereby the Corporation are at Liberty to appoint Persons to ask Alms at every Church Door, whereby great Disturbance will happen, and the People well disposed will be uncertain and diffident to whom to give their Alms, which may in all Probability greatly discourage those well-disposed Persons, not knowing or believing Strangers can or will dispose their Charity to proper Objects.  
Amongst other Exorbitant Powers, the Prosecutors of this Bill aim at, 'tis contrived that they shall have Power to raise on every Man yearly as much as he or she now pays to the Poor, which amounts to at least 10000 l. a Year, too great a Sum to be trusted to be raised or received by these Men, especially because they will not take cure of any Poor but those that are above the Age of Seven Years, and under Fifty Years, and of Health of Body, and require 12 d. per Week to be paid by the Churchwardens for each of them, which Persons are little burdensome to their respective Parishes. And after this great Sum raised, the Parishes are left burdened with Infants, ●●ed, and sick Persons: So that this Corporation seems calculated for the Benefit of the Corporation and their Agents only.  
But above all, it seems strange to considering Men, That so great a Power should be lodged in Persons who may purchase the Privilege of being of this Corporation by a small Sum of Money,( tho' they are Papists, Dissenters, Quakers, or of any other Persuasion; nay, tho' they have no pretention to Religion of any kind) whereby they may have so great an Influence on Rich and Poor.  
'Tis therefore humbly hoped, this Bill attended with so many Inconveniencies, and from whence so little Good can be expected, shall not pass into a Law. But if any part of this Bill shall be approved, 'tis humbly hoped that more Corporations shall be erected, and particularly the Ward of Farringdon without ( being a Sixth Part of the City of London and Liberties thereof) shall have a distinct Corporation in their District, with such reasonable Powers as this Honourable House shall think fit; it being impossible for the Persons now incorporated to discharge the Trust they grasp at. And by the Act of 13 and 14 of Car. II. It's Enacted, That there be and shall be one or more Corporation or Corporations, Work-house, or Work-houses within the Cities of London and Westminster: And that the Lord Mayor of the City of London for the time being, be President of the Corporation or Corporations, Workhouse or Work-houses, within the said City. And if the said Ward of Farringdon without be thought fit to be made a Corporation, for the good Government thereof, and benefit of their Poor, that the Alderman of the said Ward and his two Deputies, and the Common-Council Men of the said Ward, consisting of Seventeen in Number, may be members of the same Corporation: And otherwise as this Honourable House in their Wisdom shall think fit.   

REASONS FOR Making the Ward of Farringdon without in London a Corporation to employ their Poor, and erect Workhouses; and against the General Bill now depending in the Honourable House of Commons.