- Project Runeberg -  Life, letters, and posthumous works of Fredrika Bremer /
251

(1868) [MARC] Author: Fredrika Bremer Translator: Emily Nonnen With: Charlotte Bremer
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LETTERS. 251

upon local circumstances, which may be different in each
province of the country. The knowledge hereof, and a
clear idea of the meaning with, and the purpose of, such an
Institution, must decide the question.

One may also imagine this establishment to be at work
where no Refuge, properly so called, does exist. It then
forms a part of the invisible church, and can, like the visi-
ble church, be found in every congregation.

There, where the Refuge stands forth as an independent
Institution, having its own government, its nearer relation
to society and to the other establishments for relief and
education becomes a matter of importance to decide, and
the question then touches in the first instance the inner
organization, system of working, and the object of the Insti-
tution.

With reference to older depraved children, it appears to
me that one cannot hesitate. For them the Reformatory
must have, above all, a moral tendency. It must then be
an educational institution. It becomes to the young person
every thing or nothing. The State must here, for the sake
of its own good and for its own security, meet the prodigal
son, as did the father in the gospel. Mercy must there go
before Justice.

The case is different with regard to merely neglected or
younger children. The security of the State and the good
of the children do not require unconditionally that in the
House of Refuge they should receive a complete moral and
physical education ; because, even without it, they can be
saved, and become good and useful members of society.
Therefore we ought here to consider the important ques-
tion, concerning the moral injustice which would be done
in society, if the children of bad parents, by being admitted
into the House of Refuge, were to be better provided for,
and if better prospects for the future were to be opened for
them, than for the children of honest but poor parents.
This question is of the greatest importance, and I beg of

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