Grand Pensionary

“ The Grand Pensionary, who was not a man of military training either on sea or land, may have underrated the difficulties which weighed on the mind of Opdam, but as a politician he understood that it is sometimes better to fight and be beaten than not to fight at all, and his common-sense must have told him that if the Dutch fleet only fought hard enough, it would certainly make the English pay very dear for their victory. ”

“ The Means of Prolonging Life after Middle Age. Fourth Edition, revised and enlarged. Small crown Svo, 4J. GEDDES, James. — History of the Administration of John de "Witt, Grand Pensionary of Holland. Vol. I. 1623-1654. With Portrait. Demy Svo, 15^. GENNA, E. — Irresponsible Philanthropists, Being some Chapters on the Employment of Gentlewomen. Small crown Svo, 2s. 6d. GEORGE, Henry. — Progress and Poverty : an Inquiry into the Causes of Industrial Depressions, and of Increase of Want with Increase of Wealth. The Remedy. Second Edition. Post Svo, ^s. ”

“ If it is proposed to give him an Old Age Pension of 5s. a week, a chorus of voices exclaim that he will be demoralised—they mean that he will not work so hard if he thinks he need not die in the workhouse. ”

“ He foresaw the plight of the aged miner left in the evening of his days to the care of charity, and to create a defence against want in old age, and some measure of comfort for declining days, the pension was his special duty and care in acquiring for those who became eligible. ”

“ There’s enough to pension many widows and orphans in order to maintain our prestige. Don’t smile, for I’m not talking about myself, and I have my pension, even though a very small one, insignificant considering the services my husband rendered, but I’m talking of others who are dragging out miserable lives! ”

“ For the fact is that, since the nation has placed me on its Pension List, I have nowhere to sleep and nothing to live on. I assuredly do not ask for riches, but only for enough to enable me to finish my life and to avoid an unhappy old age. ”

“ So far from the pension being an inducement to self-maintenance in earlier years, the fact that a pension is due shortly is made a reason for asking for out-relief in the interim. And so relief is made to breed relief. But a further irony of fate remains to be recorded. When the Old Age Pensions Act was passed the greatest stress was laid upon the condition that old age pensioners or the "veterans of labour" should be entirely dissociated from all contact with the Poor Law. ”

“ The pensioners had found his fate more bitter than that of his predecessors. Of course they knew that one of them must die each year. What harm was there in that? Pensioners may not be old. Can their dim eyes no longer distinguish the cards, can their trembling hands no longer lift the glass, what is life for them, and what are they for life? ”

“ Old people in the late sixties have no longer been dying of starvation in the terror of losing the pension through accepting poor relief, and the greater independence of the State pensioner is heartening many. ”

“ The cost of the old-age pension system has greatly increased, as might have been expected, for the reason that an increasing number of old persons who previously would have come under the poor-relief system are now receiving old-age pensions. ”

“ Some time ago I mentioned the subject of Universal Old Age Pensions to my fellow Socialist Mr Cobden-Sanderson, famous as an artist-craftsman in bookbinding and printing. "Why not Universal Pensions for Life?" ”

“ Old age pensioners, many at least of whom might have provided for their own old age by reasonable prudence in their earlier years, are designated without distinction as the "veterans of labour." Since the removal of the pauper disqualification a good many people who have been in receipt of parochial relief for years have become these veterans of labour, and have obtained, or are qualifying for, an old age pension. ”

“ Old Age Pensions.—The Old Age Pensions law, enacted in 1898, provided for the free grant of pensions, not exceeding £18 a year, to persons of sixty-five years and upwards who had lived for twenty five years in the colony. Pensioners must be British subjects, poor, and not ex-criminals or of notoriously bad character. ”

“ Findlay has her old age pension each Friday. She thus has eight and six a week. I wonder did Lloyd George realise that his pension scheme would one day prevent fat farmers from having conscience qualms when they gave a widow sixpence a day? ”

“ Having filled out his fifty years with entire satisfaction to his employers and no small credit to himself, he had retired on his laurels to spend a hale and hearty old age, in the enjoyment of the comfortable pension awarded him by the company which he had served so well. ”

“ The Old Age Pensions Act removed from the shoulders of working-class families what was to many an intolerable burden. Before the Act came into force some thousands of men and women, from no cause but the lapse of time, became incapable of supporting themselves. ”

“ The English old-age pension law is a mere gratuity in the nature of outdoor relief, giving to everybody who has reached a certain age, without reference to any previous service, tramps or drones as well as workmen. ”

“ The old man that we pass in the hall, with his arm and leg in a frame, will never recover; yet he does not know it, and frequently asks me if I think he will get a pension when he is well, if he loses his leg and arm. ”

“ We have interviewed 103, and only eleven have applied for the pension. The wished-for, as I have said, has come too late; but another generation will be saved from "the House" and will be able "to die outside," so often the last wish of the aged. ”

“ He had ascertained that an Old Age Pensions scheme of some form was acceptable, and he was encouraged by many offers of help to turn out of the legislative machine a really practical and workable measure. ”

“ The second great function of the Elizabethan Poor Law was the relief of the impotent, and under it practically every poor person had an old age pension. Those who have studied the old parish books will tell you that in most parts of England almost the whole labouring population—young, middle-aged, and old—were upon the rates, and outdoor relief was universal. There is no difference, but in name, between old age pensions and outdoor relief, except that old age pensions are more attractive, because they are on a higher scale and are free from the name of pauperism. ”

“ When too old, or no longer able to work, they have pensions given them and may remain in the hospital and be cared for always if they choose, or if they have relatives and want to live with them they can have their pensions and go to them, and return always if they like. ”

“ The provision of old age pensions is another pleasing scheme. In the first place it will diminish the need of foresight and of self-restraint; it will thus weaken character by removing the great driving force of self-interest. ”

“ The old man had thought it over, and remembered hundreds of occasions when he was soaked through with icy water, and had slept on the wet ground, and gone hungry and taken cold, but he realized that he had taken no more colds in the army than he had at home, and he could not see how he could swear that a chill he received thirty-five years ago could have anything to do with his present aches, and though he knew thousands of the old boys were receiving pensions, that were no worse off than he was, he had told the pension agent that he need not apply for a pension for his pain in the knee. ”

“ To borrow a line from Senator Leahy, who is working closely with us to strengthen the safety net for our seniors, the only people who should benefit from pensions are the people who worked for a lifetime to build them. ”

“ Our Senior Citizens used to be pensioned off, while younger people worked. But when science improved the Seniors' health, they got tired of sitting in corners on pensions and, besides, a lot of them died soon after they stopped working. ”

“ A considerable proportion of the people who have reached the age of sixty are now receiving old-age pensions, and approximately one-fourth of them are men. The percentage increases greatly with advancing age. ”

“ Every phase of human need was looked to. We are just beginning to realize our obligations to care for the old, and the last twenty years has seen various efforts on the part of governments to provide old-age pensions. In the Middle Ages according to the laws of the gilds the man who had paid his dues for seven years would then draw a weekly pension equal to something more than five dollars now, for all the rest of his life if he were disabled by injury, or had become incapacitated from old age or illness. ”

“ Flowers, perhaps, at all events those of tilth and pasture, will have been all but improved away. And, as likely as not, the word Home will have only a special significance, indicating the common abode of retired labourers who are drawing old-age pensions. ”

“ There was no reason why you should have had a pension at all, in my opinion. You've been blessed with good health and no family, and you've never spent a shilling on another fellow creature in your life. ”

“ Several have been continuously receiving relief since taking their pension. In all these cases, except in six, when the pensioners came into the workhouse, they continued to receive their pension. One pensioner who had been admitted to the infirmary on five occasions stated that one reason for wishing to be admitted was in order to save money against his discharge. Some pensioners allowed their pensions to accumulate, whilst others allowed a relative or friend to draw the pension. ”

“ With regard to the aged, we have since 1908 in every County and Burgh a Local Pension Committee awarding domiciliary pensions to no fewer than 70,000 persons over 70, or more than treble the number of aged persons maintained by the Parish Councils as Poor Law Authorities, many, indeed, having been saved from the pauper roll. ”

“ When the employe was honorably retired, say at sixty or sixty-five, after a stipulated number of years of steady work, he would be pensioned until he died, which pension might in whole or in part be continued to his wife if she survived him. ”

“ At the same time, it must be remembered that, once a pension has been granted, any departure from the paths of virtue on the part of the recipient will probably be quickly noted, and the pensioner will be penalised to the extent of the whole or some part of his pension, according to the magnitude of his offence. ”

“ After a time, you get to know him as a superior sort of being reduced from his high estate, and only making the two ends meet by the grace of God. "Get a pension, and don't worry" is very good advice when the pension is big enough; but generally the pension-man is a trifle seedy—his pension won't spread all over him, but leaves him minus gloves, with patched shoes, and short everywhere. ”

“ The grant of parish relief under the old ways has been humorously likened to a State pension, which, when it has once been given, is never supposed to be revoked during the lifetime of the privileged pensioner. ”

“ She, unconsciously, perhaps, will supervise the home, and at the end of three months, when the old woman will appear again to have her pension renewed, she will be able to tell of a life which has become quieter and happier. ”

“ When he has completed twenty-one years’ service, he may retire with a pension for life of from tenpence to fourteen-pence a day; and when worn-out by age or infirmity, he may bear up for that magnificent institution, Greenwich Hospital, there among old comrades to end his days in peace. ”

“ When a pensioner begins to draw his pension at forty-five years of age, it will be less than if they did not draw it till they were fifty-five or sixty years of age, for the amount of shares will have to be divided so that they will last at least until the member is seventy-five years old. ”

“ I confess that I have endeavored to relieve myself from again interposing objections to the granting of a pension to this poor and aged widow. But I can not forget that age and poverty do not themselves justify gifts of public money, and it seems to me that the according of pensions is a serious business which ought to be regulated by principle and reason, though these may well be tempered with much liberality. ”

“ But, Gentlemen, is it right for the nation to keep on paying for life crowds of young fellows such as make up the greater part of this dead weight? This is not all, however, for, there are the widows and the children, who have, and are to have, pensions too. You seem surprised, and well you may; but this is the fact. A young fellow who has a pension for life, aye, or an old fellow either, will easily get a wife to enjoy it with him, and he will, I’ll warrant him, take care that she shall not be old. ”

“ At seventy-five one is a drag in the labour market, and the poor old fellow, feeling acutely that he would only be a burden on his sons and his daughters, asked neither for out-relief nor indoor-relief, but stood his mates a drink with his last shilling, and took the old Roman method.
However, light seems dawning through the darkness, and I think many Poor Law Guardians will rest better in their beds knowing that old-age pensions seem to have come into the sphere of practical politics. ”

“ Many old people receive pensions for no other reason, it seems to me, but as a compensation for having lived a long time ago. No doubt our town dogs still talk, in a snuffling way, about the days that tried dogs’ noses. How they got a cat up there I do not know, for they are as shy as my aunt about entering a canoe. ”

“ If we add 180,000 Old Age Pensioners, we reach the figure of nearly a quarter of a million persons, out of a total population of under four and a half millions, dependent wholly or partially for their living on the State, exclusive of Army and Navy pensioners ”