S26 Preliminary Essay to Reports on 



temporary inconvenience, while the permanent effects have inva- 

 riably been an increase in the number of hands employed, and 

 an advance in the general condition of society. 



There are, however, some exceptions. There have been im- 

 provements beneficial throughout to all parties concerned. Such 

 are those improvements in agriculture which augment the fertili- 

 ty of the soil ; or those in mechanics which have rendered prac- 

 ticable what before was impracticable. Mines and quarries which 

 could not have been profitably wrought, had the water and the 

 rubbish been removed by hand, have become at once productive 

 on the application of water, wind, or steam. And remote pas- 

 tures, whence the cattle could not be brought but at an expense 

 almost exceeding their value, now regularly supply our cities. 

 On such improvements the mind rests with unalloyed pleasure ; 

 not so when the improvement consists in the substitution of one 

 process for another. 



Since the distress of one class of workmen is often the effect 

 of a general improvement, we might consider it fair that the 

 community charge itself with the relief of the sufferers. The 

 projectors of a canal or of a railway are taken bound to make 

 up any loss that may be sustained by the trustees on the ordi- 

 nary road ; and it really appears that, with equal propriety, 

 the inventor of some new process might be made liable for the 

 damage thereby occasioned to those who practised the old ones. 

 Such an enactment, however, imagining it capable of being put 

 in execution, would crush every innovation, and produce that 

 stagnation which we see in China ; it would prevent even the 

 changes of fashion, and the shawl-weavers would at present be 

 prosecuting actions against all the weavers of printed crape. 

 Since distress, as serious as that produced by any improvement, 

 is often occasioned by the caprice of the leader of fashion, with 

 as much propriety would we define the form and material of 

 dress, as restrain the most perfect freedom in the progress of 

 discovery. Relief need not be sought from legal enactments; 

 yet the case is a hard one, and demands alleviation. 



The principal source of inconvenience lies in the difficulty 

 with which the workman acquires a new craft. Those work- 

 men who are accustomed to a great variety of processes, and to 

 a frequent change of tool, are almost secure ; but the situation 



