566 Machinery-distresses. ^Junb, 



labourer suffers, and has long suffered, precisely in proportion to what 

 are blindly, if not perversely, called innprovements. Are we then of 

 so anti-social — of so barbaric a cast, as to throw obstructions in the way 

 of improvements ? Boldly we say, yes, the moment those improvements 

 begin to infringe upon the comforts of the labourer. Go on and prosper, 

 say we, so long as the labour of the workman will keep him well, in a 

 state to support his family, with clothes on their backs, and food in their 

 bellies ; and the instant your improvements are beginning to crib and 

 cramp that condition, arrest 3rour course. The prudent wiJl do so, and 

 the imprudent should be made to do so. 



But what is to be done ? Can you expect the manufacturer, if he 

 have the opportunity, be that opportunity what it may, of extending the 

 rate of his profits, not to seize it, though it be to the ruin of some of 

 his labourei-s? Why, judging from experience, no; something to be 

 sure might be expected from humanity, and even something from the 

 profession of Christianity. Accumulation is not to be pursued through 

 right and wrong, through thick and thin, surely. Something too might 

 be looked for from calculation ; for, the more he multiplies goods beyond 

 the fair demand of the market, the more his profits must sink ; hitherto 

 he has lowered the wages of his labourers in proportion, and beyond 

 perhaps ; but there he can go no furtlicr, though his profits may and will 

 sink lower and lower still. The evil must finally recoil upon his own 

 liead, and he be left without the possibility of casting it upon others. If, 

 therefore, the manufacturer will not stop short, but still pursue his reck- 

 less course, he must take the consequence ; hunger and desperation will 

 prompt the destruction of his ruinous machinery, and he must thank his 

 own grasping pertinacity for the mischief that ensues. 



But if he will do nothing, the responsibility must be taken out of his 

 hands ; and truly, if ever there was a case for legislative interfer- 

 !ence, machinery is one, tending, as it so manifestly does, beyond a certain 

 point, to bring misery and destruction upon the labourer. Is not he 

 who cannot help himself, at least without a breach of the laws, is not he 

 a proper object for the protection of the legislature ? Is a government 

 established solely for the advantage and security of the rich and of the 

 master ? Is this to be the result of all our empty boastings of equality 

 of rights ? Shall we watch over the rights of the commanding part of 

 the nation, and yield no protection to the helots of society ? But if you 

 interfere to check the employment of capital in whatever way the owner 

 pleases, do you not clip the wings of his liberty ? No, not his social 

 liberty, only the liberty, or rather the license of injuring and depressing 

 his poorer fellow-citizens. 



But then, if the manufacturers are to be checked in the use of machi- 

 nery, we cannot compete with our continental neighbours. No ? then 

 leave the competition alone. But we do not like to abandon our profits. 

 What right, moral, or rational, or intelligible, have you to insist upon 

 seeking those profits at the expense of your fellow subjects ? Are others 

 to starve that you maj thrive ? Is it any advantage to society that you 

 make half a million and a thousand labourers are, in consequence, actually 

 starving, or, what is next to it, living upon potatoes and water ? Is it any 

 advantage to society, does it strike us as a superiority for England to 

 exult in, that though the Leicestershire frame-work knitter and his 

 family be pining on a miserable pittance, we get stockings at two shillings 

 and sixpence M'hich could not have been had under three shillings and 



