CONCLUSION. [Chap. 



grasping, greedy, selfish, unfeeling married knave 

 in every country, who has eternally on his lips, 

 " charity begins at home ; " an interpretation of 

 the above precept of Saint Paul, which inter- 

 pretation was certainly found out by tlie Devil. 

 Ask such a fellow to give to the poor ; ask him to 

 goto a public meeting; ask him to sign a petition 

 against any act of tyranny or cruelty ; ask him to 

 assist, merely by writing his name, or saying aye 

 or no^ in procuring redress of any grievance, 

 though he himself suffer from it in common with 

 the rest of the people ; ask him any of these, 

 and the answer of the creature is : " / have 

 a ivife and family'* " 1 have sixteeii children^ 

 Mr. Cobbett," said the late Sir Henry Mild- 

 may to me, when 1 was, in 1807, urging him to 

 make great efforts in Hampshire to oppose 

 the perfidious Whig Ministry s tools : " those, 

 then," said I, " Sir, are sixteen reasons in 

 addition to all that I have urged, for your 

 making the exertion." Now, this was by no 

 means a man destitute of public spirit or of 

 generosity, and was very much beloved by his 

 tenants and by all the people who lived near 

 him ; yet, even he could plead wife and family^ 

 who, God knows, were in no other danger than 

 such as might possibly arise from their having 

 too much. There was a corporal in our regi- 

 ment, who, having sacked two or three farm- 



