CONDITION OF THE LABORERS. 14] 



and they are staggering under the heavy burdens of age and 

 decay. I have already, in my First Report, referred to instances 

 of this nature. But the system most prevalent is perfectly heart 

 less : labor is considered merely as labor ; human muscles and 

 sinews are regarded like the parts of any other implement ; and 

 when their power ceases, or their elasticity is destroyed, they are 

 thrown aside, like worn-out machinery, into those melancholy 

 receptacles of decay and poverty, which have, very properly, 

 ceased to be called alms-houses, and which necessity, and not 

 charity, provides. I cannot say that such sentiments are pecu 

 liar to England. They are, it is feared, becoming too common 

 in the United States ; not merely in the departments of agricul 

 tural, and manufacturing, and mechanical labor, but likewise 

 reaching the domestic and household relations, where least of all 

 they should have obtruded themselves. This comes, in some 

 measure, from that narrow and mean utilitarian philosophy, 

 which stimulates avarice into a diseased action, and measures 

 every good in life by a purely pecuniary standard. Whatever 

 tends to divide these different classes, either in interest or feeling, 

 is, to a degree, and ultimately, I fear, it must prove in an equal 

 degree, injurious to both parties. Feelings of indifference, or 

 contempt, or cruel disdain, on the one hand, are likely to be met 

 with a sense of injury, a feeling of hate and revenge, on the 

 other ; and one of the greatest curses with which Heaven could 

 have visited mankind, would have been to have made them in 

 any sense independent of each other. There are no circum 

 stances connected with the condition of society more to be 

 regretted than such as separate different classes too strongly from 

 each other, and create hostile or conflicting interests. A perfect 

 equality of condition among men is a chimera ; and if, by any 

 conceivable or possible arrangement, it could take place, the 

 earth, in its rapid revolutions, would not pass the half of a degree, 

 but it must be interrupted. But an equality of natural rights is 

 a position which, if I may be allowed to speak for one born 

 and educated in a condition of society where it has been always 

 acknowledged, would not be readily relinquished. Now, if there 

 is any right which should be held sacred, next to that which 

 every man has to his own person, it is the right of honest labor 

 to an ample share of the products of that labor. The rights 

 of the rich man to his possessions, honestly and honorably 



