220 ON THE STATE OF IRELAND. [BOOK III. 



so interwoven, the rich are so dependent on the labour of 

 the poor, and the poor upon the wealth of the rich, that 

 any attempt to legislate partially, or with a view to the 

 good of a portion only, without a due regard to the whole 

 of the community, must prove in the end fallacious, fatal 

 to its object, and injurious in general to a ruinous degree. 



We have shown that the earnings of the agricultural 

 labourers are, on an average, from 2s. to 2s. .6d. a week, 

 or thereabouts. Wretched as these are, they yet seem to 

 afford to the Irish labourer as great a share of the produce 

 he raises as falls in Great Britain to the labourer there. 

 For as the Irish labourers exceed the British in number, 

 and the produce of Great Britain exceeds that of Ireland 

 by three-fourths, if a proportional share of the produce of 

 each country were given to the labourers of each, there 

 would be more than four times as much for the British 

 labourer as for the Irish; and we understand that the 

 earnings of an agricultural labourer in Great Britain ave- 

 rage from 8*. to 10s. a week, while in Ireland they average 

 from 2s. to 2s. 6d. or thereabouts, if spread over the year. 



This shows how necessary it is to observe the utmost 

 caution in applying any remedy to the evils we have to 

 deal with. 



If, finding the earnings of the labourer so small as they 

 are, we attempted to provide him with more than he has 

 at present out of the land, without at the same time in- 

 creasing the productive powers of it, we should give to 

 him a greater portion of the produce he helps to raise, 

 than, by comparison with Great Britain, ought to come 

 to his share ; we might thus throw land out of cultiva- 

 tion, and involve not only landlords and farmers, but the 

 labourers and the whole community, in general destruction. 



