Slaney on Rural Expenditure. 1 8 1 



ing the periods of excessive prices: and unfortunately, as we 

 have just observed, these new hopes and wants were of a na- 

 ture rather to degrade than to exalt the character. Hence, a 

 reverse fell in full force on feeble minds, and still farther de- 

 gradation of character ensued. 



Here, then, we may trace one primary cause of the evils we 

 complain of. But this cause would have been comparatively 

 harmless, had not our system of poor-laws lent its aid. The 

 redundant population, occasioned by great impulses given 

 to manufacturing and agricultural labour, when no longer em- 

 ployed, not having been prudent and saving in the days of 

 their prosperity, fell back on the poor-laws for their support ; 

 and a mortal blow was then struck into the best part of the 

 character of our peasantry, when they began to regard sup- 

 port from the poor-rates as their right, and consequently not 

 as a humiliation, to which only the most imperious necessity 

 would have forced their forefathers to have submitted. 



That population is degraded which is willing to submit to 

 a narrower sphere of comforts than usual, rather than adopt 

 the only means in their power to preserve those to which they 

 have been accustomed. Let us suppose that they have been 

 accustomed to regard 1 2s. a week as necessary before they will 

 venture on marriage, and that circumstances reduce wages to 

 105. If they still continue to marry as before, their ideas of com- 

 fort must be lowered, and ultimately their character as well as 

 condition will be much deteriorated. But their character will 

 suffer still more, though their condition, at first, not so much, 

 if, when wages are lowered to 105., they marry, looking for- 

 ward to the poor-rates to make up the deficiency, or as a 

 refuge in case of need. 



That the cause of a falling off in character and condition 

 rests entirely with the labouring classes, and that they alone 

 possess the means of producing and maintaining, or reinstating 

 that proportion between the demand for labour and the sup- 

 ply of it which will secure them a higher rank in society than 

 they at present hold, is most clearly and forcibly laid down 

 in the following quotation from a pamphlet recently pub- 

 lished. * 



" That wages depend on the proportion between population and capital, 

 is tantamount to saying, that the greater share a man gets, the richer he will 

 be. But it is never stated why the proportion between population and 



* An Exposition of Fallacies on Rent, Tithes, &e. By a Member of 

 the University of Cambridge. London, 8vo. 1826. pp.64. — This is a very 

 able pamphlet, exposing the absurdities of some of the doctrines of the new 

 school of political economy ; but not sound in all its own doctrines. 



N 3 



