Ch. iv. Of Emigration. 57 



supporting it without parish assistance. The 

 answer, I fear, could not be in the affirmative. 



It will be said that, when an opportunity of 

 advantageous emigration is offered, it is the fault 

 of the people themselves, if, instead of accepting 

 it, they prefer a life of celibacy or extreme poverty 

 in their own country. Is it then a fault for a man 

 to feel an attachment to his native soil, to love 

 the parents that nurtured him, his kindred, his 

 friends, and the companions of his early years ? 

 Or is it no evil that he suffers, because he con- 

 sents to bear it rather than snap these cords 

 which nature has wound in close and intricate 

 folds round the human heart? The great plan of 

 Providence seems to require, indeed, that these 

 ties should sometimes be broken ; but the sepa- 

 ration does not, on that account, give less pain ; 

 and though the general good may be promoted 

 by it, it does not cease to be an individual evil. 

 Besides, doubts and uncertainty must ever at- 

 tend all distant emigrations, particularly in the 

 apprehensions of the lower classes of people. 

 They cannot feel quite secure, that the represen- 

 tations made to them of the high price of labour 

 or the cheapness of land, are accurately true. They 

 are placing themselves in the power of the persons 

 who are to furnish them with the means of trans- 

 port and maintenance, who may perhaps have an 

 interest in deceiving them ; and the sea which 

 they are to pass, appears to them like the separa- 

 tion of death from all their former connections, 

 and in a manner to preclude the possibility of 



