106 Of Poor-Laws, continued, Bk. iii. 



.presumed that the power of production was not 

 essentially impeded, notwithstanding the enor- 

 mous amount of taxation; but in the state of things 

 which has occurred since the peace, and under a 

 most extraordinary fall of the exchangeable value 

 of the raw produce of the land, and a great conse- 

 quent diminution of the circulating medium, the 

 very sudden increase of the weight and pressure of 

 taxation must greatly aggravate the other causes 

 which discourage production. This effect has been 

 felt to a considerable extent on the land ; but the 

 distress in this quarter is ah-eady much mitigated ;* 

 and among the mercantile and manufacturing 

 classes, where the greatest numbers are without 

 employment, the evil obviously arises, not so 

 much from the want of capital and the means of 

 production, as the want of a market for the com- 

 modity when produced — a want, for which the 

 removal of taxes, however proper, and indeed ab- 

 solutely necessary as a permanent measure, is 

 certainly not the immediate and specific remedy. 



The principal causes of the increase of pau- 

 perism, independently of the present crisis, are, 

 first, the general increase of the manufacturing 

 system and the unavoidable variations of manu- 

 facturing labour ; and secondly, and more parti- 

 cularly, the practice which has been adopted in 

 some counties, and is now spreading pretty gene- 

 rally all over the kingdom, of paying a consider- 

 able portion of what ought to be the wages of 



* Written in 1817. It increased again afterwards from another 

 great fall in the price of corn, subsequent to 1818. 



