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CHAP. VI. 



Effects of the Knowledge of the principal Cause of 

 Poverty on Civil Liberty. 



It may appear, perhaps, that a doctrine, which 

 attributes the greatest part of the sufferings of 

 the lower classes of society exclusively to them- 

 selves, is unfavourable to the cause of liberty, as 

 affording a tempting opportunity to governments 

 of oppressing their subjects at pleasure, and lay- 

 ing the whole blame on the laws of nature and 

 the imprudence of the poor. We are not, how- 

 ever, to trust to first appearances ; and I am 

 strongly disposed to believe that those who will 

 be at the pains to consider this subject deeply 

 will be convinced, that nothing would so power- 

 fully contribute to the advancement of rational 

 freedom, as a thorough knowledge generally cir- 

 culated of the principal cause of poverty ; and 

 that the ignorance of this cause, and the natural 

 consequences of this ignorance, form, at present, 

 one of the chief obstacles to its progress. 



The pressure of distress on the lower classes 

 of people, together with the habit of attributing 

 this distress to their rulers, appears to me to be 

 the rock of defence, the castle, the guardian spirit 

 of despotism. It affords to the tyrant the fatal 

 and unanswerable plea of necessity. It is the 



