456 APPENDIX. 



quences. But still it is an approximation to a full ackiiow- 

 ledgmeut, and as sucii appears to produce much evil, both 

 with regard to the habits and the temper of the poor. 1 

 have in consequence ventured to suggest a plan of gradual 

 abolition, which, as might be expected, has not met with 

 universal approbation. I can readily understand any ob- 

 jections that may be made to it on the plea, that, the right 

 having been once acknowledged in this country, the revoca- 

 tion of it might at first excite discontents ; and 1 should 

 therefore most fully concur in the propriety of proceeding 

 with the greatest caution, and of using all possible means 

 of preventing any sudden shock to the opinions of the poor. 

 But 1 have never been able to comprehend the grounds of 

 the further assertion, which I have sometimes heard made, 

 that if the poor were really convinced that they had, no 

 claim of right to relief, tliey would in general be more in- 

 clined to be discontented and seditious. On these occa- 

 sions, the only way I have of judging is to put myself in 

 imagination in the place of the poor man, and consider how 

 I should feel in his situation. If I were told that the rich, 

 by the laws of nature and the laws of the land, were bound 

 to support me, I could not, in the first place, feel much 

 obligation for such support; and, in the next place, if I 

 were oiven any food of an inferior kind, and could not see 

 the absolute necessity of the change, which would probably 

 be the case, I should think that I had good reason to com- 

 plain. I should feel, that the laws had been violated to 

 my injury, and that I had been unjustly deprived of my 

 right. Under these circumstances, though 1 might be de- 

 terred by the fear of an armed force from committing any 

 overt acts of resistance, yet I should consider myself as 

 perfectly justified in so doing, if this fear were removed; 

 and the injury, which I believed thiit 1 had suffered, might 

 produce the most unfavourable effects on my general dispo- 

 sitions towards the higher classes of society. I cannot in- 

 deed conceive any thing more irritating to the human feel- 

 ings, than to experience that degree of distress, which, in 

 spite of all our poor-laws and benevolence, is not unfre- 

 quently felt in this country; and yet to believe that these suf- 

 ferings were not brought upon me either by my own faults, or 

 by the operation of those general laws which, like the tem- 

 pest, the blight or the pestilence, are continually falling 

 hard on particular individuals, while others entirely escape, 



