LAW IN POLITICS. 399 



And so the Factory Acts, instead of being 

 excused as exceptional, and pleaded for as 

 justified only under extraordinary conditions, 

 ought to be recognised as in truth the first 

 Legislative recognition of a great Natural Law, 

 quite as important as Freedom of Trade, and 

 which like this last, was yet destined to claim for 

 itself wider and wider application. 



Accordingly, since the year when the first Sir 

 Robert Peel pleaded the cause of Factory Ap- 

 prentices, there has been going on a double 

 movement in Legislation, one a movement of re- 

 treat, the other a movement of advance. Step 

 by step Legislation has retired from a Province 

 once considered peculiarly its own : step by step 

 it has advanced into another Province within 

 which the Schools of Political Economy would 

 have denied it a foot of ground. Since 1802, 

 there have been passed a long series of laws re- 

 moving, one after another, all restrictions which 

 aimed at guiding the individual Will in its sharp 

 and sagacious pursuit of material wealth. Dur- 

 ing the same period there have been passed 

 another long series of Acts imposing rcstric- 



