400 THE REIGN OF LAW. 



tions more and more stringent on the individual 

 Will in its blind and reckless disregard of moral 

 ends.* In neither of these movements was Parlia- 

 ment impelled by the light of reason, but under 

 the blessed teaching which belongs to the Reign 

 of Law. False theory and mistaken conduct 

 have been found out by the working of Natural 

 Consequence. The abstract reasonings of Adam 

 Smith had indeed long before prepared the minds 

 of a few to perceive the true theory of unrestricted 

 competition in the interchange of goods. But as 

 it needed the practical results of restriction — dis- 

 tress, discontent, and the danger of civil commo- 



* It was not till 1S19 that Sir Robert Peel succeeded in passing 

 an Act restricting the labour of unapprenticed children. This Act 

 (59 Geo. III., c. 66) is therefore, properly speaking, the first of the 

 Factory Acts — the first which affirmed the principle of restriction as 

 legitimately applicable to " Free" Labour. But this, as well as a 

 subsequent Act passed in 1825, at the instance of Sir J. Hobhouse. 

 were practically inoperative from defective enforcing clauses. It 

 was thus apparent that the State must charge itself not only with 

 laying clown the Law, but also with the duty of seeing it obeyed. 

 It was not till this great question was taken in hand by Lord 

 Ashley that any effectual measure was passed. His Bill became 

 Law in 1833 as 3 and 4 Will. IV., c. 103. Nothing but a stringent 

 system of Government Inspection was of any avail against the 

 powerful combination of motives, out of which the evils of the 

 Factory system arose. 



