320 On the Cause of the Distresses of the labouring People. (Sept. 1%, 
clothes to their backs, and good beef in 
their bellies?” | 
In- a government like the -British, 
where the landed and. commercial in- 
terests have conspired to chase the voice 
of the labourer almost from its legisla-, 
ture, thimgs could hardly have taken a 
diiferent turn then they have: To have 
busied itself in promoting the happiness 
of the people, or to have concerned itself 
in ascertaining the portion of national 
produce necessary to each, in order to 
preserve that happiness, would have been 
to have followed the native and uncor- 
-Tupted feelings of man: it was more con- 
genial to the spirit of an association of 
proprietors and merchants, to get posses- 
sion of as great a quantity of that pro- 
-duce for their own use as possible, and 
to take no trouble with any circumstance 
connected with it, but its cheapness: 
That West India produce might be 
sold ‘* cheap,” was the plea for the Slave- 
trade; and that British manufactures 
may be sold ‘ cheap,” is the plea for the 
pauper system: hence it is, that whole 
societies of men in England begrudge 
every hour that the people spend in re- 
laxation and pleasure; and hence it is 
that wages are reduced to a scale that 
makes hard and perpetual labour neces- 
sary to the workman’s existence. 
A mere cursory view of this principle 
would ascertain its futility; for if the 
wages of the labouring classes were raised 
‘so high as to enable them to live com- 
-fortably and take their pleasure upon 
four days’ labour inthe week, we could 
easily get the same quantity of work 
done by employing that third of our 
labourers who now live upon charity, to 
work four days in a week also. The very 
worst consequence that cowd flow from 
this policy would be, that the price of 
labour would be raised one third, with- 
out our getting any more work performed 
for it. “The natural effect of this rise, I 
“shall be told, would be to enhance the 
price of our goods to the amount of the 
additional wages paid, and would of 
course diminish our foreign commerce to 
that amount; a most alarming prospect 
to those who can see the national pros- 
-perity through no other medium than 
the tumes of claret and tobacco, but not 
quite so. dreadiul) to the disciples of the 
‘good bishop, who would suspend their 
“apprehensions till they had inquired 
whether a people who had provided 
themselves with the neéessaries of life in 
g 
good plenty, would not soon extend their 
industry to new arts and new branches 
of commerce?” Yet supposing even that 
commerce were to suffer an irrecoverable 
diminution to the amount of the whole 
sum paid in additional wages, the only 
inconvenience that the country could 
suffer would be, that it myst find a way 
to live without foreign productions to 
the same amount; and the great advan- 
tage to. set against this inconvemence 
would be, that the whole sum so saved 
would be consumed in. feeding, lodging, 
and clothing our own people. Should 
we expend ten millions a year more in 
wages, and lose the sale of manufactures 
abroad to that amount, our own people 
‘would have ten millions more to spend, 
and they would become purchasers of 
those manufactures instead of foreigners. 
For these reasons, Sir, I donot believe 
that the encrease of paupers is,to be at- 
tributed to the consolidation of farms, or 
to the invention of machinery, but to the 
injustice of society which does not allow 
the same sum to be divided amongst the. 
ageregate mass of labourers that was 
found necessary to their support before 
those means were contrived to supplant 
labour. The improvements are in them- 
selves blessings, but the principle of par 
simony converts them mtoa curse; afid 
it is in vain for the legislature or the 
public to seek about for means to remedy 
the evil whilst they persist in maintaining 
that principle. The moment that»either 
shall acquire a sincere disposition to do 
justice, the difficulty will cease, and the 
remedy will be found in the simple re- 
peal of the laws which prevent the free 
circulation of labour. Were labour ac- 
knowledged to be a species of property 
entitled to as high a price as 1t would 
fetch, no person would be willing to 
dispose of it without receiving in return 
ad 
what he should consider an equivalent; 
and that equivalent would be such a 
portion of the comforts of life, as would ~ 
place him upon a level with his neigh- 
bours. Among those comforts would be 
a degree of relaxation from toi, which 
would be regulated by the quantity of 
Jabour in the market and the demand for 
it, and which would be. prevented from 
degenerating mto leentiousness by the 
elevated manners and additional wants 
that this state of things would create 
amongst the working classes. ) 
} Your’s, &c. 
May 19, 1807. _Jouw Bons, 
Change, 
* 
“ig 
