123 
of which, “is a positive act of aggression; 
for wherever feeling exists, be. it in the 
freeinan, the slave, or the brute beast, 
there will also be found a co-existent 
right to legal protection. 
immediate good, real or imaginary, of a 
breach of right, may, or-rather must be, 
followed by a ee of evils, and the 
officious intermedling of the law has ever 
had the most unfortunate eilect upon 
human affairs, 
To apply these principles practically 
to Mr. Hall’s plan of tmvesting Par- 
lament with the power of compelling a 
man to cut down his own trees, cn ex- 
pedient which might indeed be attended 
with some benefit were not its cost too 
great, let us proceed to the natural se- 
quel, ‘taking for examples, those demands 
which have been actually made, and that 
even by those who suppose themselves 
the advocates of liberty :—a compulsory 
division of jarms, that no man shall have 
the power to Jet or hold beyond a cer- 
tain number of acres;—regulation of 
the sale of all neeessaries of life, so that 
one man sha!l not forestall, or take the 
advantage of another ;—a fixed or max- 
imum price ; ;—legal limitation of the 
waves of labour, ‘and of the property of 
the rich, restricting income to a certain 
amount: the favourite plan of Paine, 
and of many of -his disciples ;—legal re- 
straints on thinking and believing! : 
a considerable portion of these natu- 
ral illegalities bas already appeared in 
the shape of laws, however ausurd and 
inefficient; the remainder is enthusiasti- 
cally and periodically calied for By well- 
meaning in¢lividuals, whose attachinent 
to the end, blinds eg to the irregularity 
and fatal aN ge of the means, and 
equally to the most glaring proofs of past 
experience, Amongst these advocates 
of liberty, there is not at this moment 
a more favourite dogma than that the 
farmer, the butcher, and the baker, not 
to forget the publican, andthe exhibitor 
of public spectacles, ought, in all'well- 
regulated society, to be restrained hy 
peculiar laws, which it is net necessary 
to extend to other occupations. And 
why ?—-Because the former of these grow 
oy deal in the necessaries of life, between 
which and ali other commodities there 
is supposed to subsist a difference, abso- 
sulutely requiring a different species of 
legislation; which is precisely to gene- 
rnlize upon the extreme case: it is to 
authorize the magistrate to pull a man’s 
house down provideatly, and before the 
fire has really happened. In the cases 
On Cutting Down deeaying Timber Trees. 
Lastiy, the | 
‘Tn regard to belicf indee ae 
[Sept. i, 
of fire, famine, and invasion, no doubt 
expedience is right; but whilst corn can 
be purchased with money, there exisis 
no essential difference between corn and 
ether commodities, nor the smallest ne- 
cessity fur any difference im respect of 
Jegal restraint: nor ought a man to be 
biained for hoarding corn, but in coms 
mon with him who hoards. money. ‘The 
farmer has the same right to extend his 
concerns, his influence, and, in all proba- 
bility, power of effectually serving lis 
country, as ‘the man of any other occu- 
pation; and-sranting he enhance price 
with one hand, he reduces it with the 
other, by the superior produce which 
results from great means and superior 
skill, Nor have the fellowing two things 
ever been proved—inst, that fundamen- 
tal right ever ought to be invaded, but 
jlagronte necessitate ; secondly, that legal 
regulation and restraint, in defiance of 
right, have been generally successful. 
The truth is, price will ever be ultimately 
regulated by actual plenty or, scarcity, 
aud not by laws, however numerous; and 
ux the ordinary course of affairs, we are 
bound by the obligations of justice and 
right, to await the natural result. 
The law of the marimum was experi- 
rimented upon by the antimonopolists, 
antiforestallers, and antiregraters, of re- 
volutionary France: with. what success 
need-not be repeated. The experiment 
“has since been revived im New South 
Wales, with the success of nearly break- 
ing all the farmers, and starving the co- 
lony. The legislator however, or rather 
executor of the law, was ve: ry properly, 
and it may be hoped timeausly, stopped 
in his career of regulation. We now . 
and then punish a forestaller here, 
terrorem: the term) I presume, implies au 
earlyinan, Wouid it not be an improve. 
ment upon the act against such, to tack 
a ryder to it, ordaining, that no man of 
that class should, leave his bed on a 
market morning belore a certain hour, 
As to legal restraints on thinking and 
believing, we are compelled to believe, 
by act of ‘parliament; and forbidden, on 
pain of death, to deal with the d devils 
besides, I believe, being g subject to the 
penalty of twenty "pounds for every time 
we Ont going to church on the sabbath 
day. Why, what are our informers about, 
to neghect a proffered fortune of easier 
attainment than even BY the lottery ? 
have one 
set of men In our ae who are the 
loudest against compulsive creeds, with 
Sureiy the least reason on their side; 
‘for 
