{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_30238/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_30238","id":"gutenberg_30238","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30238","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: History - Modern (1750+)","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Politics","Category: Sociology","Industrial relations","Working class"],"text":"Transcribed from the 1845 William Pickering edition by David Price, email\nccx074@pglaf.org\n\n\n\n\n\n                          The Claims of Labour.\n\n\n                             AN ESSAY ON THE\n                         DUTIES OF THE EMPLOYERS\n                             TO THE EMPLOYED.\n\n                           The Second Edition.\n\n                            TO WHICH IS ADDED,\n              AN ESSAY ON THE MEANS OF IMPROVING THE HEALTH\n                    AND INCREASING THE COMFORT OF THE\n                            LABOURING CLASSES.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                                  LONDON\n                            WILLIAM PICKERING\n                                  1845.\n\n    \"There is formed in every thing a double nature of good; the one, as\n    every thing is a total or substantive in itself; the other, as it is\n    a part or member of a greater body; whereof the latter is in degree\n    the greater and the worthier, because it tendeth to the conservation\n    of a more general form.  Therefore we see the iron in particular\n    sympathy moveth to the loadstone; but yet if it exceed a certain\n    quantity, it forsaketh the affection to the loadstone, and like a\n    good patriot moveth to the earth, which is the region and country of\n    massy bodies.  This double nature of good, and the comparative\n    thereof, is much more engraven upon man, if he degenerate not; unto\n    whom the conservation of duty to the public ought to be much more\n    precious than the conservation of life and being: according to that\n    memorable speech of Pompeius Magnus, when being in commission of\n    purveyance for a famine at Rome, and being dissuaded with great\n    vehemency and instance by his friends about him, that he should not\n    hazard himself to sea in an extremity of weather, he said only to\n    them, 'Necesse est ut eam, non ut vivam.'  But it may be truly\n    affirmed that there was never any philosophy, religion, or other\n    discipline, which did so plainly and highly exalt the good which is\n    communicative, and depress the good which is private and particular,\n    as the Holy Faith; well declaring, that it was the same God that gave\n    the Christian law to men, who gave those laws of nature to inanimate\n    creatures that we spoke of before.\"\n\n                                        _Bacon's Advancement of Learning_.\n\n    \"And well may masters consider how easie a transposition it had been\n    for God, to have made him to mount into the saddle that holds the\n    stirrup; and him to sit down at the table, who stands by with a\n    trencher.\"\n\n                                                    _Fuller's Holy State_.\n\n\n\n\nTO HENRY TAYLOR, ESQ.\n\n\nMY DEAR TAYLOR,\n\nI have great pleasure in dedicating this book to you, as I know of no one\nwho, both in his life and writings, has shown a more profound and\ndelicate care for the duties of the Employer to the Employed.  Pardon me,\nif following the practice of the world, I see the author in his hero, and\nthink I hear you speaking, when Van Artevelde exclaims--\n\n    \"A serviceable, faithful, thoughtful friend,\n    Is old Van Ryk, and of a humble nature,\n    And yet with faculties and gifts of sense,\n    Which place him justly on no lowly level--\n    Why should I say a lowlier than my own,\n    Or otherwise than as an equal use him?\n    That with familiarity respect\n    Doth slacken, is a word of common use.\n    I never found it so.\"\n\nI have had some peculiar advantages in writing upon this subject.  I\nshould have been unobservant indeed, if, with such masters as I have\nserved under, I had not learnt something, in regard to the duties of a\ngreat employer of labour, from witnessing their ever-flowing courtesy;\ntheir care for those who came within their sphere; their anxiety, as the\nheads of departments, to recognize every exertion on the part of their\nsubordinates; and their ready sympathy with the poor and the friendless,\na sympathy which the vexations and harassments of office, and all those\nthings that tend to turn a man's thoughts in upon himself, could never\nsubdue.\n\nBut, happily, it is not only amongst the high in office that such\nexamples are to be found.  The spirit, and even some of the very modes of\nbenevolent exertion which I have endeavoured to recommend, have already\nbeen carried into practice, and I trust may be frequently seen, in the\nconduct towards their dependents, both of manufacturers and landed\nproprietors.\n\nI must also say how much I owe to the excellent Reports which of late\nyears have been presented to Parliament on subjects connected with the\nwelfare of the labouring classes.  It is to be regretted that these\nreports are not better known.  I have made frequent use of them, and hope\nthat the quotations I have given may induce my readers to turn to the\noriginal sources.\n\nWith regard to the subject generally, it appears to me that knowledge of\nthe duties of an employer is every day becoming more important.  The\ntendency of modern society is to draw the family circle within narrower\nand narrower limits.  Those amusements which used to be shared by all\nclasses are becoming less frequent: the great lord has put away his crowd\nof retainers: the farmer, in most cases, does not live with his labouring\nmen: and the master has less sympathy and social intercourse with his\ndomestics.  If this be so, if the family circle is thus becoming\nnarrower, the conduct of those in domestic authority, having a more\nintense influence, has the more need of being regulated by the highest\nsense of duty: and, with respect to society in general, if the old bonds\nare loosened, other ties must be fostered in their place.\n\nYou will not be likely to mistake my meaning, and to suppose that I look\nback with any fond regret at the departure of the feudal system, or that\nI should wish to bring the present generation under its influence.\nMankind does not so retrace its steps.  But still, though the course of\nour race is onwards, the nature of man does not change.  There is the\nsame need for protection and countenance on the one side, and for\nreverence and attachment on the other, that there ever has been; and the\nfact that society is in many respects more disconnected than it used to\nbe, renders it the more necessary to cultivate in the most watchful\nmanner every mode of strengthening the social intercourse between rich\nand poor, between master and servant, between the employers and the\nemployed, in whatever rank they may be.\n\nI am afraid it may be said with justice, that both this letter and the\nfollowing Essay are \"sermoni propiora,\" according to Charles Lamb's\ntranslation, \"properer for a sermon:\" but it is impossible to dwell long\non any such subject as the one which I have chosen, without having to\nappeal to the best motives of human endeavour; and the shortest way even\nto the good which is of a purely physical character lies often, I\nbelieve, through the highest moral considerations.\n\n                                                               Believe me,\n                                                           My dear Taylor,\n                                                         Most truly yours,\n                                                               THE AUTHOR.\n\nLondon, July 1, 1844.\n\n\n\n\nTHE CLAIMS OF LABOUR.\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\nMASTERS AND MEN.\n\n\nIt is a thing so common, as almost to be ridiculous, for a man to express\nself-distrust at the commencement of any attempt in speech or writing.\nAnd yet, trite as this mode of beginning is, its appropriateness makes\neach one use it as heartily as if it were new and true for him, though it\nmight have been a common-place for others.  When he glances hurriedly\nacross the wide extent of his subject, when he feels how inadequate his\nexpression will be even to his conception, and, at the same time, has a\nyearning desire to bring his audience into the same mind with himself, it\nis no wonder if he begins with a few, hesitating, oft repeated, words\nabout his own insufficiency compared with the greatness of his subject.\n\nHappily, I have not occasion to dwell much upon the importance of the\nsubject to which I am anxious to engage attention.  For a long time it\nhas been gradually emerging from the darkness in which it had been left.\nThe claims of labour and the rights of the humble and the poor have\nnecessarily gained more of the attention of mankind, as Christianity has\ndeveloped itself.  That power was sure, in its gradual encroachments upon\nthe evil nature of man, to make its voice heard in this matter.  It is a\nvoice which may come out of strange bodies, such as systems of ethics, or\nof politics; but men may call it what they please, it goes on doing its\nappointed work, \"conquering and to conquer.\"\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nPersons of a thoughtful mind seeing closely the falsehood, the folly, and\nthe arrogance, of the age in which they live, are apt, occasionally, to\nhave a great contempt for it: and I doubt not that many a man looks upon\nthe present time as one of feebleness and degeneracy.  There are,\nhowever, signs of an increased solicitude for the claims of labour, which\nof itself is a thing of the highest promise, and more to be rejoiced over\nthan all the mechanical triumphs which both those who would magnify, and\nthose who would depreciate, the present age, would be apt to point to as\ncontaining its especial significance and merit.\n\nBut what do all these mechanical triumphs come to?  It is in vain that\nyou have learned to move with double or treble the velocity of your\nimmediate predecessors: it is in vain that you can show new modes of\nluxury, or new resources in art.  The inquiring historian will give these\nthings their weight, but will, nevertheless, persevere in asking how the\ngreat mass of the people were fed, and clothed, and taught: and whether\nthe improvement in their condition corresponded at all with the\nimprovement of the condition of the middle and upper classes.  What a\nsorry answer any one, replying for this age, would have to give him.  Nor\nwould it be enough, indeed, if we could make a satisfactory reply to his\nquestions about the physical state of the people.  We ought to be able to\nsay that the different orders of society were bound together by links of\ngratitude and regard: that they were not like layers of various coloured\nsand, but that they formed one solid whole of masonry, each part having\nits relation of use and beauty to all the others.\n\nCertainly, if we look at the matter, we have not much to say for\nourselves, unless it be in that dawning of good intentions which I have\nalluded to before.  There is to be found in our metropolis, in our great\ntowns, and even in our rural districts, an extent of squalid misery such\nas we are almost afraid to give heed to, and which we are glad to forget\nas soon as we have read or heard of it.  It may be that our ancestors\nendured, it may be that many savage tribes still endure, far more\nprivation than is to be found in the sufferings of our lowest class.  But\nthe mind refuses to consider the two states as analogous, and insists\nupon thinking that the state of physical and moral degradation often\nfound amongst our working classes, with the arabesque of splendour and\nluxury which surrounds it, is a more shocking thing to contemplate than a\npressing scarcity of provisions endured by a wandering horde of savage\nmen sunk in equal barbarism.  When we follow men home, who have been\ncooperating with other civilized men in continuous labour throughout the\nlivelong day, we should not, without experience, expect to find their\nhomes dreary, comfortless, deformed with filth, such homes as poverty\nalone could not make.  Still less, when we gaze upon some pleasant\nlooking village, fair enough in outward seeming for poets' songs to\ncelebrate, should we expect to find scarcity of fuel, scantiness of food,\nprevalence of fever, the healthy huddled together with the sick, decency\noutraged, and self-respect all gone.  And yet such sights, both in town\nand country, if not of habitual occurrence, are at any rate sadly too\nnumerous for us to pass them by as rare and exceptional cases.\n\nIs this then the inevitable nature of things?  Has the boasted\ncivilization of the world led only to this?  Do we master the powers of\nnature only to let forth a new and fierce torrent of social miseries upon\nus?  Let not such thoughts be ours.  Pagans, the slaves of destiny, might\nwell have held them.  But we cannot doubt that the conditions of labour,\nunder which man holds the earth, express the mercy and the goodness, no\nless than the judgment, of God.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nMany benevolent persons feel, doubtless, very sensitively for the sad\ncondition of the labouring classes, and are anxiously looking about for\nremedies to meet it.  I would not speak slightingly of any attempt in\nthat direction.  There are problems in political economy, in government,\nand, perhaps, even in the adaptation of machinery, which may be worked\nout with signal service to the great cause of suffering humanity.  It is\nnot my intention, however, to dwell upon such topics.  My object is to\nshow what can be done with the means that are at the present moment in\nevery body's power.  Many a man, who is looking about for some specific,\nhas in his hands the immediate means of doing great good, which he would\nbe ready enough to employ, if he had but imagination to perceive that he\npossessed them.  My endeavour then will simply be to show what can be\ndone by the employers of labour in their individual and private capacity.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nWhat an important relation is that of Master and Man!  How it pervades\nthe world; ascending from the lowest gradation of planter and slave\nthrough the states of master and servant, landlord and labourer,\nmanufacturer and artisan, till it comes to the higher degrees of rule\nwhich one cultivated man has to exercise over another in the performance\nof the greatest functions.  See, throughout, what difficulties and\ntemptations encumber this relation.  How boundless is the field of\nthought which it opens to us, how infinite the duties which it contains,\nhow complete an exercise it is for the whole faculties of man.  Observe\nwhat wretchedness is caused by a misunderstanding of this relation in\ndomestic matters.  See the selfish carelessness about the happiness of\nthose around them of men not ill-intentioned, nor unkind, perhaps, in\ntheir dealings with the world in general, but lamentably unfit for the\nmanagement of a home.  Then observe the effects of similar mismanagement\nin dealing with a country.  Look at the listless loiterers about an Irish\ntown: you would naturally say to yourself, \"Surely this people have done\nall that there can be for them to do.\"  You walk out of the town, and\nfind the adjacent fields as listless-looking, and neglected, as the men\nthemselves.  Think what a want there must be of masters of labour, that\nthose hands and these weeds are not brought into closer contact.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIt may be said that the distressed condition of the labouring classes is\nowing to temporary causes, and that good times, by which is meant good\nwages, would remove a large part of the evil.  I confess it does not\nappear to me that a good harvest or two, or ready customers on the other\nside of the Atlantic, or the home demand that may arise from exhausted\nstocks, or any other cause of that nature which is simply to end in\nbetter wages, would of itself do all, or even any considerable part, of\nwhat we should desire.  I do not, for a moment, mean to depreciate the\ngood effects that would flow from an increase of employment and better\nwages.  But still I imagine that there are many cases in which, if you\nwere, in ordinary times, to double the amount of wages, a very inadequate\nproportion of good would follow.  You have to teach these poor people how\nto spend money: you have to give them the opportunities of doing so to\nadvantage: you have to provide a system of education which shall not vary\nwith every fluctuation of trade: and to adopt such methods of working as\nshall make the least possible disturbance of domestic ties.  No sudden\ninflux of money will do all these things.  In fact, whatever part of this\nsubject one takes up, one is perpetually brought back to the conviction\nof the necessity which exists for an earnest and practical application,\non the part of the employing class, of thought and labour for the welfare\nof those whom they employ.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nSome of my readers may think that I have spoken of the distress of the\nlabouring population in exaggerated terms.  Let them only read the\ndetails of it in the Report of 1842, on the Sanitary Condition of the\nlabouring population, or in the Report of last year, on the condition of\nthe children and young persons employed in mines and manufactures.  I\nscarcely know what extracts to give of these direful reports, that may\nbriefly convey the state of things to those who have not studied the\nsubject.  Shall I tell them of children ignorant who Jesus Christ was; or\nof others who know no more of the Lord's Prayer than the first words,\n\"Our Father:\" and whose nightly prayers begin and end with those two\nwords?  Shall I tell them of great towns in which one half at least of\nthe juvenile population is growing up without education of any kind\nwhatever?  Shall I show that working people are often permitted to pass\ntheir labour time, the half of their lives, in mines, workshops, and\nmanufactories, where an atmosphere of a deleterious kind prevails: and\nthis, too, not from any invincible evil in the nature of the employment,\nbut from a careless or penurious neglect on the part of their employers?\nShall I go into a lengthened description of the habitations of the poor\nwhich will show that they are often worse housed than beasts of burden?\nOr need I depict at large the dark stream of profligacy which overflows\nand burns into those parts of the land where such Want and Ignorance\nprevail?\n\nHow many of these evils might have been mitigated, if not fully removed,\nhad each generation of masters done but a small part of its duty in the\nway of amelioration.  But it was not of such things that they were\nthinking.  The thoughtless cruelty in the world almost outweighs the\nrest.\n\n\"Why vex me with these things?\" exclaims the general reader.  \"Have we\nnot enough of dismal stories?  It oppresses us to hear them.  Let us hope\nthat something will occur to prevent such things in future.  But I am not\na redresser of grievances.  Let those who live by the manufacturing\nsystem cure the evils incident to it.  Oh that there had never been such\na thing as a manufacturing system!\"  With thoughts vague, recriminatory,\nand despondent, as the foregoing, does many a man push from him all\nconsideration on the subject.  It is so easy to despair: and the\nlargeness of a calamity is so ready a shelter for those who have not\nheart enough to adventure any opposition to it.\n\nThus, by dwelling upon the magnitude of the evils we long to lessen, we\nare frightened and soothed into letting our benevolent wishes remain as\nwishes only.  But surely a man may find a sphere small enough, as well as\nlarge enough, for him to act in.  In all other pursuits, we are obliged\nto limit the number and extent of our objects, in order to give full\neffect to our endeavours: and so it should be with benevolence.  The\nfoolish sluggard stares hopelessly into the intricacies of the forest,\nand thinks that it can never be reclaimed.  The wiser man, the labourer,\nbegins at his corner of the wood, and makes out a task for himself for\neach day.  Let not our imaginations be employed on one side only.  Think,\nthat large as may appear the work to be done--so too the result of any\nendeavour, however small in itself, may be of infinite extent in the\nfuture.  Nothing is lost.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nAnd why should we despair?  A great nation is never in extreme peril\nuntil it has lost its hopeful spirit.  If, at this moment, a foreign\nenemy were on the point of invading us, how strenuous we should be: what\nmoral energy would instantly pervade us.  Faster than the beacon lights\ncould give the intelligence from headland to headland; from city to city\nwould spread the national enthusiasm of a people that would never admit\nthe thought of being conquered.  Trust me, these domestic evils are foes\nnot less worthy of our attention than any foreign invaders.  It seems to\nme, I must confess, a thing far more to be dreaded, that any considerable\npart of our population should be growing up in a state of absolute\nignorance, than would be the danger, not new to us, of the combined\nhostility of the civilized world.  Our trials, as a nation, like our\nindividual ones, are perpetually varied as the world progresses.\n\n    \"The old order changeth, yielding place to new,\n    And God fulfils himself in many ways.\"\n\nWe have not the same evils to contend with as our ancestors had; but we\nneed the same stoutness of heart that bore them through the contest.  The\nsudden growth of things, excellent in themselves, entangles the feet of\nthat generation amongst whom they spring up.  There may be something,\ntoo, in the progress of human affairs like the coming in of the tide,\nwhich, for each succeeding wave; often seems as much of a retreat as an\nadvance: but still the tide comes on.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThe settled state of things attendant upon peace, and an unquestioned\ndynasty, is good, as it enables men to look more to civil affairs; but it\nhas, perhaps, a drawback in a certain apathy which is wont to accompany\nit.  The ordinary arrangements of social life, for a long time\nuninterrupted by any large calamity, appear to become hardened into\ncertainties.  A similar course of argument would, on a large scale, apply\nnot only to this country, but to the world in general.  Security is the\nchief end of civilization, and as it progresses, the fortunes of\nindividuals are, upon the whole, made less liable to derangement.  This\nvery security may tend to make men careless of the welfare of others,\nand, as Bacon would express it, may be noted as an impediment to\nbenevolence.  I have often thought, whether in former times, when men\nlooked to those immediately around them as their body guard against\nsudden and violent attacks, they ventured to show as much ill-temper to\nthose they lived with as you sometimes see them do now, when assistance\nof all kinds is a purchasable commodity.  Considerations of this nature\nare particularly applicable when addressed to persons living in a great\ncapital like London.  All things that concern the nation, its joys, its\nsorrows, and its successes, are transacted in this metropolis; or, as one\nmight more properly say, are represented in transactions in this\nmetropolis.  But still this often happens in such a manner as would be\nimperceptible even to people of vast experience and observation.  The\ncountless impulses which travel up from various directions to this\nabsorbing centre sometimes neutralize each other, and leave a comparative\ncalm; or they create so complex an agitation, that it may be next to\nimpossible for us to discern and estimate the component forces.  Hence\nthe metropolis may not at times be sufficiently susceptible in the case\neither of manufacturing or agricultural distress, or of any colonial\nperturbation.  This metropolitan insensibility has some great advantages,\nbut it is well for us to observe the corresponding evil, and, as far as\nmay be, to guard our own hearts from being rendered apathetic by its\ninfluence.\n\nI do not seek to terrify any one into a care for the labouring classes,\nby representing the danger to society of neglecting them.  It is\ncertainly a fearful thing to think of large masses of men being in that\nstate of want and misery which leaves them nothing to hazard; and who are\nlikely to be without the slightest reverence or love for the institutions\naround them.  Still it is not to any fear, grounded on such\nconsiderations, that I would appeal.  The flood-gates may be strong\nenough to keep out the torrent for our time.  These things are not in our\nreckonings.  Occasionally the upheaving of the waves may frighten timid,\nselfish, men into concessions which they would not otherwise have made;\nbut those whom I would seek to influence, are likely to court danger and\ndifficulty rather than to shun it.  Nor would I even care to disturb the\npurely selfish man by dwelling studiously on any social dangers around\nus, or labouring to discern in present disturbance or distress the seeds\nof inevitable revolution.  No, I would say to him, if it all ends here,\n\n    \"But here, upon this bank and shoal of time,\"\n\nyou may have chosen wisely.  It is true, there are sources of happiness\nwhich you now know nothing of, and which may be far beyond any selfish\ngratification you have ever experienced.  Indeed, it may be, that you\ncannot enjoy the highest delights without sharing them, that they are not\nthings to be given out to each of us as individuals, now to this man,\nthen to that, but that they require a community of love.  But, at any\nrate, I do not wish to scare you into active and useful exertion by\nindicating that you are, otherwise, in danger of losing any of the good\nthings of this world.\n\nThe great motive to appeal to, is not a man's apprehension of personal\nloss or suffering, but his fear of neglecting a sacred duty.  And it will\nbe found here, I believe, as elsewhere, that the highest motives are\nthose of the most sustained efficiency.\n\nBut little as I would counsel despair, or encourage apathy, or seek to\ninfluence by terror, it is not that I look to the \"course of events,\" or\nany other rounded collection of words, to do anything for us.  What is\nthis \"course of events\" but the continuity of human endeavour?  And\ngiving all due weight to the influence of those general currents which\nattend the progress of opinions and institutions, we must still allow\nlargely for the effect of individual character, and individual exertions.\nThe main direction that the stream will take is manifest enough perhaps;\nbut it may come down upon long tracts of level ground which it will\noverspread quietly, or it may enter into some rocky channel which will\ncontrol it; or it may meet with some ineffectual mud embankment which it\nwill overthrow with devastation.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nPutting aside then such phrases as \"course of events,\" and the like, let\nus look to men.  And whom shall we look to first but the Masters of\nThought?  Surely the true poet will do something to lift the burden of\nhis own age.  What is the use of wondrous gifts of language, if they are\nemployed to enervate, and not to ennoble, their hearers?  What avails it\nto trim the lights of history, if they are made to throw no brightness on\nthe present, or open no track into the future?  And to employ Imagination\nonly in the service of Vanity, or Gain, is as if an astronomer were to\nuse his telescope to magnify the potherbs in his kitchen garden.\n\nThink what a glorious power is that of expression: and what\nresponsibility follows the man who possesses it.  That grace of language\nwhich can make even commonplace things beautiful, throwing robes of the\npoorest texture into forms of all-attractive loveliness: why does it not\nexpend its genius on materials that would be worthy of the artist?  The\ngreat interests of Man are before it, are crying for it, can absorb all\nits endeavour, are, indeed, the noblest field for it.  Think of\nthis--then think what a waste of high intellectual endowments there has\nbeen in all ages from the meanest of motives.  But what wise man would\nnot rather have the harmless fame, which youths, on a holiday, scratch\nfor themselves upon the leaden roof of some cathedral tower, than enjoy\nthe undeniable renown of those who, with whatever power, have written\nfrom slight or unworthy motives what may prove a hindrance, rather than\nan aid, to the well-being of their fellow-men?\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nBut, passing from those who are often the real, though unrecognized,\nrulers of their own age, and the despots of the succeeding generation,\nlet us turn to the ostensible and immediate ruling powers.  Assuredly the\ngovernment may do something towards removing part of the evils we have\nbeen considering as connected with the system of labour.  It seems as if\nthere were a want of more departments; and certainly of many more able\nmen.  The progress of any social improvement appears to depend too much\non chance and clamour.  I do not suppose, for a moment, that we can have\nthe cut-and-dried executive, or legislative, arrangements that belong to\ndespotic governments; and it is, in some respects, a wholesome fear that\nwe have of the interference of government.  Still, we may recollect that\nEngland is not a small state, nor an inactive one, where the public\nenergies are likely to be deadened, or overridden, by activity on the\npart of the government, which might, perhaps, with much safety undertake\nmore than it has been wont to do.  One thing is certain, that it may do\ngreat good, if it would but look out for men of ability to fill the\noffices at present in its gift.  No government need fear such a course as\ndestructive to its party interests.  In appointing and promoting the\nfittest men, you are likely to ensure more gratitude than if you selected\nthose, who being the creatures of your kindness, could never, you\nimagine, be otherwise than most grateful for it.  Weak people are seldom\nmuch given to gratitude: and even if they were, it is dearly that you\npurchase their allegiance; for there are few things which, on the long\nrun, displease the public more than bad appointments.  But, putting aside\nthe political expediency either way, it is really a sacred duty in a\nstatesman to choose fit agents.  Observe the whirlpool of folly that a\nweak man contrives to create round him: and see, on the other hand, with\nwhat small means, a wise man manages to have influence and respect, and\nforce, in whatever may be his sphere.\n\nI have thought, for example, with regard to the Suppression of the Slave\nTrade, that amongst all the devices that can be suggested, one of the\nfirst things would be to tempt very superior men, by large inducements,\nto take the judicial situations in the Mixed Commissions, or any other\nappointments, in slave-trading parts of the world.  We may expect great\nresults whenever real ability is brought into personal contact with the\nevils we wish it to overcome.\n\nThere is a matter connected with the functions of government which seems\nto be worthy of notice; and that is, the distribution of honours.  These\nhonours are part of the resources of the state; and it is a most\nspendthrift thing to bestow them as they frequently are bestowed.  It is\nnot merely that government gives them unworthily: it absolutely plays\nwith them; gives them, as one might say, for the drollery of the thing,\nwhen it adds a title to some foolish person, whose merits not even the\nPublic Orator at a university could discover.  It is idle to talk of such\nthings being customary.  A great minister would not recommend his\nsovereign to confer honours on such people; and sensible men would be\nglad to see that the resources of the state, in all ways, were dealt with\nconsiderately.\n\nThe above reflections are not foreign to the main subject of this essay;\nfor a government, having at heart the improvement of the labouring\npopulation, or any other social matter, might direct the stream of\nhonours towards those who were of service to the state in this matter,\nand so might make the civic crown what it was in ancient days.  Not,\nhowever, that I mean to say that the best men are to be swayed by these\nbaubles.  The hope of reward is not the source of the highest endeavour.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThere is a class of persons who interest themselves so far in the\ncondition of the labouring population, as to bring forward sad instances\nof suffering, and then to say, \"Our rich men should look to these\nthings.\"  This kind of benevolence delights to bring together, in\nstartling contrast, the condition of different classes, and then to\nindulge in much moral reflection.  Now riches are very potent in their\nway; but a great heart is often more wanted than a full purse.  I speak\nit not in any disparagement of the rich or great, when I say that we must\nnot trust to them alone.  Amongst them are many who use their riches as\nGod's stewards; but the evils which we have to contend against are to be\nmet by a general impulse in the right direction of people of all classes.\nThere are instances where a man's wealth enables him to set forth more\ndistinctly to the world's eye some work of benevolence, even to be the\npioneer in improvements, which persons of smaller fortunes could scarcely\nhave effected.  In such a case great indeed is the advantage of riches.\nBut do not let us accustom our minds to throw the burden of good works on\nthe shoulders of any particular class.  God has not given a monopoly of\nbenevolence to the rich.\n\nWhat I have just said about individual rich men, applies in some measure\nto associations for benevolent purposes.  They are to be looked upon as\naccessories--sometimes very useful ones--but they are not to be expected\nto supersede private enterprise.  A man should neither wait for them;\nnor, when they exist, should he try to throw his duties upon them, and\nindolently expect that they are to think and act in all cases for him.\nWherever a strong feeling on any subject exists, societies will naturally\nspring up in connexion with it.  What such bodies have to do, is to\ndirect their energies to those parts of the matter in which it is\nespecially difficult for private enterprise to succeed.  And private\nindividuals should be cautious of slackening their endeavours in any good\ncause, merely because they are aware that some society exists which has\nthe same object in view.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nI come now to some member of that large class of persons who are not\nrich, nor great employers of labour, nor in any station of peculiar\ninfluence.  He shudders as he reads those startling instances of\nsuffering or crime in which the distress and ignorance of the labouring\npopulation will, occasionally, break out into the notice of the world.\n\"What can I do?\" he exclaims.  \"I feel with intensity the horrors I read\nof: but what can one man do?\"  I only ask him to study what he feels.  He\nis a citizen.  He cannot be such an isolated being as to have no\ninfluence.  The conclusions which he comes to, after mature reflection,\nwill not be without their weight.  If individual citizens were anxious to\nform their opinions with care, on those questions respecting which they\nwill have to vote and to act, there would be little need of organized\nbodies of men to carry great measures into effect.  The main current of\npublic opinion is made up of innumerable rills, so small, perhaps, that a\nchild might with its foot divert the course of any one of them: but\ncollected together they rush down with a force that is irresistible.  If\nthose who have actively to distribute the labour of the world knew that\nyou, the great mass of private men, regarded them not for their money,\nbut for their conduct to those in their employ, not for the portion which\nthey may contrive to get for themselves, but for the well-being which\nthey may give rise to, and regulate amongst others; why then your\nthoughts would be motives to them, urging them on in the right path.\nBesides, you would not stop at thinking.  The man who gives time and\nthought to the welfare of others will seldom be found to grudge them\nanything else.\n\nAgain, have not you, though not manufacturers, or master-workmen, or\nowners of land, have not you dependents, in whose behalf you may find\nexercise for the principles to which I am convinced that study in this\nmatter will lead you?  Your regard for servants is a case in point.  And,\nmoreover, you may show in your ordinary, every day, dealings with the\nemployers of labour a considerateness for those under them, which may\nawaken the employers to a more lively care themselves.  Only reflect on\nthe duty: opportunities of testing the strength of your resolves will not\nbe wanting.\n\nWe sometimes feel thoroughly impressed by some good thought, or just\nexample, that we meet with in study or real life, but as if we had no\nmeans of applying it.  We cannot at once shape for ourselves a course\nthat shall embrace this newly acquired wisdom.  Often it seems too grand\nfor the occasions of ordinary life; and we fear that we must keep it laid\nup for some eventful day, as nice housewives their stateliest furniture.\nHowever, if we keep it close to the heart, and make but the least\nbeginning with it, our infant practice leads to something better, or\ngrows into something ampler.  In real life there are no isolated points.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nYou, who have but few dependents, or, perhaps, but one drudge dependent\nupon you, whether as servant, apprentice, or hired labourer, do not think\nthat you have not an ample opportunity for exercising the duties of an\nemployer of labour.  Do not suppose that these duties belong to the great\nmanufacturer with the population of a small town in his own factory, or\nto the landlord with vast territorial possessions, and that you have\nnothing to do with them.  The Searcher of all hearts may make as ample a\ntrial of you in your conduct to one poor dependent, as of the man who is\nappointed to lead armies and administer provinces.  Nay, your treatment\nof some animal entrusted to your care may be a history as significant for\nyou, as the chronicles of kings for them.  The moral experiments in the\nworld may be tried with the smallest quantities.\n\nI cannot quit this part of the subject without alluding more directly to\nthe duties of the employers of domestic servants.  Of course the\nprinciples which should regulate the conduct of masters and mistresses\ntowards their servants, are the same as those which should regulate the\nemployers of labour generally.  But there are some peculiar circumstances\nwhich need to be noticed in the application of these principles.  That,\nin this case, the employers and the employed are members of one family,\nis a circumstance which intensifies the relation.  It is a sad thing for\na man to pass the working part of his day with an exacting, unkind,\nmaster: but still, if the workman returns at evening to a home that is\nhis own, there is a sense of coming joy and freedom which may support him\nthroughout the weary hours of labour.  But think what it must be to share\none's home with one's oppressor; to have no recurring time when one is\ncertain to be free from those harsh words, and unjust censures, which are\nalmost more than blows, aye even to those natures we are apt to fancy so\nhardened to rebuke.  Imagine the deadness of heart that must prevail in\nthat poor wretch who never hears the sweet words of praise or of\nencouragement.  Many masters of families, men living in the rapid current\nof the world, who are subject to a variety of impressions which, in their\nbusy minds, are made and effaced even in the course of a single day, can\nwith difficulty estimate the force of unkind words upon those whose\nmonotonous life leaves few opportunities of effacing any unwelcome\nimpression.  There is nothing in which the aid of imagination, that\nhandmaid of charity, may be more advantageously employed, than in\nconsidering the condition of domestic servants.  Let a man endeavour to\nrealize it to himself, let him think of its narrow sphere, of its\nunvarying nature, and he will be careful not to throw in, unnecessarily,\nthe trouble even of a single harsh word, which may make so large a\ndisturbance in the shallow current of a domestic's hopes and joys.  How\noften, on the contrary, do you find that masters seem to have no\napprehension of the feelings of those under them, no idea of any duties\non their side beyond \"cash payment,\" whereas the good, old, patriarchal\nfeeling towards your household is one which the mere introduction of\nmoney wages has not by any means superseded, and which cannot, in fact,\nbe superseded.  You would bear with lenity from a child many things, for\nwhich, in a servant, you can find nothing but the harshest names.  Yet\nhow often are these poor, uneducated, creatures little better than\nchildren!  You talk, too, of ingratitude from them, when, if you\nreflected a little, you would see that they do not understand your\nbenefits.  It is hard enough sometimes to make benefits sink into men's\nhearts, even when your good offices are illustrated by much kindness of\nwords and manner; but to expect that servants should at once appreciate\nyour care for them is surely most unreasonable, especially if it is not\naccompanied by a manifest regard and sympathy.  You would not expect it,\nif you saw the child-like relation in which they stand to you.\n\nAnother mode of viewing with charity the conduct of domestic servants, is\nto imagine what manner of servant you would make yourself, or any one of\nthose whom in your own rank you esteem and love.  Do you not perceive, in\nalmost every character, some element which would occasionally make its\npossessor fail in performing the duties of domestic service?  Do you find\nthat faithfulness, accuracy, diligence, and truth pervade the circle of\nyour equals in such abundance that you should be exorbitantly angry, the\nmoment you perceive a deficiency in such qualities amongst those who have\nbeen but indifferently brought up, and who, perhaps, have early imbibed\nthose vices of their class, fear and falsehood; vices which their\nemployers can only hope to eradicate by a long course of considerate\nkindness?\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nI do not speak of the conduct of masters and mistresses as an easy\nmatter: on the contrary, I believe that it is one of the most difficult\nfunctions in life.  If, however, men only saw the difficulty, they would\nsee the worthiness of trying to overcome it.  You observe a man becoming\nday by day richer, or advancing in station, or increasing in professional\nreputation, and you set him down as a successful man in life.  But, if\nhis home is an ill-regulated one, where no links of affection extend\nthroughout the family, whose former domestics (and he has had more of\nthem than he can well remember) look back upon their sojourn with him as\none unblessed by kind words or deeds, I contend that that man has not\nbeen successful.  Whatever good fortune he may have in the world, it is\nto be remembered that he has always left one important fortress untaken\nbehind him.  That man's life does not surely read well whose benevolence\nhas found no central home.  It may have sent forth rays in various\ndirections, but there should have been a warm focus of love--that home\nnest which is formed round a good man's heart.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nHaving spoken of some of the duties of private persons, we come now to\nthe great employers of labour.  Would that they all saw the greatness of\ntheir position.  Strange as it may sound, they are the successors of the\nfeudal barons, they it is who lead thousands to peaceful conquests, and\nupon whom, in great measure, depends the happiness of large masses of\nmankind.  As Mr. Carlyle says, \"The Leaders of Industry, if Industry is\never to be led, are virtually the Captains of the World; if there be no\nnobleness in them, there will never be an Aristocracy more.\"  Can a man,\nwho has this destiny entrusted to him, imagine that his vocation consists\nmerely in getting together a large lump of gold, and then being off with\nit, to enjoy it, as he fancies, in some other place: as if that which is\nbut a small part of his business in life, were all in all to him; as if\nindeed, the parable of the talents were to be taken literally, and that a\nman should think that he has done his part when he has made much gold and\nsilver out of little?  If these men saw their position rightly, what\nwould be their objects, what their pleasures?  Their objects would not\nconsist in foolish vyings with each other about the grandeur or the\nglitter of life.  But in directing the employment of labour, they would\nfind room for the exercise of all the powers of their minds, of their\nbest affections, and of whatever was worthy in their ambition.  Their\noccupation, so far from being a limited sphere of action, is one which\nmay give scope to minds of the most various capacity.  While one man may\nundertake those obvious labours of benevolent superintendence which are\nof immediate and pressing necessity, another may devote himself to more\nremote and indirect methods of improving the condition of those about\nhim, which are often not the less valuable because of their indirectness.\nIn short, it is evident that to lead the labour of large masses of\npeople, and to do that, not merely with a view to the greatest product of\ncommodities, but to the best interests of the producers, is a matter\nwhich will sufficiently and worthily occupy men of the strongest minds\naided by all the attainments which cultivation can bestow.\n\nI do not wish to assert a principle larger than the occasion demands: and\nI am, therefore unwilling to declare that we cannot justly enter into a\nrelation so meagre with our fellow-creatures, as that of employing all\ntheir labour, and giving them nothing but money in return.  There might,\nperhaps, be a state of society in which such a relation would not be\nculpable, a state in which the great mass of the employed were cultivated\nand considerate men; and where the common interests of master and man\nwere well understood.  But we have not to deal with any such imaginary\ncase.  So far from working men being the considerate creatures we have\njust imagined them, it is absolutely requisite to protect, in the most\nstringent manner, the interests of the children against the parents, who\nare often anxious to employ their little ones most immaturely.  Nay\nmore--it is notorious that working men will frequently omit to take even\nthe slightest precaution in matters connected with the preservation of\ntheir own lives.  If these poor men do not demand from you as Christians\nsomething more than mere money wages, what do the injunctions about\ncharity mean?  If those employed by you are not your neighbours, who are?\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nBut, some great employer may exclaim: \"It is hard that we the agents\nbetween the consumer and the producer should have all the sacrifices to\nmake, should have all the labouring population thrown, as it were, on our\nhands.\"  In reply, I say that I have laid down no such doctrine.  I have\nurged the consumer to perform his duties, and tried to point out to him\nwhat some of those duties are.  As a citizen, he may employ himself in\nunderstanding this subject, and in directing others rightly; he may, in\nhis capacity of voter, or in his fair influence on voters, urge upon the\nstate its duty, and show, that as an individual, he would gladly bear his\nshare of any increased burdens which that duty might entail upon the\nstate.  He may prove in many ways, as a mere purchaser, his concern for\nthe interests of the producer.  And there are, doubtless, occasions on\nwhich you, the great employers of labour, may call upon him to make large\nsacrifices of his money, his time, and his thoughts, for the welfare of\nthe labouring classes.  His example and his encouragement may cheer you\non; and as a citizen, as an instructor, as a neighbour, in all the\ncapacities of life, he may act and speak in a way that may indirectly, if\nnot directly, support your more manifest endeavours in the same good\ncause.  It is to no one class that I speak.  We are all bound to do\nsomething towards this good work.  If, hereafter, I go more into detail\nas regards the especial methods of improving his work-people that a\nmanufacturer might employ, it is not that I wish to point out\nmanufacturers as a class especially deficient in right feelings towards\nthose under them.  Far from it.  Much of what I shall venture to suggest\nhas been learnt from what I have seen and heard, amongst the\nmanufacturers themselves.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\nSOCIAL GOVERNMENT.\n\n\nSupposing, reader, that whether you are manufacturer, master-workman,\nowner of land, or private individual, you are now thoroughly impressed\nwith the duty of attending to the welfare of your dependants; I proceed\nto make some general reflections which may aid you in your outset, or\nsustain you in the progress, of your endeavours.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nAnd, first, let me implore you not to delay that outset.  Make a\nbeginning at once, at least in investigating the matters to which I have\nstriven to draw your attention.  It is no curious work of art that you\nhave to take up; it requires no nicety of apprehension; you can hardly\nbegin wrongly, I do not say in action, but in the preparation for action.\nHowever little of each day you may be able to call your own for this\npurpose, it is better to begin with that little than to wait for some\nsignal time of leisure.  Routine encumbers us; our days are frittered\naway by most minute employments that we cannot control; and, when spare\nmoments do occur, we are mostly unprepared with any pursuits of our own\nto go on with.  Hence it is, that the most obvious evils go on,\ngeneration after generation, people not having time, as they would say,\nto interfere.  Men are for ever putting off the concerns which should be\ndearest to them to a \"more convenient season,\" when, as they hope, there\nmay be fewer trifles to distract their attention: but a great work, which\nis to commence in the heart, requires not to have the first stone laid\nfor it, with pomp, upon some holiday.  It. is good to have made a\nbeginning upon it at any time.\n\nThe wisdom, or the folly, of delay is in most instances like that of a\ntraveller coming to a stream, and wishing to ford it, yet continuing his\njourney along its banks: and whether this is wise, or not, depends mainly\non the simple fact, of whether he is walking up to the source, or down to\nthe fall.  The latter is apt to be the direction in the case of our\ngenerous resolves: their difficulty widens as I we delay to act upon\nthem.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThroughout the progress of your work, there is nothing that you will have\nmore frequently to be mindful of than your views with respect to\nself-advancement.  To take one form of it, the acquisition of money.\nMoney, as Charles Lamb, a great despiser of cant, observed, is not dross,\nbut books, pictures, wines, and many pleasant things.  Still I suspect\nthat money is more sought after to gratify vanity, than to possess the\nmeans of enjoying any of the above named pleasant things.  Money is so\nmuch desired, because it is a measure of success; so much regretted,\nbecause we fancy the loss of it leaves us powerless and contemptible.\nThat kind of satire, therefore, which delights to dwell upon the general\nsubserviency to wealth is not likely to make men less desirous of riches.\nBut a man would be likely to estimate more reasonably the possession of\nmoney and of all kinds of self-advancement, if he did but perceive, that\neven a man's worldly success is not to be measured by his success for\nhimself alone, but by the result of his endeavours for the great family\nof man.\n\nThere is a source of contemplation which nature affords us, one, too,\nthat is open to the dweller in crowded cities as well as to the shepherd\non Salisbury plain, and which might sometimes suggest the foolishness of\nan inordinate love of money.  Consider the prospect which each unveiled\nnight affords us, telling of wonders such as we have hardly the units of\nmeasurement to estimate; and then think how strange it is that we should\never allow our petty personal possessions of to-day to render us blind to\nthe duties, which, alone, are the great realities of life.  There was\nsome excuse, perhaps, for the men of olden time, who looked upon this\nearth, the birth-place of their gods, as no mean territory.  That they\nshould dote upon terrestrial things was not to be wondered at.  But what\nis to be said for us who know that this small planet is but a speck, as\nit were, from which we look out upon the profusion of immensity.  To\nthink that a man, who knows this, should nevertheless not hesitate to\nsoil his soul, lying here, cringing there, pursuing tortuous schemes of\nmost corrupt policy; or that he should ever suffer himself to be\nimmersed, innocently, if it may be so, in selfish, worldly pursuits,\nforgetful of all else; when, at the best, it is but to win some acres of\nthis transitory earth, or to be noted as one who has been successful for\nhimself.  The folly of the gambling savage, who stakes his liberty\nagainst a handful of cowrie shells is nothing to it.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nPerhaps the next thing that is likely to divert you from useful\nendeavours for the benefit of others is fear of criticism: you do not\nknow what the world will say: indeed, they may pronounce you an\nenthusiast, which word, of itself, is an icy blast of ridicule to a timid\nmind.  You shudder at doing anything unusual, and even hear by\nanticipation the laugh of your particular friends.  You are especially\nashamed at appearing to care for what those about you do not care for.  A\nlaugh at your humanity, or your \"theories,\" would disconcert you.  You\nare fearfully anxious that any project of benevolence you undertake\nshould succeed, not altogether on its own account, but because your\nsagacity is embarked in it, and plentiful will be the gibes at its\nfailure, if it should fail.  Put these fears aside.  All that is\nprominent, all that acts, must lay itself open to shallow criticism.  It\nhas been said that in no case of old age, however extreme, has the\nfaculty for giving advice been known to decay; depend upon it, that of\ncriticism flourishes in the most indolent, the most feeble, the most\ndoting minds.  Let not the wheels of your endeavour be stayed by\naccumulated rubbish of this kind.  We are afraid of responsibility,\nafraid of what people may say of us, afraid of being alone in doing\nright: in short, the courage which is allied to no passion--Christian\ncourage as it may be called--is in all ages and amongst all people, one\nof the rarest possessions.\n\nThe fear of ridicule is the effeminacy of the soul.\n\nGreat enterprises--and for you this attempt to make your working men\nhappier is a great enterprise--great enterprises demand an habitual\nself-sacrifice in little things: and, hard as it may be to keep fully in\nmind the enterprise itself, it is often harder still to maintain a just\nsense of the connection between it and these said trifling points of\nconduct, which, perhaps, in any single instance, seem so slightly and so\nremotely connected with it.  But remember it is not always over great\nimpediments that men are liable to stumble most fatally.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nYou must not expect immediate and obvious gratitude to crown your\nexertions.  The benevolence that has not duty for its stem, but merely\nsprings from some affectionateness of nature, must often languish, I\nfear, when it comes to count up its returns in the way of grateful\naffection from those whom it has toiled for.  And yet the fault is often\nas much in the impatience and unreasonable expectation of the\nbenefactors, as in any ingratitude on the part of the persons benefited.\nIf you must look for gratitude, at any rate consider whether your\nexertions are likely to be fully understood at present by those whom you\nhave served; and whether it is not a reversion, rather than an immediate\nreturn, that you should look for--a reversion, too, in many cases to be\nrealized only on the death of the benefactor.  Moreover, it is useless\nand unreasonable to expect that any motives of gratitude will uniformly\nmodify for you the peculiar tempers and dispositions of those whom you\nhave served.  Your benefits did not represent a permanent state of mind:\nneither will their gratitude.  The sense of obligation, even in most\nfaithful hearts, is often dormant; but evil tempers answer quickly to the\nlightest summons.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIn all your projects for the good of others, beware lest your benevolence\nshould have too much of a spirit of interference.  Consider what it is\nyou want to produce.  Not an outward, passive, conformity to your wishes,\nbut something vital which shall generate the feelings and habits you long\nto see manifested.  You can clip a tree into any form you please, but if\nyou wish it to bear fruit when it has been barren, you must attend to\nwhat is beneath the surface, you must feed the roots.  You must furnish\nit with that nutriment, you must supply it with those opportunities of\nsunshine, which will enable it to use its own energies.  See how the\ngeneral course of the world is governed.  How slowly are those great\nimprovements matured which our impatient nature might expect to have been\neffected at a single stroke.  What tyrannies have been under the sun,\nthings which we can hardly read of without longing for some direct divine\ninterference to have taken place.  Indeed, if other testimony were\nwanting, the cruelties permitted on earth present an awful idea of the\ngeneral freedom of action entrusted to mankind.  And can you think that\nit is left for you to drill men suddenly into your notions, or to produce\nmoral ends by mere mechanical means?  You will avoid much of this foolish\nspirit if you are really unselfish in your purposes; if, in dealing with\nthose whom you would benefit, you refer your operations to them as the\ncentre, and not to yourself, and the successes of your plans.  There is a\nnoble passage in the history of the first great Douglas, the \"good Lord\nJames,\" who, just before the battle of Bannockburn, seeing Randolph, his\nrival in arms, with a small body of men, contending against a much\nsuperior English force, rushed to his aid.  \"The little body of\nRandolph,\" says Sir Walter Scott, \"was seen emerging like a rock in the\nwaves, from which the English cavalry were retreating on every side with\nbroken ranks, like a repelled tide.  'Hold and halt!' said the Douglas to\nhis followers; 'we are come too late to aid them; let us not lessen the\nvictory they have won by affecting to claim a share in it.'\"  It is the\nself-denying nature of this chivalrous deed that I would apply to far\nother circumstances.  The interfering spirit, which I deprecate, would\ncome, not to consummate the victory, but to hinder it.\n\nFor similar reasons I would have you take care that you do not adopt mere\nrules, and seek to impress them rigidly upon others, as if they were\ngeneral principles, which must at once be suitable to all mankind.  Do\nnot imagine that your individual threads of experience form a woven\ngarment of prudence, capable of fitting with exactness any member of the\nwhole human family.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThere are several ungenerous motives, of some subtlety, which hide in the\ndark corners of the heart, and stand in the way of benevolence.  For\ninstance, even in good minds, there is apt to lurk some tinge of fear, or\nof dislike, at the prospect of an undoubted amelioration of the lot of\nothers coming too fast, as these good people would say.  Indeed, some\npersons find it hard to reconcile themselves to the idea of others'\nburdens being readily removed, even when they themselves are making\nexertions to remove them.\n\nAnother feeling to beware of, is that of envy, which, strange as it\nseems, may sometimes arise upon the view of that very prosperity, which\nthe person, feeling envy, has helped to create.  The truth is, it is\ncomparatively easy to avoid being envious of the good fortune which was\nestablished before our time, or which is out of our own sphere: but to be\nquite pleased with the good fortune of those whom we recollect in other\ncircumstances, and who, perhaps, have been accustomed to ask advice or\nassistance from us--that is the trial.\n\nAnother ungenerous sentiment, similar to the foregoing, and likely at\ntimes to prove a hindrance to benevolent exertion, arises from the\ncomparison of our own past lot with that of the persons whose condition\nis sought to be improved.  Most of us have a little tendency to grudge\nthem this amelioration.  We should shudder at the brutality of one, who,\nhaving attained to power, is more cruel because he has suffered much\nhimself, (\"_eo immitior quia toleraverat_\"); but are we not of a like\nspirit, if any dissatisfaction steals over our minds at seeing others\nexempt from those sufferings, which in our own career fell heavily upon\nus.  It is difficult to dislodge this kind of selfishness from the heart.\nIndeed, there can hardly be a surer symptom of sound benevolence in a\nman, than his taking pleasure in those paths being smoothened which he\nwill never have to traverse again: I do not say in making them\nsmoother--it is much easier to reconcile himself to that--but in their\nbeing made so without his interference.\n\nIt would be well, indeed, if selfishness came into play on those\noccasions only where self is really concerned.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThere is nothing which a wise employer will have more at heart than to\ngain the confidence of those under him.  The essential requisites on his\npart are truth and kindness.  These qualities may, however, belong in a\nhigh degree to persons who fail to gain the confidence of their\ndependents.  In domestic life, confidence may be prevented by fits of\ncapricious passion on the part of the ruling powers; and a man who, in\nall important matters, acts justly and kindly towards his family, may be\ndeprived of their confidence by his weakness of temper in little things.\nFor instance, you meet with persons who fall into a violent way of\ntalking about all that offends them in their dependents; and who express\nthemselves with as much anger about trivial inadvertencies as about\nserious moral offences.  In the course of the same day that they have\ngiven way to some outbreak of temper, they may act with great self-denial\nand watchful kindness; but they can hardly expect their subordinates to\nbe at ease with them.  Another defect which prevents confidence, is a\ncertain sterility of character, which does not allow of sympathy with\nother people's fancies and pursuits.  A man of this character does not\nunderstand any likings but his own.  He will be kind to you, if you will\nbe happy in his way; but he has nothing but ridicule or coldness for any\nthing which does not suit him.  This imperfection of sympathy, which\nprevents an equal from becoming a friend, may easily make a superior into\na despot.  Indeed, I almost doubt whether the head of a family does not\ndo more mischief if he is unsympathetic, than even if he were unjust.\nThe triumph of domestic rule is for the master's presence not to be felt\nas a restraint.\n\nIn a larger sphere than the domestic one, such as amongst the employers\nof labour and their men, the same elements are required on the part of\nthe masters to produce confidence.  Much frankness also and decisiveness\nare required.  The more uneducated people are, the more suspicious they\nare likely to be: and the best way of meeting this suspiciousness is to\nhave as few concealments as possible; for instance, not to omit stating\nany motives relating to your own interest as master, which may influence\nyour conduct towards your men.\n\nThere is a class of persons brought into contact with the employers of\nlabour and their men, who might often do good service to both, by\nendeavouring, when it is deserved, to inspire the men with confidence in\nthe kindly intentions of their masters.  This is a duty which belongs to\nthe clergy and professional men in manufacturing towns.  There are many\nthings which a man cannot say for himself; and, as Bacon has observed, it\nis one of the advantages of friendship, that it provides some person to\nsay these things for one.  So, in this case, it must often have a very\ngood effect, when a bystander, as it were, explains to the men the kind\nwishes and endeavours of a master manufacturer, which explanation would\ncome with much less force and grace from the master himself.\n\nI now come to a subject bordering on the former, namely, the political\nconfidence of the operatives.  I am afraid, that, at present, there is a\ngreat distrust amongst them of public men.  This is not to be wondered\nat.  Their distrust is much fostered by the practice of imputing bad\nmotives, and calling ill names, so much the fashion in political writing\nof all kinds.  It is not a vice peculiar to this age: indeed, I question\nwhether political writing has ever, upon the whole, been more well-bred\nand considerate than it is now.  But at all times the abusive style is\nthe easiest mode of writing, and the surest of sympathy.  The skill to\nmake, and that to cure, a wound are different things; but the former is\nthe one which belongs to most people, and often attracts most attention\nand encouragement.  This, then, is one cause of the distrust of the\nworking classes, which will only be mitigated by a higher tone of moral\nfeeling on the part of the people generally.  Another cause is to be\nfound in the unwise, if not dishonest, conduct of public men.  Look at\nthe mode of proceeding at elections.  I put aside bribery, intimidation,\nand the like, the wrongfulness of which I hope we are all agreed upon;\nand I come to the intellectual part of the business.  Extreme opinions\nare put forth by the candidates, often in violent and injurious language.\nEach strives to keep studiously in the background any points of\ndifference between himself and the electing body.  Electors are not\ntreated as rational beings; their prejudices and their antipathies are\npetted as if they belonged to some despot whom it was treason to\ncontradict.  Whereas, if ever there is a time in his life when a man\nshould weigh his words well, and when he should gird himself up to speak\nwith truth and courage, it is when he is soliciting the suffrages of an\nelectoral body.  That is the way to anticipate inconsistency; the crime\nof which is more often in the hastiness of the first-formed opinion, than\nin the change from it.  What is called the inconsistency, may be the\nredeeming part of the transaction.  The candidate is naturally tempted to\nfall in with the exact opinions that are likely to ensure success, and to\nexpress them without modification--in fact, for the sake of his present\npurpose, to leave as little room for the exercise of his discretion as\npossible.  It is easy for him to make unconditional assertions, when\nnothing is to be done upon them, but it is another thing when he has to\nbring them into action.  The direction which he may wish to give to\npublic affairs is likely to be met by many other impulses; and then he\nmay have to remain consistent and useless, or to link himself to some\nfriendly impulse which brings him, however, into opposition to some of\nhis former broad and careless declarations.  He has left himself no room\nfor using his judgment.  Indeed, one does not see very clearly why he\ntakes his seat amongst men who are met to deliberate.  The evils that\nmust arise from rash promises at elections are so great, that it is\nfortunate when the topics mooted on those occasions, form but a small\npart of those which ultimately come under the consideration of the person\nelected; and, as often happens, that important public matters come to be\ndiscussed, which were not seen on the political horizon at the election\ntime.\n\nIn addition to the distrust of individual legislators, which is,\nprobably, frequent amongst the poorer classes, there is also, I suspect,\na great distrust amongst them of the leading parties in the state.  They\nperceive the evils of party, and see nothing on the other side.  The\nmeaning and intent of party, the way in which by its means social good is\noften worked out in a manner less harsh and abrupt, perhaps, than by any\nother means that has hitherto been devised, are considerations probably\nunknown to them.  To address them upon such matters would be thought\nabsurd.  It would be said, that philosophical disquisitions on government\nare for the closet of the studious man, but not for common people coming\nto perform a plain, practical, duty.  Great principles, however, are at\nthe foundation of all good action.  Look to the divine teaching.  See how\nthe highest things are addressed to all classes.  There is no esoteric\nphilosophy there--one thing to the initiated, and another to the outer\npopulace.  And so I am persuaded in addressing the great masses of\nmankind on other subjects, you can hardly be too profound, if you\ncontrive to express yourself without pedantry; you can hardly put motives\nof too much generosity before them, if you do so with complete sincerity\nand earnestness.  All this is very difficult, but what social remedies\nare not?  They are things to be toiled and bled for; and what is far\nmore, you must run the risk of ridicule, endure want of sympathy, have\nthe courage to utter unpalatable truths, and not unfrequently resist the\ntemptation of saying such things as are sure to elicit immediate and\nhearty approbation.  When a statesman has a craving for present applause,\nit is an evil spirit always by his side, but which springs up to its\nutmost height, and overshadows him with its most baneful influence, at\nsome of the most critical periods of his career.\n\nBut, in addition to the want of confidence in public men caused by\nmalicious writing, or by their injudicious or dishonest conduct as\ncandidates, or by the ignorance amongst the operatives of the good uses\nof party; is there not also a just want of confidence arising from the\nmode in which party warfare has sometimes been carried on in the\nlegislative body?  Remember that it is possible to intrigue with\n\"interests,\" as we call them, as well as with private persons.  The nice\nmorality which would shudder at the revelations of petty intrigue\ndisclosed by the diary of a Bubb Doddington, may urge on, and ride\ntriumphantly, some popular cry, the justice of which it has never paused\nto examine.  There are also such things as a factious opposition to the\nGovernment, a selfish desertion from it, or a slavish obedience to it;\nwhich things, the people in general, are not slow to note, and often\nprone to attribute, even when there is no sufficient cause for\nattributing them.  But of all the things which tend to separate the\noperatives from the governing classes, the most effectual, perhaps, is\nthe suspicion (oh, that we could say that it was altogether an unjust\none!) that laws are framed, or maintained, which benefit those classes at\nthe expense of their poorer brethren.  We think it a marvellous act of\nmalversation in a trustee, to benefit himself unjustly out of the funds\nentrusted to his care.  Wrongs of this kind may appear to be diluted when\nthe national prosperity is the trust-fund, and the legislative body is\nthe trustee.  The largeness, however, of the transaction, does not\ndiminish the injustice of it, although it may soothe the conscience, or\npartially excuse the conduct of any individual member of the governing\nclass.  By governing class, I do not merely mean the legislative bodies,\nbut I include the electing body, who are of course equally guilty when\nthey clamour for what they deem their own peculiar interest, instead of\ncalling for just laws.  And they may be sure, that when once the great\nmass of the people are persuaded that the injustice which I have spoken\nof, is a ruling principle in any government; that government, if it\nlives, is henceforth based upon fear, and not upon affection.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nI shall now put down a few points of practice, which, though they are\nclassed together, have no other link than that they all relate to our\nconduct in a family and towards dependents.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIn social government, no less than in legislating for a state, there\nshould be constant reference to great principles, if only from the\nexceeding difficulty of foreseeing, or appreciating, the results in\ndetail of any measure.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIt is a foolish thing when a man so guides himself, that it is generally\nsupposed in his family, and among his dependents, that no arguments of\ntheirs are likely to persuade him to alter his views.  Such a one may\nfancy that what he calls his firmness is the main stay of his authority:\nbut the obstinacy, which never listens, is not less fatal than the\nfacility which never listens but to yield.  If your rule has the\nreputation of not being amenable to reason, it is liable to sudden\nconvulsions and headstrong distempers, or to unreasonable cringings, in\nwhich your welfare, and that of those whom you rule, are sacrificed to\nthe apprehension of provoking your self-will.  Moreover, the fear of\nirrational opposition on your part, often tempts those about you into\ntaking up courses, which, otherwise, they might have thrown aside upon\nreflection, or after reasonable converse with you on the subject.  You\nmay have, in the end, to oppose yourself sternly to the wishes of those\nwhom you would guide wisely; but at any rate give yourself the chance of\nhaving, in the first instance, the full effect of any forces in their own\nminds which may be on your side.  You cannot expect to have these useful\nallies, if your wont is to be blindly obstinate, and to carry things, on\nall occasions, by heavy-handed authority.  The way in which expected\nopposition acts in determining the mind, is not always by creating\nimmediate wilfulness: but a man, knowing that there is sure to be\nobjection made, in any particular quarter, to his taking a course,\nrespecting which he has not made up his own mind, sets to work to put\naside that contingent obstacle to his freedom of action.  In doing this,\nhowever, he generates, as it were, a force in the opposite direction: in\narguing against contingent opposition, he is led to make assertions which\nhe is ashamed to draw back from; and so, in the end, he fails to exercise\nan unbiassed judgment.  I have gone minutely into this matter; but it\ncannot be unimportant for those who rule, to consider well the latent\nsources of human motive.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIn addressing persons of inferior station, do not be prone to suppose\nthat there is much occasion for intellectual condescension on your part:\nat any rate do not be careless in what you say, as if any thing would do\nfor them.  Observe the almost infinite fleetness of your own powers of\nthought, and then consider whether it is likely that education has much\nto do with this.  Use simple language, but do not fear to put substance\nin it: choose, if you like, common materials, but make the best structure\nthat you can of them: and be assured that method and logical order are\nnot thrown away upon any one.  The rudest audience, as well as the most\nrefined, soon grows weary, I suspect, of protracted, driftless,\ntautology.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nDo not dwell more than you can help, upon the differences of nature\nbetween yourself and those with whom you live.  Consider whether your own\nvanity is not too requiring.  See that others have not the same complaint\nto make of your uncongeniality, that you are, perhaps, prone to make of\ntheirs.  If you are, indeed, superior, reckon it as your constant duty,\nto try and sympathize with those beneath you; to mix with their pursuits,\nas far as you can, and thus, insensibly, to elevate them.  Perhaps there\nis no mind that will not yield some return for your labour: it seems the\ndullest, bleakest, rock, not earth enough to feed a nettle; yet up grows,\nwith culture, the majestic pine.\n\nA want of sympathy leads to the greatest ignorance in the intellect as\nwell as in the heart.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nRemember that your dependents have seldom a full power of replying to\nyou; and let the recollection of that make you especially considerate in\nyour dealings with them.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nWhen you find a lack of truth in those about you, consider whether it may\nnot arise from the furiousness of your own temper which scares truth away\nfrom you: and reflect how fearful a part the angry man may have in the\nsin of those falsehoods which immoderate fear of him gives rise to.\nSuch, I am afraid, is the tyrannous nature of the human heart that we not\nonly show, but really feel, more anger at offence given us by those under\nour power, than at any other cause whatever.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIt is a mistake to suppose that we necessarily become indifferent to the\nfaults and foibles of those with whom we live: on the contrary, we\nsometimes grow more and more alive to them: they seem, as it were, to\ncreate a corresponding soreness in ourselves: and, knowing that they\nexist in the character, we are apt to fancy that we perceive them even on\noccasions when they are not in the least brought into play.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nDo not be fond of the display of authority, or think that there is\nanything grand in being obeyed with abject fear.  One certainly meets\nwith persons who are vain of their ill-temper, and of seeing how it keeps\nthe people about them in order; a species of vanity which they might\nshare with any wild animal at large.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIn reasoning with your dependants, do not allow yourself to make broad\nassertions and careless conclusions, merely because you are addressing\ninferiors.  \"The Courts of Reason recognise no difference of persons.\"\nAnd when you wish to disabuse the minds of those entrusted to your\nguidance of any thing which you are convinced is erroneous, do not\nattempt to do so by unmeasured condemnation.  It is seldom that a secure\nanswer is given to any theory, or system, except by one who exhausts, and\nlays before you, the good in it.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nLet not your forgiveness be of that kind which may almost be set down as\nforgetfulness.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nYou must not always expect to hear a good explanation of a man's reason\nfor his conduct.  In the first place, he does not carry such things about\nwith him in a producible shape; some of them he has probably forgotten,\nalthough their influence may still remain strongly upon his mind; and\nsuch as he does give, are likely to be those which he thinks will have\nmost weight with the person to whom he is speaking.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIn giving way to selfish persons, remember that you cannot sacrifice\nyourself alone.  Any relation in which you may be placed to them,\nespecially if you are the superior, is not a thing that concerns you\nonly; but is, as it were, a trust for society in general.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIt is hard to judge about quarrels, for the points on which they openly\nbreak out have often no more to do with the real grounds of difference\nthan the place of a battle with the cause of the war.  Many a quarrel,\nafter running for a long time under ground, gushes forth with a vehemence\nwhich seems unaccountable; and it is difficult to divine what lands it\nhas passed through in its hidden course.  Any particular outbreak cannot\nsafely be taken as an index of the general conduct of the parties towards\neach other.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nPlayfulness is a good means of softening social distances.  A stiff,\ngrave, man is always in danger of being feared too much.  On the other\nhand, as the self-love of many people is suspicious in the extreme, you\nmust expect that your most innocent playfulness will often be mistaken\nfor ridicule.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIt is a duty not to allow yourself to think of any living man, still less\nto treat him, as if your hopes of his amendment were utterly dead and\ngone.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nYou must not be much surprised at the ingratitude of those to whom you\nhave given nothing but money.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nOnce give your mind to suspicion, and there will be sure to be food\nenough for it.  In the stillest night, the air is filled with sounds for\nthe wakeful ear that is resolved to listen.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nA misproud man resolves to abide by the evil words which he has spoken in\nanger.  This freezing of foam is wilfully unnatural; and turns a brief\nmadness into a settled insanity.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nA man of any wisdom, in domestic authority, so far from making large\nclaims to the love of those whom he rules, and exacting all manner of\nobservance as his due, will often think with fear how unworthy he is of\nthe affection even of the dullest and least-gifted creature about him.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIn commenting on any error of an agent or dependant, beware of making\nyour own vexation, and not the real offence, the measure of your blame.\nThis is a most frequent source of injustice, and one, moreover, which\ntends to prevent anything like consistent training.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThe poor, the humble, and your dependants, will often be afraid to ask\ntheir due from you: be the more mindful of it yourself.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nWith what degree of satisfaction do you feel that you could meet those\npersons in a future state over whom you have any influence now?  Your\nheart's answer to this question is somewhat of a test of your behaviour\ntowards them.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nHow ready we should often be to forgive those who are angry with us, if\nwe could only see how much of their anger arises from vexation with\nthemselves for having begun to be angry at all.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nI am not sorry to introduce a maxim, like the above, which relates,\nperhaps, rather more to dependants than to those in authority, and which\nclaims a place among precepts on social government, only as it may tend\nto promote social harmony and peace.  I have not attempted, throughout,\nto give any account of the duties of dependants, which, however, are\neasily inferred as supplementary to the duties of masters.  It is not to\nbe supposed that any relation in life is one-sided, that kindness is to\nbe met by indifference, or that loyalty to those who lead us is not a\nduty of the highest order.  But, fortunately, the proneness of men to\nregard with favour those put in authority over them is very strong; and I\nhave but little fear of finding any large body of thoughtful and kind\nmasters suffering from permanent indifference, or ingratitude, on the\npart of their dependants.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nI cannot close the chapter better than by entreating those, who are\nendeavouring to carry on any system of benevolence, to be very watchful\nin the management of details, and to strengthen themselves against any\nfeelings of disgust and weariness which may encroach upon them, when\ntheir undertaking has lost the attraction of novelty.  Details are like\nthe fibres at the root of a tree: without their aid the tree would have\nbut little hold against the wind: they are the channels for its\nterrestrial nutriment; they are its ties to earth, its home and\nbirth-place; and, insignificant as they seem, it could live almost better\nwithout light than without them.  Here it is that practical wisdom comes\nin--that faculty, without which, the greatest gifts may serve to make a\nnoise and a flame, and nothing more.  It holds its object neither too\nnear, nor too far off; without exaggerating trifles, it can see that\nsmall things may be essential to the successful application of great\nprinciples; it is moderate in its expectations; does not imagine that all\nmen must be full of its projects; and holds its course with calmness,\nwith hope, and with humility.\n\nYou must not enter upon a career of usefulness without expecting\ninnumerable vexations and crosses to affect the details of any project or\nsystem you may undertake.  And when the novelty of your purpose has\nsomewhat worn off, and you have to meet with the honest opposition of\nother minds, as well as to contend against their vanity, their\nselfishness, and their unreasonableness, it requires a high and full\nsource for your benevolence to flow from, if it would bear down these\nannoyances.  Even when they cannot dry up the stream, or change its\ncurrent, if you are not watchful over yourself, they may make it flow\nmore feebly.  The very prospect of success is to some minds a great\ntemptation to make them slacken their efforts.  Throughout the course of\nour pursuit, we are never, perhaps, so prone to be weary and to repine,\nas when we begin to feel sure of ultimate success, but at the same time\nto perceive, that a long and definite period must elapse before the\ncompletion of our undertaking.\n\nAgainst the many temptations that beset a man in such a career, I do not\nbelieve that any good feeling, which stands upon no other than mere human\nrelations, will be found a sufficient support.  No sentimental\nbenevolence will do; nor even, at all times, a warm and earnest\nphilanthropy: there must be the inexorable sense of duty arising from a\nman's apprehension, if but in a feeble degree, of his relation towards\nGod, as well as to his fellow man.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\nLABOUR IN FACTORIES.\n\n\nThe two former chapters have been given to the consideration of the\nrelation between the employer of labour and the labouring man, and to\ngeneral reflections upon the duties arising from that relation.  Let us\nnow take a particular instance, the employment of labour in manufactures\nfor example, and go through some of the more obvious points to which the\nmaster might in that case direct his attention beneficially.\n\n\n1.  THE MILL.\n\n\nIt would seem an obvious thing enough, that when a man collects a number\nof his fellow-men together to work for him, it would be right to provide\na sufficient supply of air for them.  But this does not appear to have\nbeen considered as an axiom; and, in truth, we cannot much wonder at this\nneglect, when we find that those who have to provide for the amusement of\nmen, and who would be likely, therefore to consult the health and\nconvenience of those whom they bring together, should sedulously shut out\nthe pure air, as if they disliked letting anything in that did not pay\nfor admission.  In most grievances, the people aggrieved are very\nsensible at the time of the evil they are undergoing; which is not,\nhowever, the case with those who suffer from an impure atmosphere.  They\nare, in general, almost unconscious of what they are enduring.  This\nmakes it the more desirable, in the case we are considering, that the\nmanufacturer himself, or the government, or the community at large,\nshould be alive to the mischief arising from want of ventilation in these\ncrowded assemblages of men, and to the absolute necessity of providing\nremedies for it.\n\nThis will not be an inappropriate place for saying something about the\nnon-interference principle.  There is no doubt that interference has\noften been most tyrannous and absurd, that our ancestors, for instance,\nsometimes interfered only to insist upon impossibilities, and that we may\noccasionally do the same.  But, on the other hand, the let-alone\nprinciple proceeds upon the supposition, not only that every body knows\nhis own interest best, or if not, that his freedom of action is of more\nimportance than his acting wisely, which is often true; but it also goes\non to assume that every body knows and will take just care of the welfare\nof others.  Push either principle to any great length; and you will find\nyourself in the land of confusion and absurdity.  In truth, I should\nseldom like to say anything about the wisdom, or the folly, of\ninterference, until I knew exactly what it was about, and how far you\nintended to interfere.  It is one of those matters in which it is\nespecially desirable to keep in mind those maxims of prudence, respecting\nthe application of general rules to moral questions, which Burke has\nhandled so admirably.  \"Nothing universal,\" he observes, \"can be\nrationally affirmed on any moral, or any political subject.  Pure\nmetaphysical abstraction does not belong to these matters.  The lines of\nmorality are not like ideal lines of mathematicks.  They are broad and\ndeep as well as long.  They admit of exceptions; they demand\nmodifications.  These exceptions and modifications are not made by the\nprocess of logic, but by the rules of prudence.  Prudence is not only the\nfirst in rank of the virtues political and moral, but she is the\ndirector, the regulator, the standard of them all.\"  To take a particular\ninstance of legislative interference, namely, the enactments about\nbuilding party-walls, can any one doubt that this interference has been\nmost beneficial?  Does any one suppose that, without it, the same good\nresults would have been gained?  Would the prudence of private\nindividuals ever have accomplished it?  Besides, I think it can hardly be\ndenied that a state should have a degree of providence for the general\nbody, not to be expected from private individuals, and which might compel\nthem to do things that would not consort with their interest even upon\nthe most enlarged views which they could take of it.  The financial\naffairs of the nation are conducted with no slight apparatus of intrusion\nand vexation.  We endure this patiently: indeed, in many cases, it is\ndifficult to see how it could be obviated.  Surely we may submit to some\nsimple sanitary regulations, especially of that kind which may be\ncompared to indirect taxation, requiring to be attended to only by a\ncertain class of persons of daily experience in the matter.  Such are\nregulations with respect to building, which need to be looked to in the\nfirst instance; and then the results of them remain for ever afterwards a\ngreat gain to public health and morals.  I am speaking now rather of the\nquestion of annoyance, than of loss, from legislative interference.  Of\ncourse, in this matter of building, it is easy to perceive that limits\nmust carefully be put to the extent of interference with a view to\nkeeping down the expense.  If this is not done, the whole purpose of the\nregulations may be defeated.  But even in this, it is possible to be too\nnice with respect to interfering with what are called the rights of\nproperty, or too much afraid of creating an artificial dearness by\nregulations, many of which will in the end be found to be a great saving.\n\nBut to resume the subject of the Mill.  Each branch of manufactures has\nits peculiar dangers and disadvantages; and it behoves the master to be\nfrequently directing his attention to remedy the peculiar evils of his\nmanufacture.  He is to be the pioneer to find out for his men ways of\navoiding these evils.  It cannot be his duty to study only how to make\nhis fabric cheaper, and not to take any pains to see how it can be made\nto cost less of human life.  However, if a man has once got a just view\nof his position as an employer of labour, he will not need to be urged in\nthis matter, but must see at once that the health of his men is one of\nthe first things for him to look to.  What would you think of a commander\nwho was careless of the health of his army, merely because he had an\nindefinite power of recruiting?  In a thickly-peopled country like this,\nan employer of labour, if his work does not require much skill, can\ngenerally get any number of men to serve him, which would be a strange\nreason, however, for making the health of anyone amongst those whom he\ndoes employ less precious in his eyes.  Human labour may be ever so\nabundant, but human life cannot be cheap.\n\nWhile we are talking of the Mill, it may be well to observe that the\nsystem of piecework, when it is done by a man with children under him, is\nlikely to be made too severe work for them.  It is a hard fate, indeed,\nfor children to be always under the eye of one whose interest it is to\nget as much work out of them as possible.  The above remarks, however,\napply even more to piece-work done at home than at the mill.\n\nThe next thing to be mentioned in connexion with the Mill is the time of\nlabour.  This is a great question, embracing many considerations which it\nwould be quite foreign to my purpose to enter upon here.  But I may\nobserve that there is much in this matter which might be done by the\nmasters, individually, and collectively.  They have to consider how the\ntime that they may get for the recreation of their men is to be\napportioned.  For instance, whether it is better to give it in whole\ndays, or by half-days, or to spread it over the ordinary days of work.\nThese are questions that cannot be answered without much thought and\nknowledge respecting the social habits of the labouring people.\n\nAll that we have addressed to the manufacturer on the subject of his\nMill, applies even more cogently to the minor superintendent of labour\nand his workshop.  There, the evils complained of are often far greater.\nVentilation is less attended to; less pains are taken to diminish the\npeculiar dangers of the craft; the hours of labour are more numerous; and\nthe children sometimes exposed to cruelties utterly unheard of in\nfactories.  Read the evidence respecting the employment of milliners, and\nyou will wish that dresses could be made up, as well as the materials\nmade for them, in factories.  Alas! what a striking instance the\ntreatment of these poor milliner girls is of the neglect of duty on the\npart of employers: I mean of those who immediately superintend this\nbranch of labour, and of those who cause it.  Had the former been the\nleast aware of their responsibility, would they have hesitated to\nremonstrate against the unreasonable orders of their customers?  And, as\nfor the latter, for the ladies who expect such orders to be complied\nwith, how sublimely inconsiderate of the comfort of those beneath them\nthey must have become.  I repeat it again: the careless cruelty in the\nworld almost outweighs the rest.\n\n\n2.  THE SCHOOL-ROOM.\n\n\nSome manufacturer may think that this branch of the matter does not\nbelong to him, as he does not employ children of the age which makes it\nincumbent upon him by law to have anything to do with their schooling.\nBut I would venture to suggest that it is a matter which belongs to all\nof us, and, especially, to those who are able to pay attention to the\nhabits of large masses of people, put, as it were, under their care.\nSuppose that there had been no such thing in the world's history as a\ndecline and fall of the Roman Empire.  In the course of time, though we\nshould probably have had our Domitians and our Neros, we might have\ndelighted in a modern Trajan or an Antonine.  Under such a man, the\nprogress of letters, having proceeded in any thing like the manner that\nit has done, we should have had some general system of national\neducation, which, after the Roman fashion of completeness, would have\ntraversed the state, with iron step, doubtless even to the remote ends of\nbarbarian Britain.  To say that this would not have been a signal benefit\nto mankind would be idle: what we have to say against the despotic system\nis, that it absorbs private virtue, and suppresses private endeavour;\nthat though it may create better machines, it certainly makes worse men.\nNow then to bring these imaginings home; for they do concern us closely.\nMy readers are, to a certain extent, educated; they will have gained by\nliving in a free state; but if they continue to neglect the welfare of\nthe great mass, in respect of education, can they say that this, the\nfirst layer of the nation, the \"turba Remi,\" might not almost wish, if\nthey could comprehend the question, to live under a despot who would\neducate them, rather than with free men who do not?  Are we to enjoy the\nsingular freedom of speech and action, which we do enjoy in this country,\nand to expect to have no sacrifice to make for it?  Is liberty, the first\nof possessions, to have no duties corresponding to its invaluable rights?\nAnd, in fine, ought it not to be some drawback on the enjoyment of our\nown freedom, if a doubt can come across our minds whether a vast mass of\nour fellow citizens might not be the better for living under a despotic\ngovernment?  These are very serious questions; and the sooner we are\nable, with a good conscience, to give a satisfactory answer to them, the\nbetter.  Till that time, let no man in this country say that the\neducation of the people is nothing to him.\n\nBut how strange it is that men should require to be urged to this good\nwork of education.  The causing children to be taught is a thing so full\nof joy, of love, of hope, that one wonders how such a gladsome path of\nbenevolence could ever have been unfrequented.  The delight of educating\nis like that of cultivating near the fruitful Nile, where seed time and\nharvest come so close together.  And when one looks forward to the\nindefinite extension that any efforts in this direction may probably\nenjoy, one is apt to feel as if nothing else were important, and to be\ninclined to expend all one's energies in this one course.  Indeed, it is\nhard to estimate the enormous benefit of enabling a man to commune with\nthe most exalted minds of all time, to read the most significant records\nof all ages, to find that others have felt and seen and suffered as\nhimself, to extend his sympathy with his brother-man, his insight into\nnature, his knowledge of the ways of God.  Now the above is but a poor\ndescription of what the humblest education offers.\n\nLet us now consider the subject of \"the school-room\" more in detail.\nAnd, the first remark I have to make, is, that we should perpetually\nrecal to mind the nature of our own thoughts, and sensations, at the\nearly periods of life in which those are whom we are trying to educate.\nThis will make us careful not to weary children with those things which\nwe long to impress most upon them.  The repetition of words, whatever\nthey may contain, is often like the succession of waves in a receding\ntide, which makes less of an inroad at each pulsation.  It is different\nwhen an idea, or state of feeling, is repeated by conduct of various\nkinds: that is most impressive.  If a child, for instance, is brought up\nwhere there is a pervading idea of any kind, manifested as it will be in\nmany ways, the idea is introduced again and again without wearisomeness,\nand the child imbibes it unconsciously.  But mere maxims, embracing this\nidea, would very likely have gained no additional influence with him from\nbeing constantly repeated: that is, at the time; for, in after years, the\nmaxims may, perhaps, fasten upon his mind with a peculiar strength,\nsimply from their having been often repeated to him at an early period of\nhis life.  But at present this repetition may be of immense disservice.\nYou cannot continue to produce the same effect by words, that you did on\nfirst using them; and often you go on hammering about a thing until you\nloosen what was fast in the first instance.  It is well to keep such\nreflections steadily in mind as regards religious instruction for the\nyoung, and, especially, as regards religious services for them.  Go back\nto your own youth, and recollect how little command of attention you had\nyourself, how volatile you were, how anxious to escape all tedium, how\nweary of words, how apt to dislike routine.  Then see whether you make\nsufficient allowance for these feelings in dealing with the young; and\nwhether it might not be possible to give them the same holy precepts, to\ncommunicate the same extent, or nearly so, of religious instruction, and\nyet to ensure their love for the times, and places, and circumstances, of\nthis communication.  You must allow that you do a very dangerous thing\nindeed, when you make that wearisome which you wish to be most loved.  I\nmust confess that it has often struck me, that we insist upon too much\nreligious attendance from children of a tender age; and, considering what\nwe know of the impatience of the human mind, I cannot but think that such\na system is often most prejudicial.  I say these things with much\nhesitation, and some fear of being misunderstood; and I do not venture to\nenter into details, or to presume to say what should be the exact course\nin so difficult a question.  What I wish, is to draw the attention of\nthose engaged in instruction to a point of view which may sometimes\nescape them, or which they may be tempted to neglect for the sake of\nappearances, the household gods of this generation.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThere is one maxim which those who superintend schools should ponder\nwell; and that is, that the best things to be learnt are those which the\nchildren cannot be examined upon.  One cannot but fear that the masters\nwill be apt to think school-proficiency all in all; and that the founders\nand supporters of schools will, occasionally, be tempted by vanity to\ntake most interest in those things which give most opportunity for\ndisplay.  Yet the slightest inferiority of moral tone in a school would\nbe ill compensated for by an expertness, almost marvellous, in dealing\nwith figures; or a knowledge of names, things, and places, which may well\nconfound the grown-up bystander.  That school would in reality be the one\nto be proud of, where order was thoroughly maintained with the least\nadmixture of fear; where you would have most chance of meeting with\ntruthful replies from the children in a matter where such replies would\ncriminate themselves: and where you would find the most kindly feeling to\neach other prevalent throughout.  Yet these are things not to be seen on\nshow days, that cannot be got up for exhibition, that require unwearied\nsupervision on the part of masters and benefactors, that will never be\nattempted but by those who, themselves, feel deeply the superiority of\nmoral excellence to all else.  Such teachers will see how the kindness of\nchildren to each other may be encouraged.  They will take more notice of\na good-natured thing than a clever one.  They will show, how much, even\nin the minutest trifles, truth and fortitude weigh with them.  They will\nbe careful not to stimulate an unwholesome craving for praise in their\npupils.  They will look not only to the thing done, but also to the mode\nand spirit of doing it.  That this spirit and mode may be the means of\ngenerating and guiding future endeavour will be a main object with such\ninstructors.  The dignity of labour, the independence of thrift, the\ngreatness of contentment, will be themes dwelt upon by them, in their\nloving foresight for the future welfare of the infant labourers entrusted\nto their care.  To endear holy things to these little ones would delight\nsuch teachers far more than to instil the utmost proficiency in any\ncritical or historical knowledge of the sacred writings.  Not that the\ntwo things are in the least degree incompatible.  Far from it, indeed!\nAll I mean to insist on is, that such teachers will perceive what are the\ngreat objects of culture: and how subservient even the best knowledge is\nto the apprehension of duty.  They will see, too, more clearly the\nnecessity of bearing in mind the pre-eminence of moral and religious\nculture, when they reflect that many of their pupils come from places\nwhich cannot be called homes, where scarcely anything like parental love\nsustains or informs them, and where, perhaps, confusion, discontent, and\ndomestic turbulence prevail.\n\nWe may remark, as bearing upon this subject, that singing lessons should\nbe greatly encouraged in schools.  There are several merits connected\nwith this mode of instruction.  It employs many together, and gives a\nfeeling of communion; it is not much mixed up with emulation; the\ntenderest and highest sentiments may be unostentatiously impressed by its\nmeans, for you can introduce in songs such things as you could not\nlecture upon; then it gives somewhat of a cultivated taste, and an\nadditional topic of social interest, even to those who do not make much\nproficiency; while to others, who have a natural ability for it, it may\nform an innocent and engaging pursuit throughout their lives.\n\nWith respect to the intellectual part of teaching, I have not much to\nsay: and it is a branch of the subject which has engaged, and is\nengaging, the attention of men who are much more capable of speaking\nabout it than I am.  The only thing which it occurs to me to mention is,\nthat one would like to see a great deal of manual teaching, with a view\nnot only to the future profit, but also to the future pleasure and\ninstruction of the children.  When you think that many of them will be\nartisans, whose only occupation, perhaps, will be to perform some one\nprocess of manufactures, requiring next to no thought or skill, it\nbecomes the more necessary to educate their hands as well as their heads.\nMan is an animal very fond of construction of any sort; and a wise\nteacher, knowing the happiness that flows from handiwork, will seize upon\nopportunities for teaching even the most trivial accomplishments of a\nmanual kind.  They will come in, hereafter, to embellish a man's home,\nand to endear it to him.  They will occupy time that would, otherwise, be\nill spent.  And, besides, there are many persons whose cleverness lies\nonly in this way; and you have to teach them this or nothing.\n\n\n3.  THE PLAYGROUND.\n\n\nThis is a place quite as important as the school-room.  Here it is, that\na large part of the moral cultivation may be carried on.  It is a great\nobject to humanize the conduct of children to each other at play times\nwithout interfering with them, or controlling them, too much.  But we\nhave, before, gone over the motives which should actuate a teacher in his\nmoral guidance; and it needs only to remark, that the playground is a\nplace where that guidance is eminently required; and where the exigencies\nfor it are most easily discerned.\n\nThose games should not be overlooked which are of a manly kind, and\nlikely to be continued in after life.  This brings us naturally to think\nof the playgrounds for children of a larger growth.  Hitherto there has\nbeen a sad deficiency in this matter in our manufacturing towns, and\nalmost everywhere else.  Can any thing be more lamentable to contemplate\nthan a dull, grim, and vicious population, whose only amusement is\nsensuality?  Yet, what can we expect, if we provide no means whatever of\nrecreation; if we never share our own pleasures with our poorer brethren;\nand if the public buildings which invite them in their brief hours of\nleisure are chiefly gin palaces?  As for our cathedrals and great\nchurches, we mostly have them well locked up, for fear any one should\nsteal in and say a prayer, or contemplate a noble work of art, without\npaying for it: and we shut people up by thousands in dense towns with no\noutlets to the country, but those which are guarded on each side by dusty\nhedges.  Now an open space near a town is one of nature's churches: and\nit is an imperative duty to provide such things.  Nor, indeed, should we\nstop at giving breathing places to crowded multitudes in great towns.  To\nprovide cheap locomotion, as a means of social improvement, should be\never in the minds of legislators and other influential persons.  Blunders\nin legislating about railroads, and absurd expenditure in making them,\nare a far greater public detriment than they may seem at first sight.\nAgain, without interfering too much, or attempting to force a \"Book of\nSports\" upon the people, who in that case, would be resolutely dull and\nlugubrious, the benevolent employer of labour might exert himself in many\nways to encourage healthful and instructive amusements amongst his men.\nHe might give prizes for athletic excellence or skill.  He might aid in\nestablishing zoological gardens, or music-meetings, or exhibitions of\npictures, or mechanics' institutes.  These are things in which some of\nthe great employers of labour have already set him the example.  Let him\nremember how much his workpeople are deprived of by being almost confined\nto one spot; and let him be the more anxious to enlarge their minds by\ninducing them to take interest in any thing which may prevent the\n\"ignorant present,\" and its low cares, from absorbing all their\nattention.  He has very likely some pursuit, or some art, in which he\ntakes especial pleasure himself, and which gives to his leisure, perhaps,\nits greatest charm: he may be sure that there are many of his people who\ncould be made to share in some degree that pleasure, or pursuit, with\nhim.  It is a large, a sure, and certainly a most pleasurable\nbeneficence, to provide for the poor such opportunities of recreation, or\nmeans of amusement, as I have mentioned above.  Neither can it be set\ndown as at all a trifling matter.  Depend upon it, that man has not made\nany great progress in humanity who does not care for the leisure hours\nand amusements of his fellow-men.\n\nWhile we are upon this matter, I will mention something which borders\nclosely upon it, though it applies to the consumer rather than the\nmanufacturer.  Most men would think it much, if it were brought home to\nthem, that from any carelessness of theirs, some person had suffered\nunnecessary imprisonment, if only for a day.  And yet any one, who\nencourages unreasonably late hours of business, does what he can to\nuphold a system of needless confinement, depriving thousands of that\nhealthful change of pursuit which is one of the main aliments both for\nbody and soul, and leaving little time or opportunity for any thing to\ngrow up in their minds beyond the rudest and most trivial cares and\nobjects.\n\n\n4.  THE WORKMAN'S HOME.\n\n\nThat the workman should have a home, which, however humble it may be,\nshould yet afford room and scope for the decencies, if not for some of\nthe comforts and refinements of civilized life, is manifestly essential,\nif we wish to preserve the great body of the people from a state of\nsavageness.  There is an important and original remark on this subject in\nthe Hand Loom Weavers Report of 1841:\n\n    \"The man who dines for 6d. and clothes himself during the year for 5\n    pounds is probably as healthily fed, and as healthily clad, as if his\n    dinner cost two guineas a day, and his dress 200 pounds a year.  But\n    this is not the case with respect to habitation.  Every increase of\n    accommodation, from the corner of a cellar to a mansion, renders the\n    dwelling more healthy, and, to a considerable extent, the size and\n    goodness of the dwelling tends to render its inmates more civilized.\"\n\nIndeed, if civilization does not show itself in a man's home, where else\nis it likely to take much root with him?  Make his home comfortable, and\nyou do more towards making him a steady and careful citizen, than you\ncould by any other means.  Now only look around, and see how entirely\nthis has been neglected, at least, until within a recent date.  Our\nworkers are toiling all day long, or, if they have leisure, it is mostly\naccompanied by pecuniary distress: and can you expect in either case that\nthey will busy themselves about those primary structural arrangements\nwithout which it is scarcely possible to have a comfortable home?  Many\nof the things, too, which are needful for this end, require capital, or,\nat least, such conjoint enterprise as can hardly be expected from the\npoor.  Take any individual workman.  Suppose there is defective drainage\nin his street, or, as often happens, no drainage at all, what can one\nsuch man do, even if at all alive to the evil?  When you consider the\ndependent condition of the labouring classes, and how little time they\nhave for domestic arrangements of any kind, does it not behove the\nemployer of labour to endeavour that his workmen should have\nopportunities of getting places to live in, fit for human beings in a\ncivilized country?  I use the phrase \"employer of labour,\" in its widest\nsense; and at once say, that there are many things bearing upon the\ncomfort of the habitations of the poor, which both the local authorities\nand the imperial government ought to look to.  Is there not a strange\nmockery in the fact, stated in the Sanitary Report, that \"the annual\nslaughter in England and Wales from preventible causes of typhus which\nattacks persons in the vigour of life, appears to be double the amount of\nwhat was suffered by the allied armies in the battle of Waterloo?\"  Must\nwe not say again that the careless cruelty of the world almost outweighs\nthe rest?\n\nI have hitherto abstained from vexing my readers with details; nor do I\nwish now to do more than draw their attention to a few extracts from\npublic documents respecting the habitations of the poor.  I take the\nfollowing from the Hand Loom Weavers' Report in 1841.\n\n    \"The First Annual Report of the Registrar-General, showed for the\n    year 1838 a variation of the annual mortality in different districts\n    of the metropolis, amounting to 100 per cent.; a difference nearly\n    equal to that which exists between the most healthy and the least\n    healthy portions of the world.  The inquiries instituted at the same\n    time by the Poor Law Commissioners into the physical causes of fever\n    in the metropolis, have traced the comparative mortality of the\n    unhealthy districts principally to the presence of impurities, the\n    want of ventilation, and the bad construction of houses.\n\n    \"The following extracts from Dr. Southwood Smith's Report on Bethnal\n    Green and Whitechapel, show both the causes and the intensity of the\n    evil.\n\n    'It appears,' says Dr. Southwood Smith, 'that in many parts of\n    Bethnal Green and Whitechapel, fever of a malignant and fatal\n    character is always more or less prevalent.  In some streets it has\n    recently prevailed in almost every house; in some courts in every\n    house; and in some few instances in every room in every house.  Cases\n    are recorded in which every member of a family has been attacked in\n    succession, of whom in every such case several have died; some whole\n    families have been swept away.  Instances are detailed in which there\n    have been found in one small room six persons lying ill of fever\n    together; I have myself seen this, four in one bed, and two in\n    another.\n\n                                  * * * * *\n\n    'The room of a fever patient in a small and heated apartment in\n    London, with no perflation of fresh air, is perfectly analogous to a\n    standing pool in Ethiopia full of bodies of dead locusts.  The poison\n    generated in both cases is the same; the difference is merely in the\n    degree of its potency.  Nature with her burning sun, her stilled and\n    pent up wind, her stagnant and teeming marsh, manufactures plague on\n    a large and fearful scale.  Poverty in her hut, covered with her\n    rags, surrounded with her filth, striving with all her might to keep\n    out the pure air and to increase the heat, imitates nature but too\n    successfully: the process and the product are the same; the only\n    difference is in the magnitude of the result.\n\n    'But the magnitude of the result in London, if that magnitude be\n    estimated by the numbers attacked, is not slight.  From returns\n    received from the Bethnal Green and Whitechapel Unions it appears\n    that during the last year there occurred of fever cases,\n\nIn the Bethnal Green Union       2,084\n\nIn the Whitechapel Union         2,557\n\n                          Total  4,641\n\nThe state of things described above by Dr. Southwood Smith is by no means\nconfined to the metropolis; nor, even, is it to be seen in its worst form\nthere.  Mr. Chadwick says, \"the most wretched of the stationary\npopulation of which I have been able to obtain any account, or that I\nhave ever seen, was that which I saw in company with Dr. Arnott, and\nothers, in the wynds of Edinburgh and Glasgow.\"  I forbear to add their\ndetailed report, which, as regards Glasgow especially, represents a\nloathsome state of filth and wretchedness.  If we go now to the\nmanufacturing towns of England, the evidence is of a similar character.\n\"The following extract,\" says the Sanitary Report, \"is descriptive of the\ncondition of large classes of tenements in the manufacturing towns of\nLancashire.  It is from the report of Mr. Pearson, the medical officer of\nthe Wigan Union.\"\n\n    \"From the few observations which I have been enabled to make\n    respecting the causes of fever during the two months which I have\n    held the situation of house-surgeon to the Dispensary, I am inclined\n    to consider the filthy condition of the town as being the most\n    prominent source.  Many of the streets are unpaved and almost covered\n    with stagnant water, which lodges in numerous large holes which exist\n    upon their surface, and into which the inhabitants throw all kinds of\n    rejected animal and vegetable matters, which then undergo decay and\n    emit the most poisonous exhalations.  These matters are often\n    allowed, from the filthy habits of the inhabitants of these\n    districts, many of whom, especially the poor Irish, are utterly\n    regardless both of personal and domestic cleanliness, to accumulate\n    to an immense extent, and thus become prolific sources of malaria,\n    rendering the atmosphere an active poison.\"\n\nDr. Edward Knight, speaking of some parts of the town of Stafford, says,\n\n    \"These parts of the town are without drainage, the houses, which are\n    private property, are built without any regard to situation or\n    ventilation, and constructed in a manner to ensure the greatest\n    return at the least possible outlay.  The accommodation in them does\n    not extend beyond two rooms; these are small, and, for the most part,\n    the families work in the day-time in the same room in which they\n    sleep, to save fuel.\n\n    \"There is not any provision made for refuse dirt, which, as the least\n    trouble, is thrown down in front of the houses, and there left to\n    putrefy.\"\n\nMr. William Rayner, the medical officer of the Heaton Norris district of\nthe Stockport Union, thus describes a part of that town:\n\n    \"There are forty-four houses in the two rows, and twenty-two cellars,\n    all of the same size.  The cellars are let off as separate dwellings;\n    these are dark, damp, and very low, not more that six feet between\n    the ceiling and floor.  The street between the two rows is seven\n    yards wide, in the centre of which is the common gutter, or more\n    properly sink, into which all sorts of refuse is thrown; it is a foot\n    in depth.  Thus there is always a quantity of putrefying matter\n    contaminating the air.  At the end of the rows is a pool of water\n    very shallow and stagnant, and a few yards further, a part of the\n    town's gas works.  In many of these dwellings there are four persons\n    in one bed.\"\n\nWe might have hoped that country districts at least would have been free\nfrom the evils occasioned by contracted building, want of ventilation,\nwant of drainage, and the like; but this is far indeed from being the\ncase.  The following is from the report of Mr. Aaron Little, the medical\nofficer of the Chippenham Union:\n\n    \"The parish of Colerne, which, upon a cursory view, any person\n    (unacquainted with its peculiarities) would pronounce to be the most\n    healthy village in England, is in fact the most unhealthy.  From its\n    commanding position (being situated upon a high hill) it has an\n    appearance of health and cheerfulness which delights the eye of the\n    traveller, who commands a view of it from the Great Western road; but\n    this impression is immediately removed on entering at any point of\n    the town.  The filth, the dilapidated buildings, the squalid\n    appearance of the majority of the lower orders, have a sickening\n    effect upon the stranger who first visits this place.  During three\n    years' attendance on the poor of this district, I have never known\n    the small pox, scarlatina, or the typhus fever to be absent.  The\n    situation is damp, and the buildings unhealthy, and the inhabitants\n    themselves inclined to be of dirty habits.  There is also a great\n    want of drainage.\"\n\nMr. John Fox, the medical officer of the Cerne Union, Dorsetshire, gives\nthe following evidence:\n\n    \"In many of the cottages, where synochus prevailed, the beds stood on\n    the ground-floor, which was damp three parts of the year; scarcely\n    one had a fire place in the bed-room, and one had a single small pane\n    of glass stuck in the mud wall as its only window, with a large heap\n    of wet and dirty potatoes in one corner.  Persons living in such\n    cottages are generally very poor, very dirty, and usually in rags;\n    living almost wholly on bread and potatoes, scarcely ever tasting\n    animal food, and consequently highly susceptible of disease and very\n    unable to contend with it.  I am quite sure if such persons were\n    placed in good, comfortable, clean cottages, the improvement in\n    themselves and children would soon be visible, and the exceptions\n    would only be found in a few of the poorest and most wretched, who\n    perhaps had been born in a mud hovel, and had lived in one the first\n    thirty years of their lives.\"\n\nMr. James Gane, the medical officer of the Uxbridge Union, says,\n\n    \"I attribute the prevalence of diseases of an epidemic character,\n    which exists so much more among the poor than among the rich, to be,\n    from the want of better accommodation as residence, (their dwellings\n    instead of being built of solid materials are complete shells of mud\n    on a spot of waste land the most swampy in the parish; this is to be\n    met with almost everywhere in rural districts) to the want of better\n    clothing, being better fed, more attention paid to the cleanliness of\n    their dwellings, and less congregated together.\"\n\nMr. Thomas H. Smith, the medical officer of the Bromley Union, states:\n\n    \"My attention was first directed to the sources of malaria in this\n    district and neighbourhood when cholera became epidemic.  I then\n    partially inspected the dwellings of the poor, and have recently\n    completed the survey.  It is almost incredible that so many sources\n    of malaria should exist in a rural district.  A total absence of all\n    provisions for effectual drainage around cottages is the most\n    prominent source of malaria; throughout the whole district there is\n    scarcely an attempt at it.  The refuse vegetable and animal matters\n    are also thrown by the cottagers in heaps near their dwellings to\n    decompose; are sometimes not removed, except at very long intervals;\n    and are always permitted to remain sufficiently long to accumulate in\n    some quantity.  Pigsties are generally near the dwellings, and are\n    always surrounded by decomposing matters.  These constitute some of\n    the many sources of malaria, and peculiarly deserve attention as\n    being easily remedied, and yet, as it were, cherished.  The effects\n    of malaria are strikingly exemplified in parts of this district.\n    There are localities from which fever is seldom long absent; and I\n    find spots where the spasmodic cholera located itself are also the\n    chosen resorts of continued fever.\"\n\nIt appears from the Sanitary Report, from which I have made the above\nextracts, and which was presented to Parliament in 1842, that there were\nthen 8000 inhabited cellars at Liverpool; and that the occupants were\nestimated at from 35,000 to 40,000.  Liverpool is called a prosperous\ntown.  People point with admiration to its docks, and its warehouses, and\nspeak of its wealth and grandeur in high terms.  But such prosperity,\nlike the victory of Pyrrhus, is apt to suggest the idea of ruin.\nThirty-five thousand people living in cellars!  Surely such things as\nthese demonstrate the necessity there is for making great exertions to\nprovide fit habitations for the poor.  Each year there is required in\nGreat Britain, according to the Sanitary Report, an increase of 59,000\nnew tenements, \"a number equal to that of two new towns such as\nManchester proper, which has 32,310 houses, and Birmingham, which has\n27,268 houses.\"  In these large increments of building, is it not\nessential that there should be some care for the health and the morals of\nthe people?  Is it not a question which even in a selfish point of view\naffects the whole empire?\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nI am aware that there are great difficulties in the way of any general\nmeasure for regulating buildings.  The first difficulty which occurs, one\nwhich, of itself, forms a limit to building regulations, is, that if you\ncarry them beyond a certain extent, the poorer classes are driven, by the\nincreased expense, from the occupation of cottages to that of rooms,\nwhich would be anything but a gain.  Besides, it is obvious, on other\naccounts, that any regulations with respect to building must be\nintroduced with great care, especially in an old country, and where the\nbuildings, which you would be most anxious to modify, are those which\nwill be erected in the immediate vicinity of ground already densely\ncovered with houses.  The Liverpool Improvement Act affords a curious\ninstance of, what appears to me, absurd and impatient legislation on the\nsubject of building.  By some of its provisions a certain description of\ncellar in that town will be thrown out of occupation on a given day.\nNow, where are the inhabitants of these cellars to go to?  You might as\nwell legislate that no food except of a certain quality should be sold;\nbut it does not seem likely that this would secure the maintenance of the\npopulation so legislated upon.  Inconsiderate measures of this kind\noccasionally put even wise interference out of countenance.  Still, I\nmust contend that much good may be done by some simple building\nregulations of a sanitary nature.  Much may be done indirectly, all of\nwhich is nearly sure to be good.  For instance, it is very desirable to\nlower the taxation upon building materials.  Then, again, wherever the\nwindow-tax can be modified, with a view to benefit the dwellings of the\npoor, it should be done.  Mr. Biers, a witness examined before the Select\nCommittee in 1842 on Building Regulations, says,\n\n    \"The preamble of this Act (the Bill, I believe, then under\n    consideration) sets out that it is for the purpose of preventing\n    disease and giving better ventilation; now, it would much increase\n    the advantages of poor people if a rider or addition was made to the\n    17th section, for the purpose of giving a better ventilation without\n    being liable to the tax-gatherer.  I have added to this section,\n    'And, for the purpose of promoting health and better ventilation, it\n    is provided, that all window-lights or casements, not being between\n    the outside brick or stone reveals of greater dimensions than one\n    foot wide and three feet high, shall not be assessed to the window\n    duties, whether the same be glazed or not, provided the room or\n    appurtenance is not used for a sleeping or dwelling apartment.'\"\n\n    _Viscount Sandon_.  This is not for inhabited cellars?  No, it is to\n    promote the ventilation of any part that is not an inhabited room;\n    larders and cellars and out-appurtenances of houses.  I used to put\n    in the buildings I am now erecting what are termed lancet lights, for\n    the ventilating the cellars, larders, &c.; and, previous to the late\n    survey, these lancet lights were never taken; but so stringent were\n    the orders from the tax-board on the late survey, that if they found\n    a gimlet-hole they would take it.\n\n    _Chairman_.  Were they glazed?--Yes.\n\n    If they were not glazed, but made of wire, how would that be?--Then\n    they can take them, unless the word 'Dairy' or 'Cheese-room' is\n    written over them; I have now been obliged to reduce three of those\n    lancet lights, and do not get the ventilation.  It is as much or more\n    concern to the poor than it is to the rich, that they should have a\n    proper ventilation; and there have been many windows stopped up\n    (which ought not to have been taken) in consequence of the recent\n    survey, and which I am sure the Legislature never intended should be\n    taken.\"\n\nBut, in addition to these indirect methods for improving buildings, it is\nsurely not beyond our legislative ability to devise some very simple\nregulations, at least of that kind which are to have a prospective\napplication.  I do not like to speak confidently about the merits of the\nGovernment Bill, introduced this session, because it requires so much\ntechnical knowledge to judge of these matters; but the main provisions\nfor back-yards or open spaces attached to dwelling houses, and for the\nareas to lowermost rooms, appear to me well considered.  This Bill\napplies only to the metropolis.  The working, however, of local\nimprovement Acts may afford the best kind of evidence to prepare a\ngeneral measure upon.  When the subject was considered in Committee in\n1842, the Corporation of London sent a witness who showed that if a\ncertain regulation, embodied in the Bill they were then considering, were\ncarried into effect, it would, in some instances, not only injure\nproperty, but prevent improvement.  Partial objections of this nature,\nwhich after all may be very slight things, often prevent most useful\nmeasures from being carried.  But why should there not be a discretionary\npower vested somewhere to relax any provision which, in particular cases,\nmight be found harsh or inapplicable?  This power might be given to a\ncentral office, or to local boards of health.  Any suggestion of this\nkind is liable to objections; and the truth is, that to introduce\nsanitary provisions into a state of things not prepared for them, must at\nfirst be a matter cumbered with difficulties; but, as Lord Lyndhurst has\nsaid, \"a difficulty is a thing to be overcome.\"  Mr. Carlyle has pointed\nout what a wonderful production a soldier is, still more a body of them,\nand all the apparatus by which they are kept in working order.  And, as\nhe goes on to argue, governments could not exist if this human fighting\nmachine were not in good keeping, and, therefore, it is well cared for at\nall times.  Now if governments did but perceive the importance of some\nregulation for the dwellings of the poor, if they looked at it only as a\nmatter of finance (for, eventually, the state pays for all disease and\ndistress), it is probable they would put their shoulders to the wheel,\nand get it out of the difficulty, at least as far as their fair share of\nthe matter goes.\n\nAgain, the more difficulty there is in legislating on this subject, and\nespecially if it can be shown that there is difficulty connected with it\nof a kind almost insuperable by mere legislative efforts, the more there\nremains for private individuals to do.  I cannot believe but that human\ningenuity, in some form or other, will be able to surmount the evil in\nquestion.  The difference of expense in building a row of small cottages,\nback to back, which it will be hard to ventilate, and which must be\nwithout the most obvious household requisites, and that of building a row\nof cottages each of which shall have a yard at the back, will be about 22\nper cent. upon the outlay.  Where one would cost 100 pounds, which is a\ngood price for the lowest class cottages, the other would cost 122\npounds.  This calculation is independent of the cost of the additional\nland which would be required.  It is melancholy to think that this 22\npounds, and the price of the additional land must, in thousands of cases,\nhave determined the health and morality of the inmates.  I do not mean to\nsay that this pecuniary difference is a slight matter, but still I do\nthink it is somehow or other to be provided for.  There is always this to\nbe considered, that the better the tenement, the more it will be cared\nfor.  In the same Committee I have mentioned before, the Town Clerk of\nLeeds is asked:\n\n    \"Would not the building of the better kind of cottages always secure\n    the best tenants?--Unquestionably.\n\n    \"And the person who invested the property in buildings of that kind\n    would rather take six per cent. of good tenants than seven per cent.\n    of bad ones?--Yes; we have a number of instances in Leeds.  There is\n    a gentleman named Croysdill, who has 200 or 300 cottages; he receives\n    the lowest rents on an average of any large proprietor of cottages,\n    and they are unquestionably the most comfortable dwellings, and the\n    best occupied.\"\n\nIt may be a strong thing to say, but I can conceive it possible, in a\nChristian country, for a man to restrain himself from making the utmost\nprofit out of his possessions.  I can imagine, for instance, an owner of\nland in a town being unwilling to demand such a price for it, as would\nprevent the cottages of the labouring people from being built with those\ncomforts and conveniences upon which civilization may almost be said to\ndepend.  A man may think that there is some responsibility attached to\nownership; and he may not like to be in any way accessory to the building\nof such habitations for the poor as he thoroughly disapproves of.  And if\nthe owner of land feels this, still more may the capitalist who\nundertakes to build upon it.  It may be a satisfactory thing to collect\nin any way much money; but I think, on the other hand, that most men have\na great pleasure in doing anything well, in a workmanlike and stable\nmanner.  And, strange as it may seem, it is very possible that motives of\nprofit and loss may not be the only ones which have led to such miserable\nbuilding, as is often to be seen in the houses of the poor.  People have\nnot thought about the matter.  If they had seen the merit of building\ngood houses of a small kind, I think that in many cases, the additional\nmoney required would not have stood in the way.  In the Select Committee\nof 1842, the following questions are asked of a witness from Liverpool:\n\n    \"Is Liverpool a town which has a considerable quantity of land which\n    may be made available for the purpose of erecting houses?--There is a\n    good deal of land in the suburbs.\n\n    \"The corporation possess a good deal of land?--They do.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n    \"Have you had under your consideration the provisions of what is\n    called Lord Normanby's Act, by which it is forbidden to build houses\n    back to back?--Yes.\n\n    \"What were the reasons which induced the Corporation of Liverpool not\n    to object to houses being so built?--If houses were not to be built\n    back to back there would be a great sacrifice of land.\"\n\nI do not bring this evidence forward to censure that corporation, but\nrather to excuse private persons in some measure, by showing the general\nunconcern and ignorance about the subject.  It appears that even a\ncorporate body, who might be expected to discern the value of public\nhealth and morals, and not to be subdued by the prospect of immediate and\napparent gain, have at least not made any endeavour to introduce a good\nsystem of building cottages for the poor of their own town.  Not that\nthey, probably, were in the slightest degree, more mercenary than other\nmen; but it is only an instance to show how little attention has hitherto\nbeen given to this subject.\n\nThere is at present in the metropolis, a Society for \"improving the\ndwellings of the industrious classes;\" but what is one society?  This is\na matter which ought to interest the owners of property, and the\nemployers of labour, throughout the country.  Such a society as the one\nnamed may do great good by building model houses, making scientific\ninvestigations, and frequently laying before the public information on\nthe subject.  But the proper division of labour, as it seems to me, would\nbe that the state should give every legislative facility for contemplated\nimprovements in the way of building, should encourage all researches into\nthe subject, and be ready to enforce by law such regulations as, without\nany great intrusion upon private property, might secure for small houses\nthose primary requisites without which it cannot be expected that they\nwill be anything but nests of disease.  In fact the state might,\neventually, so order the matter that builders should not merely build\nsuch houses as the poor would take, for there is nothing in the way of a\nshelter which they will refuse to occupy, but such as ought to be let to\nthem, with due care at least for the public health.  The local\nauthorities should take upon themselves, the lighting, cleansing, paving,\nsupplying with water, and the like.  For private individuals there\nremains the most important part of the task, namely, the building of an\nimproved class of small houses.  In this good work the employers of\nlabour may be expected to come prominently forward.  Many a man will\nspeculate in all kinds of remote undertakings; and it will never occur to\nhim that one of the most admirable uses to which he might put his spare\ncapital, would be to provide fit dwelling places for the labouring\npopulation around him.  He is not asked to build alms houses.  On the\ncontrary, let him take care to ensure, as far as he can, a good return\nfor the outlay, in order to avoid what may, possibly, be an unjust\ninterference with other men's property; and also, and chiefly, that his\nbuilding for the poor may not end in an isolated act of benevolence, but\nmay indicate a mode of employing capital likely to be followed by others.\nIn the present state of things, the rents of small houses are\ndisproportionately high because of the difficulty and uncertainty of\ncollecting the rents for them; but by any improvement you introduce into\nthe habits of the occupiers of such houses, you make this difficulty and\nuncertainty less; and thereby diminish rents.  And thus, in this case, as\nin many others, physical and moral improvement go on acting and reacting\nupon each other.  It is likely, too, that these poor people will pay with\nreadiness and punctuality even a higher rent, if it be for a really good\ntenement, than a small one for a place which they must inhabit in the\nmidst of filth, discomfort, and disease, and therefore with carelessness\nand penury.  Besides; the rents they pay now, will be found, I believe,\nsufficient to reimburse the capitalist for an outlay which would suffice\nto build tenements of a superior description to the present ones.\n\nI do not mean to say that the beginners of such a system of employing\ncapital might not have a great deal to contend with: and it is to their\nbenevolence, and not to any money motives, that I would mainly appeal.\nThe devout feeling which in former days raised august cathedrals\nthroughout the land, might find an employment to the full as religious in\nbuilding a humble row of cottages, if they tell of honour to the great\nCreator, in care for those whom he has bidden us to care for, and are\nthus silently dedicated, as it were, to His name.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThe allotment system has not hitherto, I believe, been tried to any\nextent in the manufacturing districts.  Mr. James Marshall, and Mr. Gott,\nof Leeds have begun to try it; but I think it is but recently; and that\nthere has not yet been time to ascertain the result of the system.  I\ncannot but think, however, that it will be found more beneficial in\nmanufacturing, than even in rural, districts.  Let us enumerate some of\nthe probable advantages.  It would form an additional means of\nsupport--it would tend to endear home to the working man--it would\nprovide a pleasing change of employment for him in good times--it would\nrender him not so listless when out of work--and it would give him\nknowledge, an additional topic of conversation, and an interest in\nvarious things which he might never, otherwise, have felt the least\nconcern for.  Moreover, it amuses and occupies the little ones in a\nfamily; and it leaves less temptation for parents to employ children too\nearly, in factories or workshops, when they can find something else for\nthem to do which may be profitable.  In this respect, indeed, any\nimprovement in domestic comfort, or any additional domestic pursuit, is\nlikely to be beneficial, as it enlarges the sphere of household duties,\nand creates more reasons for the wife and children being left at home.\nAgain, as there is hard labour to be done in a garden, this allotment\nsystem might occasionally prevent the sense of an almost unnatural\ndependence being so much exhibited, or felt, when the children are\nemployed in some factory, and the grown up people are not.  This is one\nof the greatest evils that at present attend the state of manufactures.\nSome of the advantages which I have reckoned above, as likely to be\nconnected with the allotment system, are trifling things; but small\nimpulses, all tending one way, may lead to great results.  The main\nobjection which, I suppose, will be taken, is that to make allotments in\ncrowded districts is scarcely practicable.  Some beginning, however, has\nbeen made at a place so crowded as Leeds, and at any rate, in any future\nbuilding arrangements, room might be left for allotments of land, which\nwould also secure many advantages with respect to the sanitary condition\nof the people.  It may be remarked, too, that any manufacturer, who\npossessed cottages with allotments to them, would have an easy mode of\nrewarding good behaviour.  Such cottages would be eagerly sought after by\nthe men, and might be given, in preference, to those of good character.\n\nIs all this romantic?  Is it inevitable that the suburbs of a\nmanufacturing town must consist of dense masses of squalid habitations,\nunblest by a proper supply of air, light, or water; undrained,\nuncleansed, and unswept; enjoying only that portion of civilization which\nthe presence of the police declares; and presenting a scene which the\nbetter orders hurry by with disgust?  Or, on the contrary may we not,\nwithout giving ourselves up to Utopian dreams, imagine that we might\nenter the busy resorts of traffic through extensive suburbs consisting of\ncottages with their bits of land; and see, as we came along, symptoms\neverywhere around of housewifely occupations, and of homes which their\nhumble owners might often think of with pleasure during their day's\nlabour, looking forward to their return at evening with delight.  The\nricher classes, even those low down in the scale of wealth, mostly\nstruggle to secure some portion of country air for themselves: surely\nthey might do their best to provide for the working man something like a\nchange from the atmosphere of the factory, or workshop, in which he must\npass the greatest part of his day throughout the whole year.\n\nAgainst what I have said above, it may be urged that it would prevent the\nworkman from living near his work.  In many cases this may be an\ninconvenience; but I do not imagine that, in general, it can be proved to\nbe an insurmountable, or even a very serious objection.  Turning again to\nthe evidence of the Town Clerk of Leeds before the Building Committee, I\nfind the following:\n\n    \"_Lord Ashley_.  I have been told by several builders in London, that\n    in consequence of the improvements in the metropolis, great numbers\n    of people have been driven to the out-skirts of the town; but they\n    found in the out-skirts of the town an excellent house for less money\n    than when they lived in miserable lodgings in the heart of the town;\n    is this consistent with your experience in Leeds?--Quite consistent.\n\n    \"And no hardship to themselves?--The distance of going to work is the\n    objection; but we find the poor people will for twenty years walk two\n    or three miles in a morning to their work at six o'clock, and seem no\n    worse for it.\"\n\n\n\nV.  THE TOWN.\n\n\nIt will not be a matter unworthy the attention of a great employer of\nlabour, to improve and embellish the town where his work is carried on.\nIt is his duty to have some care for its public buildings, and its\ninstitutions.  They are means for improving, sometimes by manifest\nbenefits, sometimes by silent influence, the condition of his men.\nSurely if the employers of labour felt any thing like a home affection\nfor the towns where they live, they could not leave them in the rude,\nunadorned state in which so many of them are.  And where is a man's home,\nif not where he can do most good; where he spends the best part of his\nlife; where he directs the labour, perhaps, of thousands, and absolutely\nby his own exertion may affect the condition of the rising generation?\nIf such a man could see the many links of duty done, or duty disregarded,\nthat connect him with the spot where he works, let it be ever so dark,\nsqualid, and repulsive, he would still say that it was a great part of\nhis home, and not indulge too fondly in the idea of sunny meadows and\nbeautiful villas, to be enjoyed in some secure, golden, retirement.  He\nwould take an interest in the erection of churches, hospitals, buildings\nfor the display of art, or indeed, in any institutions that would further\nhis great work by elevating the sentiments, or improving the physical\ncondition, of his men.  The establishment of public baths would be\nanother matter worthy of his attention.  At these baths the poor might be\nadmitted on payment of a small fee to cover the expense of attendants.\nThe Romans, induced by social or political motives, had their public\nbaths, to which citizens were admitted; who formed, however, but a small\npart of their people: surely higher motives might prevail with us to have\nsimilar baths, which should be open to all our population.  While we are\nspeaking of institutions of various kinds, we must not omit Monts de\nPiete, or Loan Societies, which may enable the poor man to get small\nadvances on reasonable terms.  It will not be enough to establish such\nthings as we have spoken of: there is yet harder work to be done in the\nmanagement of them.  All charitable institutions require vigorous\nattention; and the better kind of men must not shrink from the public\nbusiness which they are the fittest to transact.  If founders or\nbenefactors were the only people needed, one generation might monopolize\nthe beneficence of all time; but charitable institutions require for ever\nduty to be done by living men.  And, as I have intimated before, it is in\ngiving thought and labour, that we may often make the greatest and the\nmost profitable sacrifices for the good of others.  But to go back to\nmere embellishment--it is very apt to go hand in hand with material\nimprovements.  Besides, it raises a higher standard.  It declares that\nthere is something besides food and clothing.  It may create, perhaps,\nthe love of beauty and order in minds that now seem sunk in sense.  At\nany rate it may do so in a coming generation.  And it is not a little\nmatter if it attach the wealthier classes to these towns.  This naturally\nbrings me to a subject of which I think the reader will, on\nconsideration, see the importance.  I have heard it said, and thought, it\na far-seeing remark, that one of the greatest benefits which could be\nconferred on manufacturing towns, would be to purify them from smoke, on\nthe ground that the wealthier classes would then have less objection to\nreside in their vicinity: and, especially, that those who constitute the\nnatural aristocracy of the place, would not be so much tempted to remove\nthemselves from the spot where their fortunes had grown up.\n\nDr. Cooke Taylor, in his letters to the Archbishop of Dublin, speaking of\nthe parts of Manchester which \"have been abandoned to the poorest grade\nof all,\" says,\n\n    \"Your Grace is aware that to some extent Dublin is similarly divided\n    into the city of the rich and the city of the poor; but I know that\n    many respectable and wealthy manufacturers reside in the liberties of\n    Dublin, while the smoke-nuisance drives every body from the township\n    of Manchester who can possibly find means of renting a house\n    elsewhere.\"\n\nNow is the doing away of this smoke a sort of chimerical and Quixotic\nundertaking?  Not in the least.  The experiments appear to be decisive\nupon this point; and had there been a reasonable care for the health,\nbeauty, and cleanliness of the towns where their work is carried on, the\nmanufacturers would long ago have contrived, I believe, that there should\nbe no such thing as opaque smoke issuing from their chimneys.  Count\nRumford says in his essays,\n\n    \"I never view from a distance, as I come into town, this black cloud\n    which hangs over London without wishing to be able to compute the\n    immense number of chaldrons of coals of which it is composed; for\n    could this be ascertained, I am persuaded so striking a fact would\n    awaken the curiosity, and excite the astonishment, of all ranks of\n    the inhabitants, and _perhaps_ turn their minds to an object of\n    economy to which they have hitherto paid little attention.\"\n\nThe essay from which this extract is made was published in 1796: what\nwould the Count say now?  I believe the calculation which he was thinking\nof has been made.  At any rate a near approximation might be; for I am\ntold, on scientific authority, that \"the actual quantity of smoke hanging\nany day over London is the fourth part of the fuel consumed on that day.\"\nMr. Cubitt, the great builder, in an examination before the House of\nCommons, quoted by the Sanitary Report, thus expresses himself on this\nsubject:\n\n    \"With respect to manufactories, here are a great number driven by\n    competition to work in the cheapest way they can.  A man puts up a\n    steam-engine, and sends out an immense quantity of smoke; perhaps he\n    creates a great deal of foul and bad gas; that is all let loose.\n    Where his returns are 1000 pounds a month, if he would spend 5 pounds\n    a month more, he would make that completely harmless; but he says, 'I\n    am not bound to do that,' and therefore he works as cheaply as he\n    can, and the public suffer to an extent beyond all calculation.\"\n\nTo show how little loss is to be apprehended from regulations abating\nthis nuisance, the Sanitary Report cites the authority of\n\n    \"Mr. Ewart, the Inspector of Machinery to the Admiralty, residing at\n    Her Majesty's Dockyard at Woolwich, where the chimney of the\n    manufactory under his immediate superintendence, regulated according\n    to his directions, offers an example of the little smoke that need be\n    occasioned from steam-engine furnaces if care be exercised.  He\n    states that no peculiar machinery is used; the stoker or fire-keeper\n    is only required to exercise care in not throwing on too much coal at\n    once, and to open the furnace door in such slight degree as to admit\n    occasionally the small proportion of atmospheric air requisite to\n    effect complete combustion.  Mr. Ewart also states that if the fire\n    be properly managed, there will be a saving of fuel.  The extent of\n    smoke denotes the extent to which the combustion is incomplete.  The\n    chimney belonging to the manufactory of Mr. Peter Fairbairn, engineer\n    at Leeds, also presents an example and a contrast to the chimneys of\n    nearly all the other manufactories which overcast that town.  On each\n    side of it is a chimney belonging to another manufactory, pouring out\n    dense clouds of smoke; whilst the chimney at Mr. Fairbairn's\n    manufactory presents the appearance of no greater quantity of smoke\n    than of some private houses.  Mr. Fairbairn stated, in answer to\n    inquiries upon this subject, that he uses what is called Stanley's\n    feeding machinery, which graduates the supply of coal so as to\n    produce nearly complete combustion.  After the fire is once lighted,\n    little remains to the ignorance or the carelessness of the stoker.\n    Mr. Fairbairn also states that his consumption of fuel in his\n    steam-engine furnaces, in comparison with that of his immediate\n    neighbours, is proportionately less.  The engine belonging to the\n    cotton-mills of Mr. Thomas Ashton, of Hyde, near Stockport, affords\n    to the people of that town an example of the extent to which, by a\n    little care, they might be relieved of the thick cloud of smoke by\n    which the district is oppressed.\n\n    \"At a meeting of manufacturers and others, held at Leeds, for the\n    suppression of the nuisance of the smoke of furnaces, and to discuss\n    the various plans for abating it, the resolution was unanimously\n    adopted, 'That in the opinion of this meeting the smoke arising from\n    steam-engine fires and furnaces can be consumed, and that, too,\n    without injury to the boilers, and with a saving of fuel.  Notice of\n    legal proceedings being given against Messrs. Meux, the brewers in\n    London, for a nuisance arising from the chimneys of two furnaces,\n    they found that by using anthracite coal they abated the nuisance to\n    the neighbourhood, and saved 200 pounds per annum.  The West\n    Middlesex Water Company, by diminishing the smoke of their furnaces\n    saved 1000 per annum.\"\n\nBut, putting aside the consideration of any pecuniary benefit to be\ngained, I think it would not be unreasonable to say that no considerate\nowner of a factory would wait for public regulations in this matter, but\nwould, himself, be anxious to prevent his occupation from being injurious\nto his neighbours.  In a manufacturing town, a man may find some excuse,\nthough a most futile one, in the consideration that it would be of no use\nfor him alone to consume his smoke, when there are hundreds of others\nover whom he has no influence to persuade them to follow his example.\nBut you sometimes see one of these foul-mouthed chimneys blackening a\nneighbourhood generally free from such things, and it does not seem to\noccur to the owner of the chimney that he is doing any thing wrong,\nprovided he is legally secure.  Probably he gives away in the course of\nthe year such a sum as would put up an apparatus which would modify, if\nnot altogether remove, the smoke.  Let him not think that charity\nconsists only in giving away something: I doubt whether he can find any\nwork of benevolence more useful to his neighbourhood and to society in\ngeneral, than putting a stop to this nuisance of his own creation.  I am\nnot inclined to rest my case against it on the ground of health alone;\nthough I believe, with the Sanitary Commissioners, that it would be found\nmuch more injurious than is generally imagined.  When you find that\nflowers and shrubs will not endure a certain atmosphere, it is a very\nsignificant hint to the human creature to remove out of that\nneighbourhood.  But independently of the question of health, this\nnuisance of smoke may be condemned simply on the ground of the waste and\ninjury which it occasions.  And what is to be said on the other side?\nWhat can any man allege in its favour?  Our ancestors, who had\nglimmerings occasionally, held that\n\n    \"Si homme fait candells deins un vill, per qui il cause un noysom\n    sent al inhabitants, uncore ceo nest ascun nusans car le needfulness\n    de eux dispensera ove le noisomness del smell.\"  (2 Rolls Abr. 139.)\n\nThis is quoted in a grave public document (the Sanitary Report): had we\nmet with it elsewhere, we might have concluded that it came from that\nchronicle in which Mr. Sidney Smith found the account which he gives of\nthe meeting of the clergy at Dordrecht.  I quote it, however, to show how\nwisely our ancestors directed their attention in this instance.  If they\nhad been begrimed with smoke as we are, and, upon inquiry, had found that\nthere was no \"needfulness\" to back the \"noisomeness,\" it is probable they\nwould have dealt with it in their most summary manner.  Whereas I fear\nthat Mr. Mackinnon's \"Smoke Prohibition\" Bill, amidst the hubbub of\nlegislation, has great difficulty in finding the attention which it\nreally deserves.  The truth is, this smoke nuisance is one of the most\ncurious instances how little pains men will take to rid themselves from\nevils which attack them only indirectly.  If the pecuniary injury done to\nthe inhabitants of great towns by smoke could only be put in the form of\na smoke rate, what unwearied agitation there would be against it.  But\nsurely we ought not to view with less hostility, because of its silent\nnoxiousness, a thing which injures the health of our children, if not of\npeople of all ages, disfigures our public buildings, creates\nuncleanliness and gives an excuse for it, affects in some degree the\nspirits of all persons who live under it, renders manufacturing towns\nless welcome places of residence for the higher classes (which is what\nbrings it in connexion with the subject of this Essay); and is, thereby,\npeculiarly injurious to the labouring population.  If these pages should\nsurvive to any future age, it will excite a smile in some curious reader\nto see how urgent I have endeavoured to be about a matter which will then\nbe so obvious--\"What strange barbarous times they must have been,\" he\nwill say to himself: \"wisdom of our ancestors, forsooth!\"  \"Far-off\nreader,\" if there be such an entity, \"do not presume: thou hast thy smoke\ntoo.\"\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIn connexion with the subject of \"the town,\" it may be well to go a\nlittle into the matter of sewerage, which almost, above all things,\ndemands the attention of those who care for the health of the labouring\npopulation, indeed, for the health of rich or poor.\n\nThis subject is admirably treated in a section of the Sanitary Report of\n1842, under the head of \"Arrangements for public health, external to the\nresidences.\"  It is now almost a trite thing to show how closely\nconnected imperfect sewerage is with disease.  Scientific men will tell\nyou that you may track a fever along the windings of an open drain.  The\nSanitary Report mentions that,\n\n    \"In the evidence given before the Committee of the House of Commons,\n    which received evidence on the subject in 1834, one medical witness\n    stated, that of all cases of severe typhus that he had seen,\n    eight-tenths were either in houses of which the drains from the\n    sewers were untrapped, or which, being trapped, were situated\n    opposite gully-holes; and he mentioned instances where servants\n    sleeping in the lower rooms of houses were invariably attacked with\n    fever.\"\n\nThe above is a good instance to show how necessary it is to have some\ngeneral measures on these matters of building and drainage.  The expense\nof trapping a gully-drain is about 3 pounds; at least that is what, I\nunderstand, the Commissioners of Sewers are willing to do it for.  Now is\nit likely that any poor man, having one of these nuisances before his\ndoor, will go to such an expense to have it prevented.  It is probable\nthat it would be very good economy for him to do so, even if his whole\nsavings amounted only to 3 pounds.  But we all know that few men are\nfar-thinking enough to invest much of their capital in a thing which\nmakes so little show as pure air.  What do you find amongst the rich?  Go\nthrough the great squares, where, in one night, a man will lavish on some\nentertainment what would almost purify his neighbourhood, and you will\noften find the same evils there, though in a different degree, that you\nhave met with in the most crowded parts of the town.  If the rich and\ngreat have so little care about what comes\n\n    \"Betwixt the wind and their nobility\"\n\nyou can hardly expect persons, whose perception in such matters is much\nless nice, to have any care at all.  It is evident that the health of\ntowns requires to be watched by scientific men, and improvements\nconstantly urged on by persons who take an especial interest in the\nsubject.  If I were a despot, I would soon have a band of Arnotts,\nChadwicks, Southwood Smiths, Smiths of Deanston, Joneses, and the like;\nand one should have gratified a wiser ambition than Augustus if one could\nsay of any great town, Sordidam inveni, purgatam reliqui.\n\nThe supply of water is of course one of the chief means for the\npurification of a town.  It is at present, I fear, grievously neglected\nthroughout the country.  The Sanitary Report draws attention to the mode\nof supplying water to Bath, and gas to Manchester: and adduces the latter\nas an instance \"of the practicability of obtaining supplies for the\ncommon benefit of a town without the agency of private companies.\"  And\nMr. Chadwick, after a lengthened investigation into the subject which\nwill well repay perusal, thus concludes:\n\n    \"I venture to add, as the expression of an opinion founded on\n    communications from all parts of the kingdom, that as a highly\n    important sanitary measure connected with any general building\n    regulations, whether for villages or for any class of towns,\n    arrangements should be made for all houses to be supplied with good\n    water, and should be prescribed as being as essential to cleanliness\n    and health as the possession of a roof or of due space; that for this\n    purpose, and in places where the supplies are not at present\n    satisfactory, power should be vested in the most eligible local\n    administrative body, which will generally be found to be that having\n    charge of cleansing and structural arrangements, to procure proper\n    supplies for the cleansing of the streets, for sewerage, for\n    protection against fires, as well as for domestic use.\"\n\nIt is possible that some of my readers may think that the wretched state\nof ventilation, drainage, and building, which I have been commenting\nupon, is mainly to be accounted for by poverty.  It belongs, they may\nsay, to an old country; it is the long accumulated neglect of ages; it\nembodies the many vicissitudes of trade which Great Britain has felt; it\nis a thing which the people would remedy for themselves, if you could\nonly give them more employment and better wages.  In answer to this I\nwill refer to an authority quoted by Mr. Chadwick in his Essay on the\n\"Pressure and Progress of the Causes of Mortality,\" read before the\nStatistical Society in 1843.\n\n    \"In abundance of employment, in high wages, and the chief\n    circumstances commonly reputed as elements of prosperity of the\n    labouring classes, the city of New York is deemed pre-eminent.  I\n    have been favoured with a copy of '_The Annual Report of the\n    Interments in the City and County of New York for the Year_ 1842,'\n    presented to the Common Council by Dr. John Griscom, the city\n    inspector, in which it may be seen how little those circumstances\n    have hitherto preserved large masses of people from physical\n    depression.  He has stepped out of the routine to examine on the spot\n    the circumstances attendant on the mortality which the figures\n    represent.  He finds that upwards of 33,000 of the population of that\n    city live in cellars, courts, and alleys, of which 6618 are dwellers\n    in cellars.  'Many,' he states, 'of these back places are so\n    constructed as to cut off all circulation of air, the line of houses\n    being across the entrance, forming a _cul de sac_, while those in\n    which the line is parallel with, and at one side of the entrance, are\n    rather more favourably situated, but still excluded from any general\n    visitation of air in currents.  As to the influence of these\n    localities upon the health and lives of the inmates, there is, and\n    can be, no dispute; but few are aware of the dreadful extent of the\n    disease and suffering to be found in them.  In the damp, dark, and\n    chilly cellars, fevers, rheumatism, contagious and inflammatory\n    disorders, affections of the lungs, skin, and eyes, and numerous\n    others, are rife, and too often successfully combat the skill of the\n    physician and the benevolence of strangers.\n\n    \"'I speak now of the influence of the locality merely.  The degraded\n    habits of life, the degenerate morals, the confined and crowded\n    apartments, and insufficient food, of those who live in more elevated\n    rooms, comparatively beyond the reach of the exhalations of the soil,\n    engender a different train of diseases, sufficiently distressing to\n    contemplate; but the addition to all these causes of the foul\n    influences of the incessant moisture and more confined air of\n    under-ground rooms, is productive of evils which humanity cannot\n    regard without shuddering.'\n\n    \"He gives instances where the cellar population had been ravaged by\n    fever, whilst the population occupying the upper apartments of the\n    same houses were untouched.  In respect to the condition of these\n    places, he cites the testimony of a physician, who states that,\n    'frequently in searching for a patient living in the same cellar, my\n    attention has been attracted to the place by a peculiar and nauseous\n    effluvium issuing from the door, indicative of the nature and\n    condition of the inmates.'  A main cause of this is the filthy\n    external state of the dwellings and defective street cleansing and\n    defective supplies of water, which, except that no provision is made\n    for laying it on the houses of the poorer classes, is about to be\n    remedied by a superior public provision.\"\n\nAfter considering this account of the State of New York, it will hardly\ndo to say, that, even under favourable circumstances, you can leave the\ngreat mass of the people to take care of those structural arrangements\nwith regard to their habitations, which only the scientific research of\nmodern times has taught any persons to regard with due attention.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nWe have now gone over some of the principal places where the employer of\nlabour may find scope for benevolent exertion.  It has been a most\ninartificial division of the subject, but still one that may be retained\nin the memory, which is a strange creature, not always to be bound by\nlogic, but led along by minute ties of association, among which those of\nplace are very strong and clinging.  I now venture to discuss a branch of\nthe subject which can hardly be referred to any particular spot, unless,\nindeed, I were to name the manufacturer's own house as the fit ground for\nit: I mean the social intercourse between the employers and the employed.\nSome persons will, perhaps, be startled at the phrase; hardly, however,\nthose who have come thus far with me.  By social intercourse I do not\nmerely mean that which will naturally take place in the ordinary\ncharities, such as visiting the sick, managing clothing societies, and\nthe like: but that intercourse which includes an interchange of thought,\nan occasional community of pursuit, and an opportunity of indirect\ninstruction; which may be frequent and extensive enough to avoid the evil\neffects of a sense of perpetual condescension on one side, and timidity\non the other; and which may give the employer some chance at least of\nlearning the general wants and wishes of his people, and also of\nappreciating their individual characters.\n\nThis matter is not an easy one.  It requires tact, patience, discretion,\nand the application of several of the maxims mentioned in the preceding\nchapter.  I am not sure however, that it is any sacrifice whatever in the\nway of pleasure.  The manufacturer's family who occasionally give an\nevening to social intercourse with their people, will not, perhaps, find\nthat evening less amusing than many that they may pass with their equals.\n\nThe advantage, to the rising generation of working people, of some\nintercourse with their betters, would be very great.  I must here quote\nthe authority of one who has fully expressed in action the benevolent\nviews which he has indicated in the following words.  \"No humble cottage\nyouth or maiden will ever acquire the charm of pleasing manners by rules,\nor lectures, or sermons, or legislation, or any other of those abortive\nmeans by which we from time to time endeavour to change poor human\nnature, if they are not permitted to _see_ what they are taught they\nshould practise, and to hold intercourse with those whose manners are\nsuperior to their own.\"  This intercourse will probably lead to something\nlike accomplishments among the young people.  Some of them will profit\nmore than others from the manners and accomplishments which they will\nobserve.  And such differences will create a higher order of love among\nthe working people.  The manners of one sex will become different from\nthe manners of the other; and the difference of individuals in each sex\nwill be brought into play.  All this is favourable to morality.  When\npeople work at the same kind of work, have no different pursuits to call\nout the different qualities of the two sexes, and have all of them\nmanners of the same rude stamp, you can hardly expect that there will be\nmuch to ennoble them in their affections.\n\nBut, in themselves, the accomplishments and acquirements, which working\npeople may attain from social intercourse with their betters, are great\nthings.  The same kind-hearted employer, whom I have quoted before,\nspeaks thus upon the subject.  \"Another point which has appeared to me of\ngreat importance is to provide as many resources as possible of interest\nand amusement for their leisure hours; something to which they may return\nwith renewed relish when their daily work is done; which may render their\nhomes cheerful and happy, and may afford subjects of thought,\nconversation and pursuit among them.\"  Moreover, a habit of attention,\nand even scientific modes of thought, are often called out in young\npeople when they are learning some game.  Besides to do anything, or know\nanything, which is harmless, is beneficial.  A man will not be a worse\nworkman because he can play at cricket, or at chess; or because he is a\ngood draughtsman, or can touch some musical instrument with skill.  He is\nlikely to have more self-respect, and to be a better citizen.  He cannot\nsucceed in anything without attention and endurance.  And these are the\nqualities which will enable him to behave reasonably in the vicissitudes\nof trade, or to prepare as much as possible against them.\n\nIn the Report on the condition of children and young persons employed in\nMines and Manufactures, there is some remarkable evidence given by a man\nwho had himself risen from the state of life which he describes.  It\nleads us to perceive the great good which any improvement in the domestic\naccomplishments of the women might be expected to produce.  He says,\n\n    \"Children during their childhood toil throughout the day, acquiring\n    not the least domestic instruction to fit them for wives and mothers.\n    I will name one instance; and this applies to the general condition\n    of females doomed to, and brought up amongst, shop-work.  My mother\n    worked in a manufactory from a very early age.  She was clever and\n    industrious; and, moreover, she had the reputation of being virtuous.\n    She was regarded as an excellent match for a working man.  She was\n    married early.  She became the mother of eleven children: I am the\n    eldest.  To the best of her ability she performed the important\n    duties of a wife and mother.  She was lamentably deficient in\n    domestic knowledge; in that most important of all human instruction,\n    how to make the home and the fireside to possess a charm for her\n    husband and children, she had never received one single lesson.  She\n    had children apace.  As she recovered from her lying-in, so she went\n    to work, the babe being brought to her at stated times to receive\n    nourishment.  As the family increased, so any thing like comfort\n    disappeared altogether.  The power to make home cheerful and\n    comfortable was never given to her.  She knew not the value of\n    cherishing in my father's mind a love of domestic objects.  Not one\n    moment's happiness did I ever see under my father's roof.  All this\n    dismal state of things I can distinctly trace to the entire and\n    perfect absence of all training and instruction to my mother.  He\n    became intemperate; and his intemperance made her necessitous.  She\n    made many efforts to abstain from shop-work; but her pecuniary\n    necessities forced her back into the shop.  The family was large, and\n    every moment was required at home.  I have known her, after the close\n    of a hard day's work, sit up nearly all night for several nights\n    together washing and mending of clothes.  My father could have no\n    comfort here.  These domestic obligations, which in a well-regulated\n    house (even in that of a working man, where there are prudence and\n    good management) would be done so as not to annoy the husband, to my\n    father were a source of annoyance; and he, from an ignorant and\n    mistaken notion, sought comfort in an alehouse.\n\n    \"My mother's ignorance of household duties; my father's consequent\n    irritability and intemperance; the frightful poverty; the constant\n    quarrelling; the pernicious example to my brothers and sisters; the\n    bad effect upon the future conduct of my brothers; one and all of us\n    being forced out to work so young that our feeble earnings would\n    produce only 1_s._ a-week; cold and hunger, and the innumerable\n    sufferings of my childhood, crowd upon my mind and overpower me.\n    They keep alive a deep anxiety for the emancipation of the thousands\n    of families in this great town and neighbourhood, who are in a\n    similar state of horrible misery.  My own experience tells me that\n    the instruction of the females in the work of a house, in teaching\n    them to produce cheerfulness and comfort at the fireside, would\n    prevent a great amount of misery and crime.  There would be fewer\n    drunken husbands and disobedient children.  As a working man, within\n    my own observation, female education is disgracefully neglected.  I\n    attach more importance to it than to any thing else.\"\n\nThis evidence is the more significant, because, one sees that the poor\nwoman had the material of character out of which the most engaging\nqualities might have been formed.  Let her have seen better things in\nearly life, and even if her schooling had been somewhat deficient, had\nshe but enjoyed the advantage of such social intercourse with her betters\nas we are now considering, that poor woman might have been a source of\njoy and hope to her family, instead of a centre of repulsion.\n\nDr. Cooke Taylor, in his \"Tour in the Manufacturing Districts,\" has given\na table, which I subjoin, \"showing the degree of instruction, age, and\nsex; of the persons taken into custody, summarily convicted, or held to\nbail, and tried and convicted, in Manchester, in the year 1841.\"  The\ntable was formed on statistical details furnished by Sir Charles Shaw.\nIt shows a state of facts which has been deduced from other tables of a\nlike nature, but the facts are of such moment, that they can hardly be\nkept too much in mind; especially when we consider that there are large\ntowns in which, as I have said before, half at least of the juvenile\npopulation is growing up without education of any kind whatever. {147}\nIf such are the favourable results even of that small and superficial\neducation, which by the way I would rather call instruction than\neducation, described in the second and third headings of the table, what\nmay we not expect from a training where the youth or maiden finds in her\nemployers not only instructors, but friends and occasional companions?\nWhat store of labour on the part of judges, jailors, and policemen, must\nbe saved by even a few of such employers.\n\n\n                                  TOTAL IN THE YEAR 1841.                                         Degree of Instruction\n\n                                                                1.  Neither Read nor     2.  Read only or      3.  Read and Write        4.  Superior\n                                                                       Write.              Read & Write               well.              Instruction.\n                                                                                           imperfectly.\n\n                             M. & F.     Male.       Fem.       Male.       Fem.       Male.       Fem.       Male.       Fem.       Male.       Fem.\n\n1st Class     Taken into          13345        9925       3420        4901       2070        3944       1218         873        119         207         13\n              Custody\n\n2nd Class     Summarily            2138        1661        447         795        265         660        198         193         14          13        . .\n              Convicted or\n              held to Bail\n\n3rd Class     Tried and              24         645        179         277        100         276         72          82          7          10        . .\n              Convicted\n\n\n\n\n\n                                                                        AGES.\n\n        Under 10        10 Years, &     15 Years, &     20 Years, &     25 Years, &     30 Years, &     40 Years, &     50 Years &      60 Years, &\n        Years of age.   under 15.       under 20.       under 25.       under 30.       under 40.       under 50.       under 60.       upwards.\n\n        Male.    Fem.   Male.    Fem.   Male.    Fem.   Male.    Fem.   Male.    Fem.   Male.    Fem.   Male.    Fem.   Male.    Fem.   Male.    Fem.\n\n1st         62       6     681      83    1581     656    2425     909    1805     755    1775     582    1018     284     422      85     156      60\nClass\n\n2nd          4     . .     151      17     302      84     418     150     264      93     327      75     129      39      49      14      17       5\nClass\n\n3rd        . .     . .      30       2     150      54     196      61      97      21     109      25      43      11      15       3       5       2\nClass\n\n\nSome persons may object to encouraging anything like refinement amongst\nthe operatives; and others, who would hardly object in open terms, find\nit difficult to reconcile themselves to the idea of it.  Whatever there\nis in this repugnance that arises from any selfish motive should be\ninstantly cast aside.  Do not let us be meanly afraid that the classes\nbelow us will tread too closely on our heels.  What a disgrace it is, if,\nwith our much larger opportunities of leisure, with professions that\ndemand a perpetual exercise of the intellectual faculties, we cannot\npreserve, on the average, an intellectual superiority fully equivalent to\nthe difference of rank and station.  Let the vast tracts now left barren\nsmile with cultivation: the happier lands, which the rivers of\ncivilization have enriched for ages, will still maintain their supremacy.\nAnd remember this, that every insight you give the humbler classes into\nthe vast expanse of knowledge, you give them the means of estimating with\na deference founded on reason, those persons who do possess knowledge of\nany kind.  Let us have faith that knowledge must in the long run lead to\ngood; and let us not fancy that our prosperity as a class depends upon\nthe ignorance of those beneath us.  Has not our partial enlightenment\ntaught us in some measure to be reconciled to the fact of there being\nclasses above us?  And why should we fear that knowledge, which smoothes\nso many of the rugged things in life, should be found unavailing to\nsoften the inequalities of social distinction?  It is the ignorant\nbarbarians who can pluck the Roman Senate by the beard; and who, in the\ndepth of savageness, can see nothing in sex, age, station, or office, to\ndemand their veneration.  Make the men around you more rational, more\ninstructed, more helpful, more hopeful creatures if you can; above all\nthings treat them justly: and I think you may put aside any apprehension\nof disturbing the economy of the various orders of the state.  And if it\ncan be so disturbed, let it be.\n\nWhat I have said above is not drawn from airy fancies of my own.  Such\nthings as I have suggested, have been done.  I could mention one man, who\nmight not, however, thank me for naming him, who has devoted himself to\nthe social improvement of his working people: and, without such an\nexample, I should never, perhaps, have thought of, or ventured to put\nforward, the above suggestions with respect to the social intercourse\nbetween masters and men.  It is the same benevolent manufacturer from\nwhose letters to Mr. Horner I have made extracts before.  The general\nsystem on which he has acted may be best explained in his own words.  \"In\nall plans for the education of the labouring classes my object would be\n_not to raise any individuals among them above their condition_, _but to\nelevate the condition itself_.  For I am not one of those who think that\nthe highest ambition of a working man should be to rise above the station\nin which Providence has placed him, or that he should be taught to\nbelieve that because the humblest, it is therefore the least happy and\ndesirable condition of humanity.  This is, indeed, a very common notion\namong the working classes of the people, and a very natural one; and it\nhas been encouraged by many of their superiors, who have interested\nthemselves in the cause of popular improvement, and have undertaken to\ndirect and stimulate their exertions.  Examples have constantly been held\nup of men who by unusual ability and proficiency in some branch of\nscience had raised themselves above the condition of their birth, and\nrisen to eminence and wealth; and these instances have been dwelt upon\nand repeated, in a manner, that, whether intentionally or not, produces\nthe impression that positive and scientific knowledge is the summum bonum\nof human education, and that to rise above our station in life, should be\nthe great object of our exertion.  This is not my creed.  I am satisfied\nthat it is an erroneous one, in _any_ system of education for _any_ class\nof men.  Our object ought to be, not to produce a few clever individuals,\ndistinguished above their fellows by their comparative superiority, but\nto make the great mass of individuals on whom we are operating, virtuous,\nsensible, well-informed, and well-bred men.\"  And again he states that\nhis object is \"to show to his people and to others, that there is nothing\nin the nature of their employment, or in the condition of their humble\nlot, that condemns them to be rough, vulgar, ignorant, miserable, or\npoor:--that there is nothing in either that forbids them to be\nwell-bred--well-informed, well-mannered--and surrounded by every comfort\nand enjoyment that can make life happy;--in short, to ascertain and to\nprove what the condition of this class of people might be made--what _it\nought to be_ made--what is the interest of all parties that _it should\nbe_ made.\"\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nBefore concluding this chapter, I must say a few more words on the\ngeneral subject of interference.  No one can be more averse than I am to\nunnecessary interference, or more ready to perceive the many evils which\nattend it.  There is, however, the danger of carrying non-interference\ninto inhumanity.  Mankind are so accustomed to the idea that government\nmainly consists in coercion, that they sometimes find it difficult to\nconsider interference, even as applied to benevolent undertakings, and\nfor social government, in any other than a bad light.  But take the rule\nof a father, which is the type of all good government, that under which\nthe divine jurisdiction has been graciously expressed to us.  Consider\nhow a wise father will act as regards interference.  His anxiety will not\nbe to drag his child along, undeviatingly, in the wake of his own\nexperience; but rather, to endue him with that knowledge of the chart and\ncompass, and that habitual observation of the stars, which will enable\nthe child, himself, to steer safely over the great waters.  Such a father\nwill not be unreasonably solicitous to assimilate his son's character or\npurposes to his own.  He will not fall into the error of supposing that\nexperience is altogether a transferable commodity.  The greatest good\nwhich he designs for his son will, perhaps, be that which he can give him\nindirectly, and which he may never speak to the youth about.  He will\nseek to surround him with good opportunities and favourable means: and\neven when he interferes more directly, he will endeavour, in the first\ninstance, to lead rather than to compel, so that some room for choice may\nstill be left.  Not thinking that his own power, his own dignity, his own\nadvantage are the chief objects for him to look to, his imagination will\noften be with those whom he rules; and he will thus be able to look at\nhis own conduct with their eyes, not with his.  This, alone, will keep\nhim from a multiplicity of errors.  Now the same principles, actuated by\nthe same kind of love, should be at the bottom of all social government.\nI believe that we shall be better able in practice to place wise limits\nto interference by regulating and enlightening the animus which prompts\nit, than by laying down rules for its action determined upon abstract\nconsiderations.  The attempt to fix such rules is not to be despised; but\nif the persons, or society, about to interfere on any occasion, desired a\ngood object from right motives, I think they would have the best chance\nof keeping themselves from using wrong means.  In many cases, an unwise\ninterference takes place from a partial apprehension of the good to be\naimed at: enlarge and exalt the object; let it not be one-sided; and\nprobably the mode of attaining it will partake largely of the wisdom\nshown in the choice of it.  If, for instance, a government saw that it\nhad to encourage, not only judicious physical arrangements, but mental\nand moral development, amongst those whom it governs, it would be very\ncautious of suppressing, or interfering with, any good thing which the\npeople would accomplish for themselves.  The same with a private\nindividual, an employer of labour for instance, if he values the\nindependence of character and action in those whom he employs, he will be\ncareful in all his benevolent measures, to leave room for their energy to\nwork.  What does he want to produce?  Something vital, not something\nmechanical.  It is often a deficiency of benevolence, and not an\noverflow, that makes people interfering in a bad sense.  Frequently the\nsame spirit which would make a man a tyrant in government, would make him\na busy-body, a meddler, or a pedantic formalist, in the relations of\nordinary life.  I have taken the instance of father and son, which might\nbe supposed by many as one in which extreme interference was not only\njustifiable, but requisite.  In stating how necessary it is even there to\nbe very careful as regards the extent and mode of interference, I leave\nmy readers to estimate how essential it must be in all other cases where\nthe relation is not of that closely connected character.  I believe that\nthe parental relation will be found the best model on which to form the\nduties of the employer to the employed; calling, as it does, for active\nexertion, requiring the most watchful tenderness, and yet limited by the\nstrictest rules of prudence from intrenching on that freedom of thought\nand action which is necessary for all spontaneous development.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\nSOURCES OF BENEVOLENCE.\n\n\nThere is a common phrase which is likely to become a most powerful\nantagonist to any arguments that have been put forward in the foregoing\npages: and I think it would be good policy for me to commence the attack,\nand endeavour to expose its weakness in the first instance.  If you\npropose any experiment for remedying an evil, it is nearly sure to be\nobserved that your plan is well enough in theory, but that it is not\npractical.  Under that insidious word \"practical\" lurk many meanings.\nPeople are apt to think that a thing is not practical, unless it _has_\nbeen tried, is immediate in its operation, or has some selfish end in\nview.  Many who do not include, either avowedly, or really, the two\nlatter meanings, incline, almost unconsciously perhaps, to adopt the\nformer, and think that a plan, of which the effects are not foreknown,\ncannot be practical.  Every new thing, from Christianity downwards, has\nbeen suspected, and slighted, by such minds.  All that is greatest in\nscience, art, or song, has met with a chilling reception from them.  When\nthis apprehensive timidity of theirs is joined to a cold or selfish\nspirit, you can at best expect an Epicurean deportment from them.\nWarming themselves in the sun of their own prosperity, they soothe their\nconsciences by saying how little can be done for the unfed, shivering,\nmultitude around them.  Such men may think that it is practical wisdom to\nmake life as palatable as it can be, taking no responsibility that can be\navoided, and shutting out assiduously the consideration of other men's\ntroubles from their minds.  Such, however, is not the wisdom inculcated\nin that religion which, as Goethe well says, is grounded on \"Reverence\nfor what is under us,\" and which teaches us \"to recognize humility and\npoverty, mockery and despite, disgrace and wretchedness, suffering and\ndeath, as things divine.\"\n\nThere is a class of men utterly different from those above alluded to,\nwho, far from entertaining any Epicurean sentiments, are prone to view\nwith fear the good things of this world.  And, indeed, seeing the\nmultiform suffering which is intertwined with every variety of human\nlife, a man in present ease and well-being may naturally feel as if he\nhad not his share of what is hard to be endured.  The fanatic may seek a\nrefuge from prosperity, or strive to elevate his own nature, by\nself-inflicted tortures; but one, who adds wisdom to sensibility, finds\nin his own well-being an additional motive for benevolent exertions.  It\nis surely bad management when a man does not make a large part of his\nself-sacrifices subservient to the welfare of his fellow-men.  In active\nlife nothing avails more than self-denial; and there its trials are\nvarying and multifarious: but ascetics, by placing their favourite virtue\nin retirement, made it dwindle down into one form only of self-restraint.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nI suppose there are few readers of history who have not occasionally\nturned from its pages with disgust, confusion, a craving for any grounds\nof disbelief, and a melancholy darkness of soul.  It can hardly be\notherwise, when you read, for instance, of the colossal brutalities of\nthe Roman Emperors, many of whom indulged in a sportive cruelty to their\nfellow men, which reminds one of children with insects.  When you find,\nagain, some mighty Master of the World, renowned for valour, and for\nprudence, one of those emphatically called the \"Good\" Emperors, kindly\npresenting hundreds of men to kill each other for the amusement of the\nRoman multitude--when you are told that that multitude contained, what\nmay have been for that age, good men, and gentle women--when, passing\nlower down the turbid stream of the recorded past, you read of Popes and\nCardinals, Inquisitors and Bishops, men who must have heard from time to\ntime some portions of the holy words of mercy and of love, when you find\nthem, I say, counselling and plotting and executing, the foulest deeds of\nblood--when, descending lower still, you approach those days when law\nbecame the tyrant's favourite scourge, and you find the legal slave\ntelling his master how he has interrogated some poor wretch \"in torture,\nbefore torture, after torture, and between torture\"--when you have some\ninsight into what that thing torture was, by contrasting the hand-writing\nof the distracted sufferer before and after his examination--when, to\nyour surprise, you read that these very victims of persecution, were\nthemselves restless and dissatisfied, unless they could direct the arm of\npower against another persecuted race--and when, coming to your own day,\nyou find that men, separated from you by distance, though not by time,\ncan show the utmost recklessness of human life, if differently coloured\nfrom their own.  Pondering over these things, your heart may well seek\ncomfort in the thought that these tyrants were, or are, rude men, of iron\nframe, ready to inflict, ready themselves to suffer.  It is not so.  A\nNero clings to his own life with abject solicitude.  A Louis the\nEleventh, who could keep other men in cages, wearies Heaven with prayers,\nand Earth with strange devices, to preserve his own grotesque existence.\nA James the First, who can sanction at the least, if not direct, the\ntorture to be applied to a poor, old, clergyman, was yet in the main a\nsoft-hearted man, can feel most tenderly for a broken limb of any\nfavourite, have an anxious affection for \"Steenie and Baby Charles,\" and\nan undoubted, and provident, regard for his own \"sacred\" person.  What\nshall we say, too, of that Chancellor of his, a man, like his master, of\na soft heart, full of the widest humanity, and yet, as far as we know,\nunconscious of the horror of those ill doings transacted in his own great\npresence?  Why is it that I recall these things?  Why do I bring forward\nwhat many of us, forgetting the iron weight with which the sentiments of\nhis age press down even upon the mightiest genius, might look upon as a\nhumiliating circumstance far greater than it is, in the life of a man we\nought all to love so much?  Is history a thing done away with, or is not\nthe past for ever in the present?  And is it not but too probable that we\nourselves are occasionally guilty of things which, for our lights, are as\nsad aberrations as those which, in reading of the past, we have dwelt\nupon with the profoundest pity, and turned away from in overwhelming\namazement?  Are we quite sure that none of the vices of tyranny rest with\nus; and that we individually, or nationally, have not to answer for any\ncarelessness of human life or for any indifference to human suffering?\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nWhat is it that has put a stop to many of the obvious atrocities I allude\nto as disgracing the page of history?  The introduction of some great\nidea, the recognition, probably, in some distinct form of the command \"to\ndo unto others as you would they should do unto you.\"  And this is what\nis wanted with regard to the relation of the employer and employed.  Once\nlet the minds even of a few men be imbued with an ampler view of this\nrelation, and it is scarcely possible to estimate the good that may\nfollow.  Around that just idea what civilization may not grow up!  You\ngaze at the lofty cathedral in the midst of narrow streets and squalid\nbuildings, but all welcome to your sight as the places where miserable\nmen first found sanctuary; you pass on and look with pleasure at the rich\nshops and comfortable dwellings; and then you find yourself amongst ample\nstreets, stately squares, and the palaces of the great, with their\ncolumns and their statues: and if then you turn your thoughts to the\ncomplex varieties of modern life, and the progress of civilization and\nhumanity, may you not see the same thing there; how all that is good, and\nmerciful, and holy, is to be traced up to some cathedral truths, at first\nlittle understood, just restraining rude men from bloody deeds, and then\ngradually extending into daily life, being woven into our familiar\nthoughts, and shedding light, and security, and sanctity, around us?\nAnd, as the traveller's first impulse, when he rises in the morning after\nhis journey, is to catch a glimpse of that famous building which must\never be the thing most worthy of note in the city; so, in your travels,\nwould you not look first for these cathedral truths, and delight to\nrecognize their beneficent influence wherever you may meet with anything\nthat is good in man?\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nAnd now, reader, I have come to the close of this Essay.  I do not assert\nthat I have brought forward any specific, or even any new remedy of a\npartial nature, for the evils I have enumerated.  Indeed I have not\nfeared to reiterate hacknied truths.  But you may be sure, that if you do\nnot find yourself recurring again and again to the most ordinary maxims,\nyou do not draw your observations from real life.  Oh, if we could but\nbegin by believing and acting upon some of the veriest common places!\nBut it is with pain and grief that we come to understand our first\ncopy-book sentences.  As to the facts, too, on which I have grounded my\nreasonings, they are mostly well known, or might be so; for I have been\ncontent to follow other men's steps, and so assist in wearing a pathway\nfor the public mind.  I am well aware that I have left untouched many\nmatters bearing closely on the subject, more closely, perhaps, some of my\nreaders will think, than the topics I have taken.  In the fields,\nhowever, of politics, and political economy, there are many reapers: and\nthe part of the subject which I have chosen seemed to me of sufficient\nimportance to be considered by itself.  I know that in much of what I\nhave said, I have touched with an unpractised hand, upon matters which\nsome of those who are great employers of labour will have examined and\nmastered thoroughly.  Still, let them remember, that it is one thing to\ncriticise, and another to act.  Their very familiarity with the subject\nmay render them dull to the means of doing good which their position\naffords them.  We pass much of our time in thinking what we might do if\nwe were somewhat different from what we are; and the duties appropriate\nto our present position invite our attention in vain.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nTo others I may say, there is nothing in these pages, perhaps, that will\nexactly point out the path most fitting for you to take; still I cannot\nbut think that so many have been indicated, that you will have no\ndifficulty in finding some one that may lead to the main object if your\nheart is set upon it.  If you throw but a mite into the treasury of good\nwill which ought to exist between the employers and the employed, you do\nsomething towards relieving one of the great burdens of this age,\npossibly of all ages; you aid in cementing together the various orders of\nthe state; you are one of those who anticipate revolutions by doing some\nlittle part of their duty towards the men of their own time; and, if you\nwant any reward to allure you on, you will find it in the increased\naffection towards your fellows which you will always have, when you have\nendeavoured to be just to them.\n\nBut I would wish to put more solemn considerations before you.  Ask\nyourself, if making all allowance for the difference of times and\ncountries, you think that the payment of poor rates, of itself, fulfils\nthe command to visit the sick, clothe the naked, and feed the hungry.\nDepend upon it, our duties, however they may be varied by the different\ncircumstances of different periods, cannot be satisfied by any thing that\nthe state demands of us, or can do for us.  We have each, from the\nhighest to the lowest, a circle of dependents.  We say that Kings are\nGod's Vicegerents upon earth: but almost every human being has at one\ntime or other of his life, a portion of the happiness of those around him\nin his power, which might make him tremble, if he did but see it in all\nits fullness.  But at any rate, the relation of master and man is a\nmatter of manifest and large importance.  It pervades all societies, and\naffects the growth and security of states in the most remarkable and\npregnant manner; it requires the nicest care; gives exercise to the\nhighest moral qualities; has a large part in civil life; a larger part in\ndomestic life; and our conduct in it will surely be no mean portion of\nthe account which we shall have to render in the life that is to come.\n\n\n\nAPPENDIX.\n\n\nAccording to tables of which Mr. Grainger states that he has ascertained\nthe general accuracy, the proportionate numbers among the working-classes\nin the Birmingham district at present receiving education are as\nfollows:--Out of a population of 180,000 persons,\n\n10,902 or 6.05 per cent. attend day or evening schools only;\n\n4,141 or 2.30 per cent. attend both day or evening and Sunday-schools;\n\n12,616 or 7.01 per cent. attend a Sunday-school only; making a total\nof\n\n27,659 or 15.36 per cent. of the population attending schools of some\nkind or other.\n\nOf this number--\n\n5,835 are under 5 or above 15 years of age; leaving\n\n21,824 children between the ages of 5 and 15 attending school in the\nborough of Birmingham at the time the schools were visited.\n\nAccording to the population abstracts of 1821 and 1831, one-fourth of the\ntotal population consists of children between these ages.  Hence it would\nappear, that of the 45,000 between the ages of 5 and 15 in the borough of\nBirmingham--\n\n21,824 or 48.5 per cent. were receiving instruction in day and\nSunday-schools; and\n\n23,176 or 51.5 per cent. were not found receiving instruction in\neither day or Sunday-schools within the borough of Birmingham.\n\n                    (Grainger, Evidence: App.  Pt. I., p. _f_ 185, 1. 13.)\n\nIn the Wolverhampton district, including the neighbouring towns of\nWillenhall, Bilston, Wednesfield, Sedgley, Darlaston, and also in the\ntowns of Dudley, Walsall, Wednesbury, and Stourbridge, though there are\nmany day-schools, yet the chief means relied on for the education of the\nworking classes are Sunday-schools.  In the Collegiate Church district in\nthe town of Wolverhampton, containing a population of from 16,000 to\n20,000 persons, there is no National or British School.  There is not a\nsingle school, reading-room, or lending library attached to any of the\nmanufactories, foundries, or other works, with one exception near\nWednesbury; there are no evening-schools, and there is only one\nindustrial school in these districts, namely, at Wednesbury.  It is\nstated in evidence that the great majority of the children receive no\neducation at all; that not one half of them go even to the\nSunday-schools, and that those who do go to these schools seldom attend\nthem with regularity.  Throughout the whole of these districts, the\nproportion that can read is represented as being unusually small; some\nwho stated that they could read, when examined, were found unable to read\na word; and out of 41 witnesses under eighteen years of age examined at\nDarlaston, only four could write their names.  (Horne, Report: App. Pt.\nII., p. Q 16, ss. 182 _et seq._)\n\n\"The number of children on the books at the different schools in\nSheffield, comprising every description of schools,\" says Mr. Symons,\n\"was made the subject of minute and accurate inquiry in 1838, by the Rev.\nThomas Sutton, the vicar; and I have reason to believe that no material\ndifference has taken place in the amount of scholars taught at the\n'common' and 'middling' private day-schools since Mr. Sutton's census was\nmade.\"  From this census it appears that the maximum number of children\non the books of the different day-schools, including the infant-schools,\nis 800; but on a personal examination of these schools by the\nSub-Commissioner, he states that a large proportion, no less than 26.47\nper cent. out of the total number on the books, must be deducted as being\ncontinually absent.  \"Assuming,\" therefore, he continues, \"that the\nschools thus estimated are a criterion of the rest (and they are\ncertainly superior), the number who attend the schools out of the 8000 on\nthe books is only 5869.  Of the number present at the schools visited,\nwhen probably the least instructed were absent, it appears that 45.83 per\ncent. were unable to read fairly, and that 63.43 per cent. could not\nwrite fairly.  Taking this as an index to the education of the total\nnumber on the books, it results that, of the whole 8000, 4333 only can\nread fairly, and 2925 only can write fairly, or, in other terms, have\nattained an elemental education.\"\n\nThe population of Sheffield _parish_ is computed to be 123,000.  Of this\nnumber it is assumed that at least one-fifth will consist of children\nbetween the ages of three and thirteen.  There will be therefore 24,600.\nOf these more than two-thirds will be of the working classes: at least\n16,500, then, of these classes are of an age at which they ought to be\nreceiving education at day-schools; yet little more than one-third of\nthis number, viz. one only out of 2.8 attend day-schools.  It is\nimpossible to ascertain what proportion of those who do not attend\nday-schools can read or write; but as it is certain that they are less\ninstructed by at least one-half, I have every reason to believe that, out\nof the total 16,500 working class children, not above 6,500 can read\nfairly.  Among the older youths there is still less education, for they\nhave had more time to forget the little they were formerly taught.  This\nestimate is so thoroughly corroborated by the most trustworthy evidence I\nhave received, that I entertain the belief that two-thirds of the working\nclass children and young persons are growing up in a state of ignorance,\nand are unable to read.  On the books of the Sunday-schools there were\nduring the last year 2258, of which the average attendance was only 1708.\nFrom this it appears that 24.40 per cent. or nearly a quarter, are absent\nof the whole number on the books of the Sunday-schools.  (Report: App.\nPt. I. pp. E 18 _et seq_. ss. 136, 138, 144-148, 150, 151.)\n\nIn the returns from the Warrington district it is stated that nearly\nthree-fourths of the children can read; but the Sub-Commissioner reports\nthat of this number nine-tenths can only give the sound of a few\nmonosyllables; that they have just acquired so much knowledge in the\nSunday-schools, and that they will probably attain to little more during\ntheir lives.  (Austin, Report: App.  Pt.  II. p.  M 19, ss. 125 _et\nseq._)\n\n_Report on the Physical and Moral Condition of the Children and young\nPersons employed in Mines and Manufactures_.\n\n\n\n\nII.  AN ESSAY ON THE MEANS OF IMPROVING THE HEALTH AND INCREASING THE\nCOMFORT OF THE LABOURING CLASSES.\n\n\nThis Essay is chiefly based on evidence respecting the condition of the\nlabouring classes in towns.  It is not, however, necessary, on that\naccount, to consider the subject as applying to those classes only.\nThere is good reason to believe that the state of the agricultural\nlabourers does not differ much, at least in kind, from that of the\nworking people in towns.  The remedies for the evils in both are of the\nsame nature; and whatever results are arrived at with respect to the\nhealth of towns may generally be adapted, without much difficulty, to the\nwants of the rural population.\n\n                                                                   London,\n                                                             Feb. 6, 1845.\n\n\n\nCHAP.  I.\nDISTRESS AMONGST THE LABOURING CLASSES.\n\n\nKnowing that there is an element of decay in any over-statement, I was\nvery anxious, in the former Essay, to avoid even the least exaggeration\nin describing the distressed state of the labouring people.  This anxiety\nwas, in that case, needless.  An elaborate Report has since been\npublished by the Health of Towns Commission; and the evidence there given\nmore than bears out the statements which I then made.\n\nIndeed, the condition of a large part of the labouring classes, as seen\nin this Report, is evidently one which endangers the existence amongst\nthem of economy, decency, or morality.  You may there see how more than\nsavage is savage life led in a great city.  Dr. Southwood Smith in his\nevidence says,\n\n    \"The experiment has been long tried on a large scale with a dreadful\n    success, affording the demonstration that if, from early infancy, you\n    allow human beings to live like brutes, you can degrade them down to\n    their level, leaving them scarcely more intellect, and no feelings\n    and affections proper to human minds and hearts.\"\n\nHe mentions that it has happened to him, in his visits to the poor, as\nPhysician to the Eastern Dispensary, to be unable to stay in the room,\neven to write the prescription.\n\n    \"What must it be,\" he adds, \"to live in such an atmosphere, and to go\n    through the process of disease in it?\"\n\nIn another place he says,\n\n    \"You cannot in fact cure.  As long as the poor remain in the\n    situations which produce their disease, the proper remedies for such\n    disease cannot be applied to them.\"\n\nThis state of things, too, according to the same authority, is advancing\non us:\n\n    \"Whatever may be the cause, the fact is certain, that at the present\n    time an epidemic is prevailing, which lays prostrate the powers of\n    life more rapidly and completely than any other epidemic that has\n    appeared for a long series of years.\"\n\nThe experienced student of history, reading of long wars, looks for their\nconsummation in the coming pestilence.  Gathering itself up, now from the\nravaged territory, now from the beleaguered town, now from the carnage of\nthe battle field, this awful form arises at last in its full strength,\nand rushing over the world, leaves far behind man's puny efforts at\nextermination.  We have a domestic pestilence, it seems, dwelling with\nus; and if we look into the causes of that, shall we find less to blame,\nor less to mourn over, than in the insane wars which are the more\nacknowledged heralds of this swift destruction?  But, to return to\ndetail.  Mr. Toynbee, one of the surgeons of the St. George's and the St.\nJames's Dispensary, tells us:\n\n    \"In the class of patients to our dispensary, nearly all the families\n    have but a single room each, and a very great number have only one\n    bed to each family.  The state of things in respect to morals, as\n    well as health, I sometimes find to be terrible.  I am now attending\n    one family, where the father, about 50, the mother about the same\n    age, a grown up son about 20, in a consumption, and a daughter about\n    17, who has scrofulous affection of the jaw and throat, for which I\n    am attending her, and a child, all sleep in the same bed in a room\n    where the father and three or four other men work during the day as\n    tailors, and they frequently work there late at night with candles.\n    I am also treating, at this present time, a woman with paralysis of\n    the lower extremities, the wife of the assistant to a stable-keeper,\n    whose eldest son, the son by a former wife, and a girl of 11 or 12\n    years of age, all sleep in the same bed!  In another case which I am\n    attending in one room, there are a man and his wife, a grown up\n    daughter, a boy of 16, and a girl of 13; the boy has scrofulous\n    ulcers in the neck; the father, though only of the age of 49, suffers\n    from extreme debility and a broken constitution.\"\n\nThe medical officer of the Whitechapel Union says,\n\n    \"I know of few instances where there is more than one room to a\n    family.\"\n\nMr. Austin, an architect, gives us the following description of Snow's\nRents, Westminster, which is but one instance \"among many worse,\" of the\nstate of things produced simply by the want, as he expresses it, of\n\"proper structural arrangement and control.\"\n\n    \"This court is of considerable width, upwards of 20 feet, but the\n    houses are mostly without yards, and the refuse, when become\n    intolerable inside the houses, is deposited in the court itself, the\n    whole centre being a pool of black stagnant filth, that accumulates\n    from time to time, and is left to decompose and infect the whole\n    neighbourhood.  Ventilation, or rather a healthy state of the\n    atmosphere is impossible.  What little disturbance of the air does\n    take place, would appear only to render its state more intolerable.\"\n\nBeing asked what the condition of this court is with regard to drainage\nand the supply of water, he says,\n\n    \"There are none whatever there.  In wet weather, when the water\n    attains a certain height In the court, it finds its way into an open,\n    black, pestilence-breathing ditch in a neighbouring court; but in the\n    ordinary state of things the whole centre of this place is one mass\n    of wet decomposing filth, that lies undisturbed for weeks, from\n    which, so dreadful is the effluvia at times arising, that in the\n    tenants' own words, 'they are often ready to faint, it's so bad!'\n    The supply of water consists in this: that 16 houses are accommodated\n    with one stand pipe in the court!  On the principal cleaning day,\n    Sunday, the water is on for about five minutes, and it is on also for\n    three days in the week for one half hour, and so great is the rush to\n    obtain a modicum before it is turned off, that perpetual quarrelling\n    and disturbance is the result.\"\n\nIf we go now from the Metropolis to some of the great towns, we find,\nsubstantially, the same account, varied by the special circumstances of\neach place.  Liverpool, which we will look at next, is probably the\nworst.  An official enumeration of the court and cellar population of\nthat town was made two years ago, from which it appeared that 55,534\npersons, more than one-third of the working classes, inhabited courts;\nand 20,168 persons lived in cellars.  There are also cellars in the\ncourts containing probably 2000 inhabitants.\n\n    \"With regard to the _character_ of these courts, 629, or nearly\n    one-third, were closed at both ends; 875, or less than one-half, were\n    open at one end; and only 478, or less than one-fourth, open at both\n    ends.\n\n    \"The cellars are 10 or 12 feet square; generally flagged,--but\n    frequently having only the bare earth for a floor,--and sometimes\n    less than six feet in height.  There is frequently no window, so that\n    light and air can gain access to the cellar only by the door, the top\n    of which is often not higher than the level of the street.  In such\n    cellars, ventilation is out of the question.  They are of course\n    dark; and from the defective drainage, they are also very generally\n    damp.  There is sometimes a back-cellar, used as a sleeping\n    apartment, having no direct communication with the external\n    atmosphere, and deriving its scanty supply of light and air solely\n    from the front apartment.\"\n\nThe above extract, and the numbers of the court and cellar population,\nare taken from Dr. Duncan's evidence.  He thinks, from extensive data in\nhis possession, that the numbers, as given in this enumeration, are under\nthe mark.  And it is suggested that, possibly, casual lodgers have been\nomitted.  Dr. Duncan then gives some further details which enable us more\nfully to understand what dog-holes these cellars are.\n\n    \"Of the entire number of cellars, 1617 have the back apartment I have\n    mentioned; while of 5297 whose measurements are given, 1771, or\n    one-third, are from five to six feet deep,--2324 are from four to\n    five feet, and 1202 from three to four feet below the level of the\n    street: 5273, or more than five-sixths, have no windows to the front;\n    and 2429, or about 44 per cent. are reported as being either damp or\n    wet.\"\n\nIn cellars of this kind there are sometimes 30 human beings, sometimes\nmore, \"furnished,\" as Dr. Duncan tells us, \"with a supply of air\nsufficient for the wants of only seven.\"  Occasionally, in this Report,\nthere are scenes described in a circumstantial, Dutch-picture way which\nthe most vigorous imagination, priding itself on its ingenuity in\ndepicting wretchedness, would hardly have conceived.  Take the following\ninstance from the evidence of Mr. Holme of Liverpool.\n\n    \"Some time ago I visited a poor woman in distress, the wife of a\n    labouring man.  She had been confined only a few days, and herself\n    and infant were lying on straw in a vault through the outer cellar,\n    with a clay floor, impervious to water.  There was no light nor\n    ventilation in it, and the air was dreadful.  _I had to walk on\n    bricks across the floor to reach her bed-side_, _as the floor itself\n    was flooded with stagnant water_.  This is by no means an\n    extraordinary case, for I have witnessed scenes equally wretched; and\n    it is only necessary to go into Crosby-street, Freemason's row, and\n    many cross streets out of Vauxhall-road, to find hordes of poor\n    creatures living in cellars, which are almost as bad and offensive as\n    charnel houses.  In Freemason's-row I found, about two years ago, a\n    court of houses, the floors of which were below the public street,\n    and the area of the whole court was a floating mass of putrefied\n    animal and vegetable matter, so dreadfully offensive that I was\n    obliged to make a precipitate retreat.  Yet the whole of the houses\n    were inhabited!\"\n\nThink what materials for every species of comfort and luxury, are\nperpetually circulating through Liverpool.  If there had not been, for\nmany a day, a sad neglect of supervision on the part of the employers,\nand great improvidence on that of the employed, we should not see the\nthird part of the working population of such a town immersed in the most\nabject wretchedness, and all this wealth passing through and leaving so\nlittle of the comforts of life in the active hands through which it has\npassed.  It may be said, however, that a considerable part of the\npopulation of Liverpool is immigrant, and Irish.  Turn then to\nNottingham, or York, or Preston, it is the same story.  Mr. Hawksley, the\nengineer, says of Nottingham:\n\n    \"With few exceptions the houses of Nottingham and its vicinity are\n    laid out either in narrow streets, or more commonly are built in\n    confined courts and alleys, the entrance to which is usually through\n    a tunnel from 30 to 36 inches wide, about 8 feet high, and from 25 to\n    30 feet long, so that purification by the direct action of the air\n    and solar light is in the great majority of these cases perfectly\n    impracticable.  Upwards of 7000 houses are erected _back to back and\n    side to side_, and are of course by this injurious arrangement\n    deprived of the means of adequate ventilation and decent privacy.\"\n\nDr. Laycock says of York,\n\n    \"From these inquiries it appears that in the parish of St. Dennis, in\n    which strict accuracy was observed, from 8 to 11 persons slept in one\n    room in 4.5 per cent. of the families resident there; in 7.5 per\n    cent. from 6 to 8 persons slept in one room; of the total 2195\n    families visited by the district visitors, 26 per cent. had one room\n    only for all purposes.\"\n\nThe Rev. Mr. Clay gives an account of an examination of a part of\nPreston,\n\n    \"The streets, courts, and yards examined contain about 422 dwellings,\n    inhabited at the time of the inquiry by 2400 persons sleeping in 852\n    beds, i.e. an average of 5.68 inhabitants to each house, and 2.8\n    persons to each bed.\n\n    \"In 84 cases 4 persons slept in the same bed.\n    ,, 28 ,, 5\n    ,, 13 ,, 6\n    ,, 3 ,, 7\n    ,, 1 ,, 8\n\n    \"And, in addition, a family of 8 on bed stocks covered with a little\n    straw.\"\n\nThe results of statistical investigations, with respect to the duration\nof life, are in unison with the inferences that we should naturally make\nfrom the facts before us.  Dr. Laycock shows us that in York, in the best\ndrained parishes, where the population to the square rood is 27, and the\nmean altitude above the sea in feet is 50, the mean age at death is\n35.32; in intermediate parishes, where the population is denser and the\naltitude less, the mean age at death is 27.29; in the worst drained,\nworst ventilated, and lowest situated parishes, the mean age at death is\n22.57.  He mentions a fact well worth noticing, that the cholera in 1832\nbroke out in the court called \"the Hagworm's nest,\" which is in the same\nspot where the pestilences of 1551 and 1604 had dwelt.  Surely, in these\nlast two hundred years, we might have drained and ventilated a locality\nwhich experience had shown to be so attractive to epidemics.  The Rev.\nMr. Clay has furnished a table, subjoined in the Appendix, showing the\nprogressive diminution of vitality in the respective classes of gentry,\ntradesmen, and operatives, at Preston.  Dr. Duncan says respecting the\nmortality of Liverpool,\n\n    \"While in Rodney Street and Abercromby Wards, with upwards of 30,000\n    inhabitants, the mortality is below that of Birmingham--the most\n    favoured in this respect of the large towns in England--in Vauxhall\n    Ward, with a nearly equal amount of population, the mortality exceeds\n    that which prevails in tropical regions. * * * * * 177 persons die\n    annually in Vauxhall Ward for every 100 dying out of an equal amount\n    of population in Rodney Street and Abercromby Wards.\"\n\nVauxhall Ward is where the greater number of inhabitants dwell in\ncellars.  Well may Dr. Duncan, in commenting on this difference of\nmortality in Vauxhall Ward and Rodney Street, declare that it is a fact\n\"sufficient to arouse the attention and stimulate the exertions of the\nmost indifferent.\"\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThe average age at death in the following classes is made out from all\nthe deaths which took place in the Suburban, the Rural, and the Town\ndistricts of Sheffield in the three years, 1839, 1840, and 1841:\n\nGentry, professional persons, and their families            47.21\n\nTradesmen and their families                                27.18\n\n               Artisans, Labourers, and their families\n\nA.  Employed in different kinds of trade and handicraft     21.57\ncommon to all places\n\nB.  Employed in the various descriptions of manufacture     19.34\npursued in Sheffield and its neighbourhood\n\nPersons whose condition in life is undescribed              15.04\n\nPaupers in the Workhouse                                    25.51\n\nFarmers and their families                                  37.64\n\nAgricultural Labourers and their families                   30.89\n\nIn considering such statistics, the premature death of these poor people\nis not the saddest thing which presents itself to us, but the unhealthy,\nineffectual, uncared-for, uncaring life which is the necessary\nconcommitant of such a rapid rate of mortality.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nSince the publication of the preceding Essay, Mr. Pusey's \"Poor in\nScotland,\" an abstract which has brought the evidence taken before the\nScotch Poor Law Commission within short compass, has been published.\nThis evidence is of a nature that cannot be passed by.  We may think that\nsuch details are wearisome, but we must listen to them, if we would learn\nthe magnitude of the evil.  It is no use proceeding without a sufficient\nsubstratum of facts.  Turning then to this abstract, we find one minister\nin Edinburgh saying,\n\n    \"I visited a part of my parish on Friday last, and in all the houses\n    I found persons destitute of food, and completely destitute of fuel;\n    without an article of furniture; without beds or bedding, the inmates\n    lying on straw.\"\n\nAnother tells the Commissioners,\n\n    \"the allowance generally made, is not sufficient to keep them (the\n    outdoor pensioners) in existence at the lowest possible rate of\n    living.\"\n\nA third says\n\n    \"I have often trembled when I have gone at the call of duty to visit\n    the receptacles of wretchedness, because I felt that I could not\n    relieve the misery which I must look upon; and in such cases, nothing\n    but a sense of duty could compel me to go and visit the poor.\"\n\nAnd a fourth minister mentions that his poor parishioners had stated to\nhim\n\n    \"that they regarded themselves as outcasts from the sympathy of their\n    fellow-men.\"\n\nIt also appears from Dr. Alison's evidence that this distress is\nincreasing.  You read of Glasgow, always fruitful in extreme instances of\nmisery, that in one of the private poor-houses, 22 children were found,\nall afflicted with fever, and occupying a room _about fourteen feet\nsquare_.  The Superintendent of the Glasgow Police, speaking of a\ndistrict in the centre of the town, says\n\n    \"These places are filled by a population of many thousands of\n    miserable creatures.  The houses in which they live are altogether\n    unfit for human beings, and every apartment is filled with a\n    promiscuous crowd of men, women and children, in a state of filth and\n    misery.  In many of the houses there is scarcely any ventilation.\n    Dunghills lie in the vicinity of the dwellings, and from the\n    extremely defective sewerage, filth of every kind constantly\n    accumulates.\"\n\nTouching the immediate object of the enquiry, the relief of paupers, we\nfind that Humanity having gone with cold and cautious steps (giving 4_s._\na month, sometimes, to fathers and mothers of families) through the\nSouthern and middle regions of Scotland, becomes in the Highlands nearly\npetrified: at \"the utmost\" is only able to divide amongst \"the impotent\npoor about 3_s._ 6_d._ a-head for the whole year.\"  I dare say many\nthings may be urged against this, as against all other evidence--a bit\npicked off here, another pruned off there--this statement modified, that\na little explained.  Do what you will: this evidence, like that of the\nHealth of Towns Commission, remains a sad memorial of negligence on the\npart of the governing and employing classes.\n\nIt may be said that the improvidence of the labouring people themselves\nis a large item in the account of the causes of their distress.  I do not\ncontend that it is not, nor even that it is not the largest; and, indeed,\nit would be very rash to assert that this class has, alone, been innocent\nof the causes of its own distress.  But whatever part of their\nimprovidence is something in addition to the improvidence of ordinary\nmortals, belongs, I believe, to their want of education and of guidance.\nIt is, therefore, only putting the matter one step further off, to say\nthat their distress is mainly caused by their improvidence, when so much\nof their improvidence is the fruit of their unguided ignorance.  However\ntrue it may be, that moral remedies are the most wanted, we must not\nforget that such remedies can only be worked out by living men; and that\nit is to the most educated in heart and mind that we must turn first, to\nelicit and to spread any moral regeneration.  Besides, there is a state\nof physical degradation, not unfrequent in our lowest classes, where, if\nmoral good were sown, it could hardly be expected to grow, or even to\nmaintain its existence.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThe extracts given in the foregoing pages present some of the salient\npoints which these new materials afford of the distressed state of the\nlabouring classes.  It is a part of the subject requiring to be dwelt\nupon; for I believe there are many persons in this country who, however\ncultivated in other respects, are totally unaware of the condition of\nthat first material of a state, the labouring population, aye even of\nthat portion of it within a few streets of their own residences.\n\nIndeed, everybody is likely at some time or other to have great doubts\nabout this distress which is so much talked of.  We walk through the\nmetropolis in the midst of activity and splendour: we go into the country\nand see there a healthful and happy appearance as we pass briskly along:\nand we naturally think that there must be great exaggeration in what we\nhave heard about the distressed condition of the people.  But we forget\nthat Misery is a most shrinking unobtrusive creature.  It cowers out of\nsight.  We may walk along the great thoroughfares of life without seeing\nmore than the distorted shadow of it which mendicancy indicates.  A\nlittle thought, however, will soon bring the matter home to us.  It has\nbeen remarked of some great town, that there are as many people living\nthere in courts and cellars, or at least in the state of destitution\nwhich that mode of life would represent, as the whole adult male\npopulation of London, above the rank of labourers, artisans, and\ntradesmen.  Probably we should form the most inadequate estimate of this\ncourt and cellar population, even after a long sojourn in the town.  Now\nponder over the fact.  Think of all the persons in London coming within\nthe above description whom you know by sight.  Think how small a part\nthat is of the class in question, how you pass by throngs of men in that\nrank every day without recognizing a single person.  Then reflect that a\nnumber of people as great as the whole of this class may be found in one\ntown exhausting the dregs of destitution.  When we have once appreciated\nthe matter rightly, the difficulty of discerning, from casual inspection,\nthe amount of distress, will only seem to us an additional element of\nmisfortune.  We shall perceive in this quiescence and obscurity only\nanother cause of regret and another incitement to exertion.\n\n\n\nCHAP. II.\nREMEDIES AND REFLECTIONS SUGGESTED BY THE HEALTH OF TOWNS REPORT.\n\n\nHaving now made ourselves to some extent aware of the distress existing\namongst the labouring classes, we will consider the main branches of\nphysical improvement discussed in the Health of Towns Report.\n\n\n1.  VENTILATION.\n\n\nI put this first, being convinced that it is the most essential.  It is\nbut recently that any of us have approximated to a right appreciation of\nthe value of pure air.  But look for a moment at one of those great\nforest trees; and then reflect that all that knotted and gnarled bulk has\nbeen mainly formed out of air.  We, in our gross conceptions, were wont\nto think that the fatness of the earth was the tree's chief source of\nnourishment.  But it is not so.  In some cases this is almost perceptible\nto the eye, for we see the towering pine springing from a soil manifestly\nof the scantiest nutritive power.  When we once apprehend how large a\nconstituent part, air is, of bodies inanimate and animate, of our own for\ninstance, we shall be more easily convinced of the danger of living in an\nimpure atmosphere.\n\nAnd whether it agree with our preconceived notions or not, the evidence\non this point is quite conclusive.  The volumes of the Health of Towns\nReport teem with instances of the mischief of insufficient ventilation.\nIt is one body of facts moving in one uniform direction.  Dr. Guy noticed\nthat, in a building where there was a communication between the stories,\ndisease increased in regular gradations, floor by floor, as the air was\nmore and more vitiated, the employment of the men being the same.  But it\nis needless to quote instances of what is so evident.  With respect to\nthe remedies, these are as simple as the evils to be cured are great.\nFor instance, there was a lodging house in Glasgow where fever resided;\n\"but by making an opening from the top of each room, through a channel of\ncommunication to an air pump, common to all the channels, the disease\ndisappeared altogether.\"  Other modes of ventilation are suggested in the\nReport; and one very simple device introduced by Mr. Toynbee, a\nperforated zinc plate fixed in the window-pane furthest from the fire or\nthe bed, has been found of signal benefit.  I shall take another\nopportunity of saying more upon the subject of ventilation.  Of all the\nsanitary remedies, it is the most in our power.  And I am inclined to\nbelieve that half per cent. of the annual outlay of London, that is ten\nshillings in every hundred pounds, spent only for one year in\nimprovements connected with ventilation, would diminish the sickness of\nLondon by one fourth.\n\n\n2.  SEWERAGE.\n\n\nMelancholy as the state of this department is shown to be; destructive\nannually, I fear, of thousands of lives; it is almost impossible not to\nbe amused at the grotesque absurdity with which it has been managed.  One\ncan imagine how Swift might have introduced the subject in Grildrig's\nconversations with the King of Brobdingnag.  \"The King asked me more\nabout our 'dots' of houses, as his Majesty was pleased to call them; and\nhow we removed the scum and filth from those little 'ant-heaps' which we\ncalled great towns.  I answered that our custom was to have a long brick\ntube, which we called a sewer, in the middle of our streets, where we\nkept a sufficient supply of filth till it fermented, and the foul air was\nthen distributed by gratings at short intervals all over the town. {202}\nI also told his Majesty, that to superintend these tubes, we chose men\nnot from any particular knowledge of the subject, which was extremely\ndifficult, but impartially, as one may say; and that the opinions of\nthese men were final, and the laws by which they acted irrevocable.  I\nalso added that if we had adopted the mode of making these tubes which\nour philosophers would have recommended, (but that we were a practical\npeople) we might have saved in a few years a quarter of a million of our\ngolden coins.  'Spangles,' said His Majesty, who had lately seen me\nweighing one of the golden likenesses of our beloved Queen against a\nBrobdingnag spangle that had fallen from the dress of some maid of\nhonour.  Spangles or not, I replied, they were very dear to us, dearer\nthan body and soul to some, so that we were wont to say when a man died,\nthat he died 'worth so much,' by which we meant so many gold coins or\nspangles, at which His Majesty laughed heartily.  I then went on to tell\nthe King, of our river Thames, that it was wider than His Majesty could\nstride, that we were very proud of it, and drank from it, and that all\nthese tubes led into it, and their contents were washed to and fro by the\ntide before the city; and, then, my good Glumdalclitch seeing that I had\ntalked a long time and was much wearied, took me up and put me into my\nbox and carried me away.  But not before I had heard the King speak of my\ndear country in a way which gave me great pain.  'Insufferable little\nwretches,' His Majesty was pleased to say, 'as foolish when they are\nliving at peace at home as when they are going out to kill other little\ncreatures abroad,' with more that was like this, and not fit for me to\nrepeat.\"\n\nIn sober seriousness, this subject of sewerage has been most absurdly\nneglected.  I do not blame any particular class or body of men.\nParliament has been repeatedly applied to in the matter, but nothing has\nbeen done, as it was a subject of no public interest, though it is\nprobable, if the truth were known, that in those Sessions in which the\nsubject was mooted, there were few questions of equal significance before\nthe House.  There are excellent suggestions in the Health of Towns Report\nfor improvement in the original construction of sewers, for their\nventilation, for their being flushed, for making the curves at which the\nside sewers ought to be connected with the main trunks, for a better\nsystem of house drainage, respecting which Mr. Dyce Guthrie has given\nmost valuable evidence, for the doing away with unnecessary gully drains,\nand for conducting all the contents of these sewers, not into our much\nloved river, but far away from the town, where they can do no mischief,\nand will be of some use.  This is not a simple matter like ventilation;\nand what is proposed involves large undertakings.  Still it is of immense\nand growing importance, and should be resolutely begun at once, seeing\nthat every day adds to the difficulty which will have to be overcome.\n\n\n3.  SUPPLY OF WATER.\n\n\nThis is an essential part of any large system of sanitary improvement,\nand one that does not present very great difficulty.  The principal facts\nwhich I collect from the Report are, that the expense of transmission is\ninconsiderable, and consequently that we may have water from a distant\nsource; that the plan of constant supply seems to be the best; that this\nconstant supply, under a high pressure, could be thrown over the highest\nbuildings in case of fire, that it could be used for baths, public\nfountains, and watering and cleansing streets; that it could be supplied\nat 1_d._ or 1.5_d._ a week to the houses of the poor, and for this that\nthey might have any quantity they chose to take.  At present the labour\nof bringing water entirely prevents cleanliness in many of the more\nsqualid parts of the town: and the advantage of a constant and unlimited\nsupply would be almost incalculable.  There appears to be some difficulty\nin applying the principle of competition to the supply of water; for the\nmultiplication of water companies has in some instances only produced\nmischief to the public.  I would suggest to the political economist\nwhether there may not be some spheres too limited for competition.  But\nthese are questions which I cannot afford at present to dwell upon.\n\n\n4.  BUILDING OF HOUSES.\n\n\nIn considering this branch of the subject, the first thing that occurs is\nthe absolute necessity of getting sufficient space to build upon.  Other\nimprovements may follow; but almost all of them will be defective, if\nthis primary requisite be wanting.  Hence it is of such importance to\ncombat the notion that people must live near their work.  It is a great\nconvenience, no doubt.  But the question is not of living near their\nwork, but of dying, or being perpetually ill, near it.  Mr. Holland has\nmade a calculation from which it appears, that in some parts of the town\nof Chorlton-upon-Medlock, in a family of five individuals, \"there will be\non the average about 50 days a year more sickness _due to the insalubrity\nof the dwellings_.\"  To avoid this additional illness, it is surely worth\nwhile for working men to live even at a considerable distance from their\nwork.  Indeed I think two or three miles is not such a distance as should\nprevent them.  Besides, is it not probable that, in many instances, the\nwork would come to them?\n\nSupposing that new building takes place, whether from the poorer classes\ntending more to the suburban districts, or from the dense parts of towns\nbeing rebuilt, much might be done by modifying, if not repealing, the\nwindow tax and the tax on bricks.\n\nWith respect to the next point, the laying out of the ground, there are\nmost valuable suggestions given by Mr. Austin in the Health of Towns\nReport.  The result of his evidence is, that the average rental paid now\nin Snow's Fields, a place which I have endeavoured to make the reader\nacquainted with before, would return upwards of 10 per cent. upon money\nlaid out in making a substantial set of buildings to occupy the place of\nthe present hovels; and that these new houses should have \"every\nstructural arrangement requisite to render them healthy and comfortable\ndwellings.\"  I have only to add on this subject, that it would be of the\nutmost advantage in any new buildings, and especially for small houses,\nlikely to be built by small capitalists, that there should be a survey\nmade of every town, and its suburbs, with 'contours of equal altitude.'\n{209}  As things are managed at present, people building without any\nreference to a general scale, or any connexion with each other (the\nnon-interference principle carried to its utmost length) the greatest\ndifficulties in the way of sanitary improvement are introduced where\nthere need have been none.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThe main branches of sanitary improvement touched upon by the Report are\nenumerated above.  There are, however, some general results and\nprinciples which demand our especial attention.\n\nIn the first place it seems to be universally true that economy goes hand\nin hand with sanitary improvement.  So beneficently is the physical world\nconstructed, that our labour for sanitary ends is eminently productive.\nThe order of Providence points out that men should live in cleanliness\nand comfort which we laboriously and expensively contravene.  In the\nAppendix I subjoin a table drawn up by Mr. Clay, showing in detail the\nsaving produced by sanitary measures.  I may notice, as bearing on the\npoint of economy, that there is concurrent evidence showing an excessive\nrate of mortality to be accompanied by excessive reproduction.\nConsequently, the result of the present defective state of sanitary\narrangements is, that a disproportionate number of sickly and helpless\npersons of all ages, but chiefly children, are thrown upon the state to\nbe provided for.  If this were to occur in a small community it would be\nfatal.  In a great state it is not more felt than a calamitous war, or an\nadverse commercial treaty.  But it requires a continued attention as\ngreat as that which those more noisy calamities are able to ensure for\nthemselves while they are in immediate agitation.\n\nSecondly, it is stated that the seats of disease are the seats of crime,\na result that we should naturally expect.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nAgain, it appears from many instances that what we are wont to call the\nimprovements in great towns are apt to be attended by an increase of\ndiscomfort to the poor.  To them, the opening of thoroughfares through\ndensely crowded districts, in the displacement which it creates, is an\nimmediate aggravation of distress.  Considering this, ought we not to\nendeavour that improvements for the rich and the poor should go on\nsimultaneously?  It is a hard measure to destroy any considerable\nquantity of house property appropriated to the working classes, and\nthereby to raise their rents and densify their population, without making\nany attempt to supply the vacuum thus created in that market.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIt is stated by Dr. Arnott \"that nearly half of the accidental illnesses\nthat occur among the lower classes might be prevented by proper public\nmanagement:\" a statement which the general body of evidence, I think,\nconfirms.  Now, consider this result.  Think what one night of high fever\nis: then think that numbers around you are nightly suffering this, from\ncauses which the most simple sanitary regulations would obviate at once.\nWhen you are wearied with statistical details, vexed with the difficulty\nof trying to make men do any thing for themselves, disgusted with\ndemagogues playing upon the wretchedness of the poor, then think of some\nsuch signal fact as this; and you will cheerfully, again, gird up\nyourself to fight, as heretofore, against evils which are not to be\nconquered without many kinds of endurance as well as many forms of\nendeavour.\n\nI do not wish to raise a senseless moan over human suffering.  Pain is to\nbe borne stoutly, nor always looked on with unfriendly eye.  But surely\nwe need not create it in this wholesale fashion; and then say that that\nwhich is a warning and a penalty, is but wholesome discipline, to be\nregarded with Mussulman indifference.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nI come now to what seems to me the most important result obtained in the\nwhole course of the elaborate evidence taken before the Health of Towns\nCommission.  It appears not only that distress can exist with a high rate\nof wages, without apparently any fault on the part of the sufferers;\n{214a} but, actually, that in some instances, _there is an increase of\nsickness with an increase of wages_. {214b}  The medical officer of the\nSpitalfields' District states that the weavers have generally less fever\nwhen they are out of work.  This statement is confirmed by testimony of a\nlike nature from Paisley, Glasgow, and Manchester.  It is one of the most\nsignificant facts that has struggled into upper air.  We talk of the\nincrease of the wealth of nations--it may be attended by an increase of\nmisery and mortality, and the production of additional thousands of\nunhealthy, parentless, neglected human beings.  It may only lead to a\nlarger growth of human weeds.  The explanation of the matter is simple.\nDr. Southwood Smith tells us that \"Fever is the disease of adolescence\nand manhood.\"  Now, wretched as the dwelling houses of the poor are,\n_their places of work are frequently still worse_. {215a}  Consequently,\nwith an increase of work, there comes an increase of fever from working\nin ill-ventilated rooms, an increase of poor-rates, {215b} and an\nespecial increase of orphanage and widowhood, as the fever chiefly seizes\nupon persons in the prime of life.  And a large part of this increase is\nthus distinctly brought home to neglect, or ignorance, on the part of the\nemployers of labour.  Surely, as soon as they are made cognizant of this\nmatter, they will at once hasten to correct it.  In the appendix to this\nwork there is a letter from Dr. Arnott, giving an account of the causes\nof defective ventilation, and the remedies for it.  We can no longer say\nthat the evil is one which requires more knowledge than we possess to\nmaster it.  Science, which cannot hitherto be said to have done much for\nthe poor, now comes to render them signal service.  It is for us to use\nthe knowledge, thus adapted to our hands, for a purpose which Bacon\ndescribes as one of the highest ends of all knowledge, \"the relief of\nman's estate.\"  Consider the awful possibility that we may at some future\ntime fully appreciate the results of our doings upon earth.  Imagine an\nemployer of labour having before him, in one picture as it were, groups\nof wretched beings, followed by a still more deteriorated race, with\ntheir vices and their sufferings expressed in some material, palpable\nform--all his own handiwork in it brought out--and at the end, to console\nhim, some heaps of money.  If he had but a vision of these things by\nnight, while yet on earth, such an all-embracing vision as comes upon a\ndrowning man!  Then imagine him to awake to life.  You would not then\nfind that he knew methods of ensuring to his workmen fresh air, but\nlacked energy, or care, to adventure any thing for them.  Talk not to me\nof money, he would say--Money-making may be one of the conditions of\ncontinuance in this matter that I have taken in hand, but on no account\nthe one great object.  Indeed, if a man cannot make some good fabric by\ngood means, he would perform a nobler part, as Mr. Carlyle would tell us,\nin retiring from the contest, and saying at once that the nature of\nthings is too hard for him.  He is far, far, better conquered in that\nway, than obstructing the road by work badly done, or adding to the\nworld's difficulties by inhumanity.\n\nWhat I have given is but an outline of the Health of Towns Report; and I\nwould fain persuade my readers to turn to the original itself.  Some\ndelight in harrowing tales of fiction: here are scenes indicated, if not\nabsolutely depicted, which may exercise the tenderest sympathies.  Others\nare ever bending over the pages of history: here, in these descriptions\nof the life of the poor, are sources of information respecting the\nwell-being of nations, which history, much given to tell only of the\ndoings of the great, has been strangely silent upon.  For the man of\nscience, for the moral philosopher, or even for the curious observer of\nthe ways of the world, this Report is full of interesting materials.  But\nit is not as a source of pleasurable emotion that our attention should be\ncalled to it.  It is because without the study of such works, we cannot\nbe sure of doing good in the matter.  If there is anything that requires\nthought and experience, it is the exercise of Charity in such a\ncomplicated system as modern life.  Indeed, there is scarcely anything to\nbe done wisely in it without knowledge.  And I believe it would be\nbetter, for instance, that people should read this Health of Towns\nReport, than that they should subscribe liberally to carrying out even\nthose suggestions which are recommended by men who have thought upon\nthese subjects.  There is no end to the quickening power of knowledge;\nbut mere individual, rootless acts of benevolence are soon added up.\n\nThere is not the less necessity for this knowledge, because public\nattention is in some measure awakened to the duties of the employers of\nlabour.  I do not know a more alarming sight than a number of people\nrushing to be benevolent without thought.  In any general impulse, there\nare at least as many thoughtless as wise persons excited by it: the\nlatter may be saved from doing very foolish things by an instinct of\nsagacity; but for the great mass of mankind, the facts require to be\nclearly stated and the inferences carefully drawn for them, if they are\nto be prevented from wasting their benevolent impulses upon foolish or\nmischievous undertakings.\n\n\n\nCHAP. III.\nBY WHAT MEANS THE REMEDIES MAY BE EFFECTED.\n\n\nCertainly, whether built upon sufficient information or not, there is at\nthe present time a strong feeling that something must be done to improve\nthe condition of the labouring classes.  The question is, how to direct\nthis feeling--where to urge, where to restrain it; and to what to limit\nits exertions.  An inane desire for originality in such matters is wholly\nto be discouraged.  People must not dislike taking up what others have\nbegun.  Of the various modes of improving the sanitary condition of the\nlabouring classes, each has some peculiar claim.  Ventilation is so easy,\nand at the same time so effective, that it seems a pity not to begin at\nonce upon that.  Again, structural arrangements connected with the\nsewerage of great towns are pressing matters, because, like the purchase\nof the Sybil's books, you have less for your money, the longer you delay.\nThese two things and the supply of water seem to me the first points to\nbe attacked; but a prudent man will endeavour to fall in with what others\nare doing, if it coincides with his direction, and he can thereby hasten\non, not exactly his own methods, but the main result which he has in\nhand.\n\nThere is one conclusion which most persons who have thought on these\nsubjects seem inclined to come to--namely, that a Department of Public\nHealth is imperatively wanted, as the duties to be performed in this\nrespect are greater than can be thrown upon the Home Secretary.  I\nventure to suggest one or two things which it might be well to consider\nin the formation of such a Department.  It should not be a mere Medical\nBoard under one of the great branches of the Executive; but an entirely\nindependent Department.  It will thus have a much firmer voice in\nParliament, and elsewhere.  Scientific knowledge, as well as legal and\nmedical, should be at its daily command.  I lay much stress upon the\nfirst, and for this reason.  Medical men, who are not especially\nscientific, are apt, I suspect, to be \"shut up in measureless content\"\nwith the old ways of going on.  Their knowledge becomes stereotyped.  And\nas, in such a Department, the aid of the latest discoveries is wanted, it\nis better to rely upon those whose especial business it is to be\nacquainted with them.  All departments and institutions are liable to\nbecome hardened, and to lose their elasticity.  It is particularly\ndesirable that this should be avoided in a Department for the Public\nHealth; and, therefore, great care should be taken in the constitution of\nit, to ensure sufficient vitality, and admit sufficient variety of\nopinion, or it would be better to trust to getting each special work done\nby new hands.  The change of political chiefs, a thing frequent enough in\nmodern times, will ensure some of that diversity of mind which is one of\nthe main inducements for lodging power in a Commission or a Board.\n\nIt is a great question what authority should be entrusted by this central\nbody to Municipalities or local bodies.  They should certainly have the\nutmost that can discreetly be given to them.  It does not do to say that,\nhitherto, they have been totally blind to their duty in this matter.  So\nhave other people been.  The great principle of an admixture of\ncentralization with local authority should not be lost sight of without\nurgent reasons.  That any reform should be undertaken in sanitary\nmeasures betokens an improved state of moral feeling.  The feeling\namongst the most influential classes which produces the legislative\nreform may be expected to go lower down--indeed, the reform has already,\nin all probability, found some of its most useful supporters in a lower\nclass--and therefore we may expect to find fit persons to work in the\nlower executive departments.  It is not fair to go back and assume that\nthe old state of feeling exists--in fact, that the parchment law is\nchanged, and not the people.  This might be so in a despotic government,\nbut not here.  It is an oversight, when, in such cases, a general\nimprovement is not calculated upon.\n\nOne of the first things that might be attempted in the legislative way is\nSmoke Prohibition.  It is exactly a matter for the interference of the\nstate.  The Athenian in the comedy, wearied of war, concludes a separate\npeace with the enemy for himself, his wife, his children, and his\nservant; and forthwith raises a jovial stave to Bacchus.  Now all\nsensible people would not only be glad to enter into amicable relations\nwith Smoke, but would even be content to pay a good sum for protection\nagainst the incursions from factory chimnies and other nuisances in their\nneighbourhood.  But there is no possibility of making such private\ntreaties.  The common undistinguishable air is vitiated: and we ask the\nState, for the sake of the common weal, to see this matter righted.  It\nhas been long before the public; and there is sufficient evidence to\nlegislate at once upon.  At any rate, if Mr. Mackinnon's bill is referred\nto a Committee, it ought to be upon the understanding that the\nsuggestions of the Committee shall be forthwith and earnestly considered,\nwith a view to instant legislation.  If the Committee were to make an\nexcursion into the smoke-manufacturing parts of the Metropolis, they\nwould see here and there factory chimnies from which less smoke issues\nthan from private houses.  This seems to be conclusive.  They will not\nfind, I think, that these smokeless chimnies belong to unimportant\nfactories.  Now, if the nuisance can be cured in one case, why not in\nall?  Here we have new and stately public buildings, in the East and the\nWest of the town, which only a few of us, for a short time, will see in\ntheir pristine purity.  If we cannot appreciate the mischief which this\nsmoke does to ourselves, let us have some regard for the public\nbuildings.  Consider, too, at what an immense outlay we purchase this\ncanopy of smoke.  Certainly at hundreds of thousands a year in London\nalone.  We have, therefore, made an investment in smoke of some millions\nof money.  If we had but the resources to spend upon public improvements,\nwhich have thus been worse than wasted, we should need no other\ncontribution.  Moreover, the proposed restrictions in the case of smoke\nwould not only be beneficial to the public, but profitable to the\nindividual: and the more one considers the subject, the more astonished\none is, that they should not long ago have been enacted.\n\nBut the truth is, we are quite callous to nuisances.  A public prosecutor\nof nuisances is more wanted than a public prosecutor of crime.  And this\nis one of the things that would naturally come under the supervision of a\nDepartment of Health.  I find, from the Health of Towns Report, that it\nis proposed to permit the continuance of sundry noxious trades in London\nfor thirty years, and then they are to be carried on under certain\nrestrictions.  It cannot be said that this is selfish legislation: the\npresent generation may inhale its fill of gas and vitriol; but our\ngrandchildren will imbibe \"under certain restrictions\" only that quantity\nwhich is requisite to balance the pleasures of a city life.  At Lyons\nthere is a long line of huge stumps of trees bordering on the river.  The\ntraveller, naturally enough, supposes that this is the record of some\ncivil commotion; but, on inquiry, he finds that the fumes of an adjacent\nvitriol manufactory have in their silent way levelled these magnificent\ntrees as completely as if it had been done by the most effective\ncannonade.  If we could but see in some such palpable manner how many\nhuman beings are stunted by these nuisances, we should proceed in their\nexpulsion with somewhat of the vigour which it deserves.  Imagine, if\nonly for one day, we could enjoy a more than lynx-like faculty, and could\nsee, not merely through rocks, but into air, what an impressive sight it\nwould be in this Metropolis.  Here, a heavy layer of carbonic acid gas\nfrom our chimnies--there, an uprising of sulphuretted hydrogen from our\ndrains--and the noxious breath of many factories visible in all its\nvarieties of emanation.  After one such insight, we should need no more\nSanitary Reports to stimulate our exertions.  But it is only our want of\nimagination that prevents us from apprehending now the state of the\natmosphere.  Science demonstrates the presence of all that I have\npictured, and far more.\n\nGreat resistance might, perhaps, be made, if large measures were to be\ntaken for the removal of noxious trades from great towns.  In many cases,\nwhere rapid measures would be harsh and unjust, it would be well worth\nwhile for the community to buy the absence of these unpleasant\nneighbours, resolutely shutting the gates against the incoming of any\nsimilar nuisances for the future.  On the other hand, mere clamour about\nthe rights of property and the injustice of interference must be firmly\nresisted.  This clamour has been made in all times.  Indeed, men seldom\nraise a more indignant outcry than when they are prevented from doing\nsome injury to their neighbours.  How the feudal barons must have chafed,\nwhen deprived of the right of hanging in their own baronies: how cruel it\ndoubtless seemed to the monopolists of olden times, when some \"factious\"\nHouse of Commons summoned to its bar the Sir Giles Overreaches, and made\nthem disgorge their plunder; how planters in all climes storm, if you but\ntouch the question of loosening the fetters of their slaves.  And so, in\nthese minor matters, when the community, at last awake to its interest,\nforbids some injurious practice to go on any longer, it is natural that\nthose who have profited by it, and who, blinded by self-interest, still\nshare the former inertness of the public, should find it hard to submit\nquietly and good-naturedly to have any restrictive regulations put upon\ntheir callings.  And where the public can smooth this in any way, they\nought to do so; not grudging even large outlay, so that the nuisances in\nquestion be speedily and effectually removed.  The money spent by the\ncommunity on sanitary purposes is likely to be the most reproductive part\nof its expenditure, and especially beneficial to the poorer classes who,\nfor the most part, live near these nuisances, and have few means of\nresisting their noxious influence.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nAfter discussing what might be done by legislation, we come naturally to\nconsider what might be done by Associations for benevolent purposes.\nHowever inadequate such Associations may be as an equivalent for\nindividual exertion, there are, doubtless, many occasions on which they\nmay come in most effectively; doing that which individuals can hardly\nundertake.  In London, for instance, an association that would give us an\nelaborate Survey of the town, would accomplish a most benevolent purpose,\nand not be in any danger of interfering unwisely with social relations.\nThe same may be said of our other towns, for, I believe, there is not one\nof them possessing a Survey fit to be used for building and sanitary\nimprovements.  Again, there are certain fields at Battersea at present\nunbuilt upon, close to the river, one of those spots near the metropolis\nthat ought to be secured at once for purposes of public health and\namusement: if a Society will do that for us, they will accomplish a noble\nwork.  Happily, the necessity for public parks is beginning to be\nappreciated.  These are the fortifications which we should make about our\ntowns.  Would that, on every side of the Metropolis, we could see such\nscenes as this so touchingly described by Goethe.\n\n    \"Turn round, and from this height look back upon\n    The town: from its black dungeon gate forth pours,\n    In thousand parties, the gay multitude,\n    All happy, all indulging in the sunshine!\n    All celebrating the Lord's resurrection,\n    And in themselves exhibiting, as 'twere\n    A resurrection too--so changed are they,\n    So raised above themselves.  From chambers damp\n    Of poor mean houses--from consuming toil\n    Laborious--from the work-yard and the shop--\n    From the imprisonment of walls and roofs,\n    And the oppression of confining streets,\n    And from the solemn twilight of dim churches--\n    All are abroad--all happy in the sun.\"\n\n                                                         _Anster's Faust_.\n\nMany other excellent enterprises might be suggested which societies are\npeculiarly fitted to undertake.  I must own that I think they are best\noccupied in such matters as will not require perpetual looking after,\nwhich when they are once done are wholly done, such as the formation of a\npark, the making of a survey, the collection of materials for a\nlegislative measure, and the like.  These bodies are called in for an\nexigency, and we should be able to contemplate a time when their\nfunctions will cease; or at least when their main work will be done.\n\nOther limits in their choice of objects might be suggested.  For\ninstance, it is desirable that they should address themselves, in\npreference, to such purposes as may benefit people indirectly; or such as\nconcern the public as a body rather than distressed individuals of the\npublic; or that aim at supplying wants which the people benefited are not\nlikely in the first instance to estimate themselves.  Such is the supply\nof air, light, and the means of cleanliness.  There is small danger of\ncorrupting industry by giving any extent of facilities for washing. {233}\n\nWhile we are on this subject, we must not pass over the societies which\nhave started up in connexion with our immediate object.  These \"Baths and\nWashhouses for the Poor\" are an admirable charity, obvious to very little\nof the danger which is apt to threaten benevolent undertakings.  It\nwould, however, be a most serious drawback on their utility, if they were\nto render people indifferent to the much greater scheme of giving a\nconstant supply of water at home.  With respect to the building\nassociations for the improvement of the houses of the poor, their\nefforts, as it seems to me, will be most advantageously directed, not in\nbuilding houses, but in buying and preparing ground, and letting it out\nto the individual builder upon conditions compelling the desired\nstructural arrangements.  In this way they may immensely extend the\nsphere of their usefulness.  It is not by limiting their profit, and so\ninsisting upon proving their benevolence, but by giving birth to the\ngreatest amount of beneficial exertion on the part of individuals, that\nthey may do most good.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nWe come now to consider what may be done by individual exertion.  Here it\nis, that by far the largest field is open for endeavour: here, that\nneglect is most injurious.  Many a man who subscribes largely to\ncharities, has created more objects for them, than he has furnished them\nwith means to relieve, if he has neglected but a little his duties as an\nemployer of labour, or an owner of property.  This mischief arises from\nconsidering charity as something separated from the rest of our\ntransactions; whereas a wise man weaves it in with them, and finds the\nfirst exercise for it in matters that grow out of his nearest social\nrelations, as parent, master of a household, employer of labour, and the\nlike.\n\nThe more we look into the question, the more weight, I think, we shall\nattach to individual exertion.  Take it in all its branches.  Consider\nthe most remarkable impulse ever given to the energies of Europe--the\nCrusades.  It was an aggregate of individual impulses.  Every strong and\nenterprising man felt that it was a matter which concerned his own soul.\nIt was not only that he was to cause something to be done for the great\nobject, but, if possible, he was to do it himself.  A Crusade against\nMisery is called for now; and it will only be carried on successfully by\nthere being many persons who are ready to throw their own life and energy\ninto the enterprise.  Mere mercenary aid alone will never do it.\n\nLook, moreover, at what one man can do.  A Chatham springs into power,\nand we are told that down to the lowest depths of office a pulsation is\nfelt which shows that there is a heart once more at the summit of\naffairs.  The distant sentinel walks with a firmer tread on the banks of\nthe Ebro, having heard that the Duke has arrived at head quarters.  So,\nthroughout.  Every where you find individual energy the sustaining power.\nSee, in public offices, how it is the two or three efficient men who\ncarry on the business.  It is when some individuals subscribe largely in\ntime, thought, and energy, to any benevolent association that it is most\nlike to prosper--for then it most resembles one powerful devoted man.\nThe adding up of many men's indolence will not do.  You think, perhaps,\nlistless man of rank or wealth, that your order sustains you.  Short time\nwould it do so, but for the worthy individuals who belong to it, and who,\nat the full length of the lever, are able to sustain a weight which would\nthrow the worthless, weightless men into air in a minute.\n\nIn the above cases it has been one man wielding much power; but in the\nefforts that are wanted to arrest the evils which we have been\nconsidering, the humblest amongst us has a large sphere of action.  A\nprovident labouring man, for example, is a blessing to his family and to\nhis neighbours; and is thus doing what he best can, to relieve even\nnational distress.\n\nIt is a total mistake to bring, as it were, all the misery and misfortune\ntogether, and say, now find me a remedy large as the evil, to meet it.\nResolve the evil into its original component parts.  Imagine that there\nhad been no such thing as the squandering, drinking, absentee Irish\nlandlords we read of in the last generation--do you suppose that we\nshould have as many inhabitants in St. Giles's, and the Liverpool\ncellars, to look after now?  So, with the English landlords and\nmanufacturers of that time, see what a subtraction from the general mass\nof difficult material there would have been, if those men had done their\nduty.  But you will say we are still talking of bodies.  Imagine, then,\nthat during the last generation there had been the energetic efforts of\nindividuals in these bodies, that there are now, directed to the welfare\nof the people under them.  It would, no doubt, have been a great easement\nof the present difficulty.  Any body who does his duty to his dependents\nkeeps a certain number out of the vortex; and his example is nearly sure\nto be followed, if he acts in an inoffensive, modest fashion.  Dr. Arnott\nhas shown what great things may be done in the way of ventilation by\nindividual employers.  See what benefit would arise if only some few\nbuilders, taking to heart the present miserable accommodation for the\npoor, which few know better than they do, would, in their building\nenterprises, speculate also in houses of the smaller kind, and take a\npride in doing the utmost for them.\n\nOne might easily multiply instances where individual exertion would come\nin; but each man must in some measure find out the fit sphere of action\nfor him.  \"The Statesman\" tells us that the real wealth of a state is the\nnumber of \"serviceable\" minds in it.  The object of a good citizen should\nbe to make himself part of this wealth.  Let him aid where he can in\nbenevolent associations, if well assured of their utility, and at the\nsame time mindful of the duty of private endeavour; but do not let him\nthink that he is to wait for the State's interference, or for\nco-operation of any kind.  I do not say that such aids are to be\ndespised, but that they are not to be waited for, and that the means of\nsocial improvement are in every body's hands.  For warfare, men are\nformed in masses, and scientific arrangement is the soul of their\nproceedings.  But industrial conquests and, especially, the conquests of\nbenevolence, are often made, here somewhat and there somewhat, individual\neffort struggling up in a thousand free ways.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThe individual freedom which we possess is a great reason for individual\nexertion.  How large that freedom is, it needs but a slight acquaintance\nwith the past to estimate.  Through what ages have we not toiled to the\nconviction that people should not be burnt for their opinions.  The\nlightest word about dignities, the slightest claim to freedom of thought\nor speech upon those matters which, perhaps, angelic natures would hardly\nventure to pronounce upon, even the wayward play of morbid imagination,\nwere not unlikely in former times to lead to signal punishments.  A man\nmight almost in his sleep commit treason, or heresy, or witchcraft.  The\nmost cautious, official-spoken man amongst us, if carried back on a\nsudden to the days of Henry the Eighth, would, at the end of the first\nweek, be pursued by a general hue and cry from the authorities, civil and\necclesiastical, for his high and heinous words against King, Church, and\nState.  While now, Alfred Tennyson justly describes our country as\n\n    \"The land, where girt with friends or foes,\n    A man may say the thing he will.\"\n\nThere is danger of our losing this freedom if we neglect the duties which\nit imposes.  But I have resolved to avoid dwelling upon dangers, and\nwould rather appeal to other motives.  The triumph for a nation so\nindividually free as ours, would be to show that the possible benefits of\ndespotism belonged to it--that there should be paternal government\nwithout injurious control--that those things should ultimately be\nattained by the exertions of many which a despot can devise and execute\nat once, but which his successor may, with like facility, efface.\nWhereas what is gained for many by many, is not easily got back.  It must\nbe vast embankments indeed which could compel that sea to give up its\nconquests.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nWe have now gone through the principal means by which social remedies may\nbe effected: there comes the consideration within what limits these means\nshould be applied.  The subject of interference is a most difficult one.\nWe are greatly mistaken, however, if we suppose that the difficulty is\nconfined to Government interference.  Who does not know of extreme\nmischief arising from over-guidance in social relations as well as in\nstate affairs?  The inherent difficulty with respect to any interference,\nis a matter which we have to get over in innumerable transactions\nthroughout our lives.  The way in which, as before said, it appears to me\nit should be met, is principally by enlightenment as to the purposes of\ninterference.  Look at the causes which are so often found to render\ninterference mischievous.  The governing power is anxious to exalt\nitself; instead of giving life and energy, wishes only to absorb them.\nOr it is bent upon having some outward thing done, careless of the\nprinciples on which it is done, or of the mode and spirit of doing it.\nHence, in public affairs, things may be carried which have only a show of\ngoodness, but in reality are full of danger; and in private life, there\narise formality, hypocrisy, and all kinds of surface actions.  Or, again,\nthe governing power is fond of much and minute interference, instead of,\nas Burke advises, employing means \"few, unfrequent, and strong.\"  There\nmay also be another error, when from over-tenderness, or want of\nknowledge, the authority in question suffers those under its influence to\nlean on it, when they are strong enough to walk by themselves.  All these\nerrors are general ones, which require to be guarded against in the\neducation of a child, as well as in the government of a state.  All of\nthem, too, have their root in an insufficient appreciation of the value\nof free effort.  But when this is once attained, the interfering party\nwill see that his efforts should mainly be enabling ones: that he may\ncome as an ally to those engaged in a contest too great for their\nability; but that he is not to weaken prowess by unneeded meddling.  It\nmay be said that this is vague.  I am content to be vague upon a point\nwhere, I believe, the greatest thinkers will be very cautious of laying\ndown precise rules.  Look at what Burke says with regard to state\ninterference--that it should confine itself to what is \"truly and\nproperly publick, to the publick peace, to the publick safety, to the\npublick order, to the publick prosperity.\"  How large a scope do those\nwords \"publick prosperity\" afford.  Besides, the transactions, in which\nwe want to ascertain just limits for our interference, are so numerous,\nand so various, that they are not to be met but by an inconceivable\nmultiplicity of rules.  Such rules may embody much experience, but they\nseldom exhaust the subject which they treat of; and there is the danger\nof our suffering them to enslave, instead of merely to guide, our\njudgments.  And then, on some critical occasion, when the exception, and\nnot the rule, is in accordance with the principle on which the rule has\nbeen formed, we may commit the greatest folly in keeping to what we fancy\nthe landmarks of sagacity and experience.  Instead, therefore, of laying\ndown any abstract rules, I will only observe that a prima facie\nreluctance to all interference is most reasonable, and perhaps as\nnecessary in the social world, as friction is in the physical world, in\norder to prevent every unguided impulse from having its full mechanical\neffect: that, nevertheless, interference must often be resorted to: and\nthat the best security for acting wisely in any particular case, is not\nto suffer ourselves to be narrowly circumscribed by rules, but at the\nsame time to be very cautious of attempting any mere present good, of\ngetting notions of our own rapidly carried into action, at the expense of\nthat freedom and moral effort which are the surest foundations of all\nprogress.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nWe were considering, above, the claim which our individual freedom makes\non our individual exertion for the good of others.  But this freedom must\nin some degree be limited in order to produce its best results; and\namongst them, to secure the greatest amount of such individual exertion.\nWe know the restraint that must exist upon all, if all are to enjoy equal\nfreedom.  The freedom of one is not to be a terror to another.  Law is\nbased upon this obvious principle.  But there are other circumstances\nalso, in which individuals will find support and comfort in the general\nfreedom being circumscribed by some interference on the part of the state\nor other bodies.  Such a case occurs when the great majority of some\nclass of private individuals would willingly submit to wise regulations\nfor the general good, but cannot do so without great sacrifice, because\nof the selfish recusancy of some few amongst them.  Here is a juncture at\nwhich the State might interfere to enable individuals to carry out their\nbenevolent intentions.  But one of the main reasons for some degree of\ninterference from the State or other authorized bodies, in matters\nconnected with our present subject, is that, otherwise, the\nresponsibilities of individuals would be left overwhelming.  It is to be\nremembered by those who would restrain such interference within the\nnarrowest possible bounds, that they by so much increase individual\nresponsibility.  Responsibility can, happily, by no scheme, be made to\nvanish.  Wherever a signal evil exists, a duty lies somewhere to attack\nit.  Suppose a district, for instance, in which the state of mortality is\nexcessive, a mortality clearly traceable to the want of sanitary\nregulations.  In a despotic government it may be enough to mention this\nto the central body.  In a free state, where the duties of a citizen come\nin, more is required from the individual; and if there is no fit body of\nany kind to appeal to in such a case, the burden lies upon all men\nacquainted with the facts, to endeavour conjointly, or separately, to\nremove the evil.  While, on the one hand, we must beware of introducing\nsuch interference, whether coming from the State or other bodies, as\nmight paralyse individual exertion, we must at the same time remember\nthat the weight to be removed may be left overwhelmingly disproportionate\nto individual effort, or even to conjoint effort, if unauthorized, both\nof which may thus be stiffened by despair into inaction.\n\nIn the instance we have just been considering, we must not say that the\npeople immediately interested in removing the evil will do so themselves.\nIt is part of the hypothesis that they will not.  Ages have passed by,\nand they have not.  They do not know what is evil.  It has been observed\nthat savages are rarely civilized by efforts of their own.  A vessel from\ncivilized parts comes and finds them savages.  A generation passes away.\nAnother vessel comes, how differently propelled, how differently\nconstructed; manned by sailors who have different costume, food, ways of\nspeech and habits from the former ones; but they are able to recognize at\nonce the savages described by their forefathers.  These have not changed.\nThe account of them is as exact as if it were written yesterday.  In such\na land, we must not look for the germ of improvement amongst the\nmiserable inhabitants themselves.  It must come from without, brought\nthither by hopeful, all-sympathizing enterprize.\n\n\n\nCHAP.  IV.\nIN WHAT SPIRIT THE REMEDIES ARE TO BE EFFECTED.\n\n\nWhenever the condition of the labouring people becomes a general topic,\nsome erroneous modes of discussing it arise which deserve notice.  In the\nfirst place, there is a matter which, in all our friendly efforts for the\nworking classes, we must not forget, and that is, to make these efforts\nwith kindliness to other classes.  The abuse of other people is an easy\nmode of showing our own benevolence, more easy than profitable.  To\nalleviate the distress of the poor may be no gain, if, in the process, we\naggravate the envies and jealousies which may be their especial\ntemptation.  The spirit to be wished for is sympathy; and that will not\nbe produced by needless reproaches.  Besides, it is such foolish\ninjustice to lay the blame of the present state of things on any one\nclass.  It is unpractical, unphilosophical, and inconsistent with\nhistory.  If we must select any class, do not let us turn to the wealthy,\nwhom, perhaps, we think of first.  They have, in no time that I am aware\nof, been the pre-eminent rulers of the world.  The thinkers and writers,\nthey are the governing class.  There is no doubt that the rich and great\nhave in most cases a large sphere of usefulness open to them; and they\nare fatally blind, if they neglect it.  That is, however, rather a matter\nfor them to think of, than for those who are under them.  And I feel\nquite certain that the evils we are now, as a nation, beginning to be\nsensitive to, are such as may be more fairly attributed to the nation, in\nits collective capacity, than to any one class, or even to any one\ngeneration.  I notice the error of the opposite opinion, believing it to\nbe a signal hindrance to improvement.  Let us not begin a great work with\nbitterness.  I am not, however, for the slightest concealment of the\ntruth, and can well understand the righteous indignation that will break\nout at witnessing the instances of careless cruelty to be seen daily.\nStill, this is not to be done by a systematic and undistinguishing attack\nupon any one class: if it requires a bold hand, it requires a just one\nalso, under a reasonable restraint of humility.  I suspect that those\nmen, if any, who have a right to cast the first stone at their neighbour\nin this matter will be among the last persons to do so.\n\nIt is a grievous thing to see literature made a vehicle for encouraging\nthe enmity of class to class.  Yet this, unhappily, is not unfrequent\nnow.  Some great man summed up the nature of French novels by calling\nthem the Literature of Despair: the kind of writing that I deprecate may\nbe called the Literature of Envy.  It would be extreme injustice to say\nthat the writers themselves are actuated by an envious or malignant\nspirit.  It is often mere carelessness on their part, or ignorance of the\nsubject, or a want of skill in representing what they do know.  You would\nnever imagine from their writings that some of the most self-denying\npersons, and of those who exert themselves most for the poor, are to be\nfound amongst the rich and the well-born, including of course the great\nEmployers of labour.  Such writers like to throw their influence, as they\nmight say, into the weaker scale.  But that is not the proper way of\nlooking at the matter.  Their business is not to balance class against\nclass, but to unite all classes into one harmonious whole.  I think if\nthey saw the ungenerous nature of their proceedings, that alone would\nstop them.  They should recollect that literature may fawn upon the\nmasses as well as on the aristocracy: and in these days the temptation is\nin the former direction.  But what is most grievous in this kind of\nwriting, is the mischief it may do to the working people themselves.  If\nyou have their true welfare at heart, you will not only care for their\nbeing fed and clothed; but you will be anxious not to encourage\nunreasonable expectations in them, not to make them ungrateful or\ngreedy-minded.  Above all, you will be solicitous to preserve some\nself-reliance in them.  You will be careful not to let them think that\ntheir condition can be wholly changed without exertion of their own.  You\nwould not desire to have it so changed.  Once elevate your ideal of what\nyou wish to happen amongst the labouring population; and you will not\neasily admit anything in your writings that may injure their moral or\ntheir mental character, even if you thought it might hasten some physical\nbenefit for them.  That is the way to make your genius most serviceable\nto mankind.  Depend upon it, honest and bold things require to be said to\nthe lower as well as to the higher classes; and the former are in these\ntimes much less likely to have such things addressed to them.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIn the same way that we are fond of laying the neglect, and the duty, of\nexertion upon some class, even on our own, rather than on our especial\nselves, we are much given to look for something new which, in a magical\nmanner, is to settle the whole difficulty.  But when people look for a\nnovelty of this kind, what do they mean?  Some moral novelty?  The\nChristian religion has been eighteen hundred years before the world, and\nhave we exhausted the morality in that?  Some political novelty?  We are\nsurely the nation, whose constitution, whatever may be said against it,\nhas been most wrought and tempered by diverse thought and action.  Some\nnovelty in art or science?  Where has man attained to a greater mastery\nover matter than in this iron-shearing country?  The utmost that one age\ncan be expected to do in the way of discovery is but little; and that\nlittle by few men.  Let us sit down and make use of what we have.  The\nstock out of which national welfare might be formed lies in huge,\nunworked-up masses before us.  Social improvement depends upon general\nmoral improvement.  Moral improvement mostly comes, and at least is most\nsafely looked for, not in the way of acquisition but of development.\nNow, as regards the conduct of the various classes of the state to each\nother, we do not want any new theory about it, but only to develop that\nkindly feeling which is already in the world between like and like, which\nmakes a parent, for instance, so kind even to the faults of his children.\nWe want that feeling carried over all the obstructions of imperfect\nsympathy which hedge it in now.  This will be done by both classes\nknowing more of each other.  One of the great reasons for the education\nof the people is, that even educating them a little enables rich and poor\nto understand each other better--in fact, to live more harmoniously\ntogether.  If our sympathies were duly enlightened and enlarged, we\nshould find that we did not need one doctrine for our conduct to friends,\nanother for our conduct to dependents, and another for our conduct to\nneighbours.  One spirit would suffice to guide us rightly in all these\nrelations.  The uninstructed man looking around him on the universe, and\nseeing a wonderful variety of appearances, is inclined to imagine that\nthere are numberless laws and substances essentially different, little\nknowing from how few of either the profusion of beauty in the world is\nformed.  But the creative energy of what we call Nature, dealing with few\nsubstances, breaks out into every form and colour of loveliness.  Here,\nwe have the dainty floweret which I would compare to the graceful\nkindnesses passing among equals; there, the rich corn-field like the\nsubstantial benefits which the wise master-worker confers on those around\nhim; here again, the far-spreading oak which, with its welcome depth of\nshade, may remind us of the duties of protection and favour due from the\ngreat to the humble; and there, the marriage of the vine to the elm, a\nsimilitude for social and domestic affection.  The kindnesses to which I\nhave compared these various products of Nature, are also of one spirit,\nand may be worked out with few materials.  Indeed, one man may in his\nlife manifest them all.  No new discovery, no separate teaching, for each\nbranch of this divine knowledge, is needed.\n\nI do not say that there may not be physical discoveries, or legislative\nmeasures, which may greatly aid in improving the condition of the\nlabouring classes.  But, if we observe how new things come, in our own\nlife for instance, or in the course of history, we shall find that they\nseldom come in the direction in which we are looking out for them.  They\nfall behind us; and, while we are gazing about for the novelty, it has\ncome down and has mingled with the crowd of old things, and we did not\nknow it.  Let us begin working on the old and obvious foundations, and we\nshall be most ready to make use of what new aid may come, if we do not\nfind an almost inexhaustible novelty in what we deemed so commonplace.\nThere is no way of burnishing up old truths like acting upon them.\n\nYou may rely upon it that it is one of the most unwholesome and\nunworkmanlike states of mind to be looking about for, and relying upon,\nsome great change which is all of a sudden to put you into a position to\ndo your duty in a signal manner.  Duty is done upon truisms.\n\nBut let discoveries in morals or in physics have come; suppose any extent\nof political amelioration you please; and grant that the more outward\nevils have been conquered by combined effort.  Let our drains flow like\nrivulets, and imagine that light and air permeate those dwellings which\nnow moulder in a loathsome obscurity.  Let the poor be cared for in their\nhealth, their amusements, their education, and their labour.  Still the\ngreat work for an employer of labour remains for ever to be renewed; that\nwhich consists in the daily intercourse of life, in that perpetual\nexercise of care and kindness concerning those small things which, small\nas they may be, are nevertheless the chief part of men's lives.  Perhaps\nthe greatest possible amelioration of the human lot is to be found in the\nimprovement of our notions of the duties of master to man.  It were hard\nto say what could be named as an equivalent for even a slight improvement\nin that respect, seeing that there is no day in which millions upon\nmillions of transactions do not come within its limits.  If this relation\nwere but a little improved, with what a different mind would the great\nmass of men go to their work in the morning, from the slave who toils\namid rice fields in Georgia to the serf in Lithuanian forests.  Nor would\nthose far above the extremes of serfdom fail to reap a large part of the\nbenefit.  It cannot be argued that civilization renders men independent:\nit often fastens but more firmly the fetters of servitude--at least it\nbinds them upon limbs more easy to be galled.  Its tendency is to give\nharsh words the power of blows.  Consider what a thing it is to be\nmaster.  To have the king-like privilege of addressing others first, to\ncomment for ever on their conduct, while you are free from any reciprocal\nanimadversion.  Think what an immeasurable difference it must make,\nwhether your subordinate feels that all he does is sure to be taken for\nthe best, that he will meet with continual graciousness, that he has a\nmaster who is good lord and brother to him: or whether he lives in\nconstant doubt, timidity, and discomfort, with a restless desire of\nescape ever uppermost in his mind.  I do not apply this only to the\nordinary relation of master and servant.  You sometimes see the most\ncruel use made even of a slight social superiority, where the cruelty is\nenhanced by the education and other advantages of the suffering party.\nTo say nothing of Christianity, there is the greatest want of chivalry in\nsuch proceedings, in whatever rank they take place, whether from masters\nto servants, employers to employed, or in those more delicately\nconstituted relationships just alluded to.  In all our intercourse with\nthose who have not a full power of replying to us, instead of being the\nless restrained on this account, which is the case with most of us, the\nweakness on the other side ought to be an irresistible claim to\ngentleness on ours.  The same applies when what is naturally the weaker,\nbeing guarded by social conventionalities on its side, is in reality the\nstronger, and is tempted into insolence, thus abusing the humanity of the\nworld.  But, let us turn from the abuse of power, and see what it is when\nwielded by discerning hands.  It is like a healthful atmosphere to all\nwithin its boundaries.  Other benefits come and go, but this is inhaled\nat every breath, and forms the life of the man who lives under it.  It is\na perpetual harmony to him, \"songs without words,\" while he is at his\nwork.  One of the most striking instances we have had in modern times of\nthis just temperament of a master was to be noted in Sir Walter Scott.\nThe people dependent upon him were happier, I imagine, than you could\nhave made them, if you had made them independent.  If you could have\ndistributed, as it were, Scott's worldly prosperity, you cannot easily\nconceive that it would have produced more good than when it fell full on\nhim, and was forthwith radiated to all around him.  You may say that this\nwas partly the result of genius.  Be it so.  Genius is, by the definition\nof it, one of the highest gifts.  If, with humble means, we can produce\nsome of its effects, it is great gain.  Without, however, wishing to\ndepreciate the attaching influence of genius, we must, I think, attribute\nmuch of this admirable bearing in Scott to an essential kindliness of\nnature and a deep sense of humanity.  If he had possessed no peculiar\ngifts of expression or imagination, and quietly followed the vocation of\nhis father, a writer to the Signet, he would have been loved in his\noffice as he was on his estate; and old clerks would have been Laidlaws\nand Tom Purdies to him.  Scott would under any circumstances have\ninsisted on being loved: he would have been \"a good lord and brother\" to\nany man or set of men over whom he had the least control.  You cannot\nmake out that true graciousness of his to be a mere love of feudal\nusages.  It is the best thing that remains of him, better than all his\nwritings, if, indeed, it were not visible throughout them.\n\nThe duties of master to man are the more important, because, however much\nthe relation may vary in its outward form, it will not be mapped down as\nin this or that latitude, but remains as pervading as the air.  We may\nhave brought down the word charity to its most abject sense, considering\nwhat is but the husk of it to be the innermost kernel.  Mere symbols of\nit may go on.  In times, when few things were further apart than charity\nand papal sway, the popes still went through the form of washing poor\nmen's feet.  But that symbol has a wondrous significance--the depth of\nservice which is due from all masters, the humble charity which should\never accompany true lordship and dominion.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nWhen considering in what spirit our remedies should be attempted, one of\nthe most important things to be urged is, that it should be in a spirit\nof hopefulness.\n\nIn one of Dr. Arnold's letters there is the following passage.  \"'Too\nlate,' however, are the words which I should be inclined to affix to\nevery plan for reforming society in England; we are ingulfed, I believe,\ninevitably, and must go down the cataract; although ourselves, i.e. you\nand I, may be in Hezekiah's case, and not live to see the catastrophe.\"\nSimilar forebodings were uttered on other occasions by this eminently\ngood man in the latter years of his life.  I quote the passage to show\nhow deep must have been the apprehension of danger and distress which\ncould so depress him; and, more especially, for the purpose of protesting\nagainst any similar despondency which I fear to be very prevalent in\nthese times.  It mainly arises, as it seems to me, from a confusion\nbetween the term of our own life and that of the state.  We see a cloud\nwhich overshadows our own generation, and we exclaim that the heavens and\nearth are coming together.  How often, in reading history, does a similar\nfeeling occur to us.  We think, how can the people we are reading of\nrevive after this whirlwind of destruction!  Imagine how much more they\nthemselves must have felt despondency.  A Northumbrian looking upon\nWilliam the Conqueror's devastations--a monk considering the state of\nthings around him in the exterminating contest of Stephen and Matilda, or\nthe wars of the Roses--the remaining one of a family swept off by some of\nthose giant epidemics which desolated our towns in the fourteenth\ncentury--a member of the defeated party in the struggles of the\nReformation, the Rebellion, or the Revolution--what would any such person\nhave prophesied as to the fate of his country?  How little would he have\nforeseen the present plethoric, steam-driving, world-conquering England!\nSo with us.  We too have evils, perhaps of as large dimension, though in\nsome respects of a totally different character from those which our\nforefathers endured--and did not sink under.  Nothing is to be shunned\nmore than Despair.  How profound is the wisdom which has placed Hope in\nthe front rank of Christian virtues.  For is it not the parent of\nendeavour?  And in this particular matter, the improvement of our social\ncondition, the more we examine it, the more we shall discover cause for\nhope.  The evils are so linked together that a shock given to any one\nwould electrify the whole mass of evil.  Take an instance.  Suppose that\nthose who have the means bestir themselves to improve the houses of the\npoor.  See what good will flow from that.  Physical suffering is\ndiminished; but that is, perhaps, the least thing.  Cleanly and\neconomical habits are formed; domestic occupations are increased; more\npersons live through the working period of life; and a class is formed\nlow down in the body politic who are attached to something, for a man who\nhas the tenancy of a good house to lose, is not altogether destitute.\nAnd under what circumstances is all this done?  By the more influential\nclasses taking a kindly concern in a matter in which all are deeply\ninterested.  This is not the least part of the good.  Indeed, without it,\nall the rest, however excellent in itself, would lack its most engaging\nfeatures.  Seeing then in one instance how much good may be done even\nwith slight efforts, we may determine to resist despondency.  To yield to\nit, even but a little, is to help in building up the trophy for the other\nside.\n\nAlthough we must not listen to despondency, we must not, on the other\nhand, attempt to conceal from ourselves that this subject, the \"condition\nof England question\" as it has been called, is oppressively large; or\nsuppose that it can be dealt with otherwise than by ever-growing vigour.\nAt the present moment public attention is unusually fixed upon it.  But\nthis may be of brief duration.  The public soon becomes satiated with any\nsubject.  Some foreign war, or political contest, may all at once turn\nits looks in far other directions.  But the social remedies that we have\nbeen talking of, are not things to be finished by a single stroke.  We\ncannot expect to complete them just while the daylight of public opinion\nis with us.  The evil to be struggled against is a thing entwined with\nevery fibre of the body politic.  It is enough to occupy the whole mind\nof the age; and demands the best energies of the best minds.  It should\nbe a \"Thirty years' war\" against sloth and neglect.  It requires men who\nwill persevere through public favour or disfavour, who can subdue their\nown fastidiousness, be indifferent to ingratitude, tolerant of folly, who\ncan endure the extreme vexation of seeing their most highly prized\nendeavours thwarted by well intentioned friends, and who are not\ndependent for reward upon those things which are addressed to vanity or\nto ambition.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nAfter a long fit of distress which, for the poorer classes, may almost be\ncalled a seven years' famine, we are now apparently entering upon one of\nour periodic times of prosperity.  You hear of thousands of additional\n\"hands\" being wanted, of new mills rising up, and at last of a revival of\nthe home trade.  It is one of those \"breathing spaces\" in which we can\nlook back with less despondency, and forward with some deliberation.\nEach man's apprehensions for his own fortunes need no longer absorb his\nwhole attention.  Yet one cannot observe all this clashing and whizzing\nof machinery, this crowding on our quays, this contention of railway\nprojects, and the general life and hum of renewed activity, without a\nprofound fear and sadness lest such things should pass on, as their\npredecessors have passed, leaving only an increased bulk of unhandy\nmaterials to be dealt with.  It is one of those periods upon which the\nhistorian, armed with all that wisdom which a knowledge of the result can\nfurnish him, may thus dilate in measured sentences.  \"A time of nearly\nseven years of steady distress had now elapsed; nor can it be said, that\nthis distress had been lightly regarded by thoughtful minds, or that its\nsalutary process had not commenced.  The question of the condition of the\nlabouring classes had in a measure become prominent.  The Essayist\nmoralized about it after his fashion; the lover of statistics arrayed his\nfearful lists of figures to show its nature and extent; the writer of\nfiction wove it into his tale; the journalist found it a topic not easily\nto be exhausted: old men shook their heads over it; and the young, to the\nastonishment of the world, began to talk of it as a matter of pressing\ninterest to them.  Now was the time when Great Britain might have looked\ninto this question.  But a return of prosperity, which we must almost\ncall insidious, lulled attention.  Sickness and adversity are soon\nforgotten.  And this nation awoke as from a bad dream which it was by no\nmeans desirous of recalling in its daylight reminiscences.\"  My friends,\nlet us not give an opportunity to the historian to moralize upon us in\nthis manner.  If we are employers of labour, let us bethink ourselves\nthat now is the time for persuading our men to do something for\nthemselves; now is the time for getting improvements made in our town and\nneighbourhood, the public being in a cheerful mood; now, too, we can\nourselves adventure something for the good of those around us.  Do not\nlet us be anxious to drain the cup of prosperity to its last drop,\nholding it up so that we see nothing but it.  Let us carry ourselves\nforward in imagination, and then look backward on what we are doing now.\nThat is the way to master the present, for the best part of foresight is\nin the reflex.  What matter is it how many thousands of pounds we make,\ncompared to how we make them?\n\n\"Yes,\" some one will reply, \"the imaginary historian deserves to be\nheard.  This is the time for the nation to do something.  Really a\nGovernment with a surplus should put all things to rights.\"  Oh, these\nunhappy collective nouns, what have they not to answer for!  This word\n\"nation,\" for instance: we substitute it instead of writing down some\nmillions of names, a convenience not altogether to be despised.  But\nyours, my friend, is there.  The word nation is not an abstract idea; but\nmeans an aggregate of human beings.  No individual man is eliminated by\nthis process of abbreviation.  Your being one of a nation is to enrich\nyou with duties, not to deprive you of them.  But these large words often\nsoothe us into obliviousness.  It puts one in mind of long algebraical\noperations in which the student has wholly lost sight of reality, and is\ndriving on his symbols, quite unable to grasp their significance.  This\nmay be well enough for him, for eventually some result comes out which\ncan be verified.  But if we, in active life, play with general terms, we\ndo not come to such distinct results, but only get into profound\nconfusion, as it will be in this case, if we expect great things to\nhappen from some combined effort in their corporate capacity of those\nwho, as individuals, are looking on.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nBefore we leave off, let us look at the subject in its full scope.  A\nlarge portion of our fellow countrymen are living, not in a passive state\nof distress, but in one which manufactures rapidly disease, and poverty,\nand crime.  I think it has been shown that it is in the power of other\nclasses to raise this condition.  At any rate it is in their power to\nmake the attempt.  There is no occasion for waiting--each of us can do\nsomething to-day in this matter.  Now consider what would be the effect\nof success in these endeavours.  Let us not take the other result as\nprobable; or, even in hypothesis, draw any picture that might make\ndespondency plausible.  Suppose, then, the success of individual, or\nunited efforts, in raising the condition of the labouring classes.  What\nan undivided good it is.  Has any man some particular reform at heart,\nsome especial hopes for his race?  Where can he look for such a basis to\nrest upon as in the improved condition of the largest layer of the\npeople?  What a field it opens for science, literature, and art.  What\nfreedom may it not give to the highest ranges of thought.\n\nI cannot think the destinies of our race an unimproving matter of\ncontemplation, and that it savours of presumption, or of needless\nforelooking, to reflect on these things.  A notable portion of the great\nhuman family utters every day a prayer in which the individual supplicant\nasks, not for himself alone, even those blessings which he can\nindividually enjoy, but also, and first, implores those general blessings\nwhich include the welfare of his own race at least.  What is the meaning\nof this, if we are to take no interest in the general welfare, or not, by\nevery means in our power, to aid in it?\n\nIn the better order of men there is a desire for social improvement\ntotally independent of all thought of personal gain.  Bishop Butler saw\nin the fact, that there were persons who devoted themselves to a pursuit\nso remote from worldly ends as astronomy, a wonderful instance of the\ninnate consciousness in man of his high origin and destiny.  But an\nearnest and unselfish love of social progress, is a far more satisfying\nsign that the impress of good is not altogether effaced, and that men are\nnot wholly isolated by worldliness from the future and the past.\n\n          \"Hence, in a season of calm weather,\n          Though inland far we be,\n    Our souls have sight of that immortal sea\n          Which brought us hither,\n          Can in a moment travel thither,\n    And see the Children sport upon the shore,\n    And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.\"\n\n                                  FINIS.\n\n\n\nAPPENDIX.\n\n\nThe following table shows the progressive decrease in the sum of vitality\nin the three classes of the inhabitants of Preston.  The calculations are\nfounded on the ages at death for the six years ending June 30, 1843:--\n\n                  1.  Gentry.       2.  Tradesmen.    3.  Operatives.\n\nBorn                           100               100               100\n\nRemaining at                  90.8              79.6              68.2\nthe end of 1st\nyear\n\n     ,, 2nd year              87.6              73.5              57.5\n\n     ,, 5th year              82.4              61.8              44.6\n\n    ,, 10th year              81.1              56.6              38.8\n\n   ,,  20th year              76.3              51.6              31.5\n\n    ,, 30th year              72.3              45.9              25.2\n\n    ,, 40th year              63.4              37.5              20.4\n\n    ,, 50th year               56.              28.1              15.6\n\n    ,, 60th year              45.1              20.5              11.2\n\n    ,, 70th year              25.4              13.3               6.1\n\n    ,, 80th year                8.               4.5               2.1\n\n    ,, 90th year               1.3                .8                .2\n\n   ,, 100th year               . .               . .               .03\n\n                  Terminates in     Terminates in     Terminates in\n                  the 92nd year.    the 96th year.    the 103rd year.\n\n        _Evidence of Rev. J. Clay_.  _Health of Towns Report_, _page_ 174.\n\nThe following table shows the progressive decrease in the vitality of the\nthree classes from the age of 21 years:--\n\n                  Gentry, &c.       Tradesmen, &c.    Operatives.\n\n21 years old                   100               100               100\n\nRemaining at 30               94.7              89.4              79.7\nyears old\n\n ,, 40 years old              83.2              73.2              63.7\n\n ,, 50 years old              73.4              55.0              48.9\n\n ,, 60 years old              59.1              40.4              34.6\n\n ,, 70 years old              33.4              26.5              18.9\n\n ,, 80 years old              10.8               9.6               7.1\n\n ,, 90 years old               1.6               1.5               1.1\n\n    ,, 100 years               . .               . .               0.6\n             old\n\n                  Terminates at     Terminates at     Terminates at\n                  92 years.         96 years.         103 years.\n\n        _Evidence of Rev. J. Clay_.  _Health of Towns Report_, _page_ 175.\n\n1.  Saving by one-third of the actual number of           1,240 pounds\nDeaths.  The expense of each being estimated at\n2_l._ 10_s._\n\n2.  Saving in the excess of Births beyond 1 in 44           827 pounds\nof the Population; the expense of each Birth\nbeing taken at 1_l._\n\n3.  Saving in day's labour from sickness,                 7,047 pounds\nestimating one-third of the cases out of the\nexpense.  16,710 Cases.\n\n4.  Reduction by one-half of the existing expense           501 pounds\nof Widowhood and Orphanage, the amount taken from\nthe actual expenditure.\n\n5.  Saving in the expense of Insurance, by               15,000 pounds\nkeeping the water on night and day, so as to be\nin readiness at one minute's notice.  Estimated\non half the number of Houses at 6_s._ per House.\n\n6.  Saving of Productive Manure estimated at             25,000 pounds\n10_s._ per head on the whole Population.  All\nliquid and solid Manure and Street Sweepings\nbeing carried out of Town by the Sewers.\n\n7.  Saving in Washing, &c. consequent on the             10,450 pounds\nburning of Factory Smoke.  Estimated at 1_d._ per\nhead per week of the Population.\n\n8.  Saving of outside painting of Shops and               1,250 pounds\nHouses; estimating the cost per House at 25_s._\nand the saving at one-fourth of the sum.\n\n\n\n                                            pounds     _s._       _d._\n\nTotal annual saving to the town             47,815        0          0\n\nTotal weekly saving to the town                919       10          4\n\nTotal annual saving to each house                4       15          7\n\nTotal weekly saving to each house                0        1         10\n\nTotal annual saving to each                      0       19          1\nindividual\n\nTotal weekly saving to each                      0        0       4.25\nindividual\n\n        _Evidence of Rev. J. Clay_.  _Health of Towns Report_, _page_ 197.\n\n                                Total                  A.                      B.             C.                   D.\n                              Number of   Cost per House for Capital.   Rent per House.     Total        Total Increased Rental\n                               Houses.                                                     Outlay.       required defraying by\n                                                                                                         Annual Instalments of\n                                                                                                       Principal and Interest of\n                                                                                                         20 Years for the House\n                                                                                                          cleansing and Water\n                                                                                                      Apparatus, and 30 Years for\n                                                                                                           Sewers and Drains.\n\n                                              pounds     _s._     _d._     _s._     _d._      pounds      pounds     _s._     _d._\n\n1.  In want of water               5,000           0       10        0        0        6       2,500         200       15        0\n\n2. . . . main sewer               10,000           0        5        0        0        2       2,500         162       12        6\n\n. . . secondary do.                7,919           2        9        6        2        6      19,599       1,274       18        9\n\n3. . . . house-drains             10,000           0       15        0        0        9       7,500         487       17        9\n\n4. . . . water closets            10,000           2        0        0        2        0      20,000       1,606        1        0\n\n5. . . . ventilation              10,000           0       15        0        0        9       7,500         602        4        6\n\n6. . . . street-sweeping          10,000             . . .                    9        3     . .           4,625        0        0\n\n\n\n                                   pounds      _s._         _d._\n\nTotal immediate expenditure of        51,599        0                0\ncapital required for the\nimprovement of the town\n\nTotal increased rental                 8,959        9                8\n(including the annual expense\nof street-sweeping)\n\nImmediate expenditure for each             5       19                3\nhouse\n\nTotal increased annual rent                0       15               11\nfor each house\n\nTotal increased weekly rent                0        0             3.75\nfor each house\n\nImmediate expenditure per head             1        3                9\nof the population\n\nAnnual expenditure per head of             0        3              6.5\nthe population\n\nWeekly expenditure per head of             0        0       0.75 14/52\nthe population\n\n        _Evidence of Rev. J. Clay_.  _Health of Towns Report_, _page_ 196.\n\n\n\nDR. ARNOTT TO THE AUTHOR, ON THE SUBJECT OF VENTILATION.\n\n\n                                            Bedford Square, January, 1845.\n\nMY DEAR SIR,\n\nTo aid the memory of persons inquiring about the means of preserving\nhealth, I have elsewhere endeavoured to mark clearly, that the four\nthings, fit _air_, _temperature_, _aliment_, and _exercise_, are all that\nneed to be secured, and the two things _violence_ and _poisons_ all that\nneed to be avoided, by men of sound constitution, that they may enjoy\nuninterrupted health and long life;--and consequently that the causes of\nall other disease than the decay from age are to be looked for in errors\ncommitted in regard to these four necessaries, or in the direct influence\nof these two kinds of noxious agents.  The tabular view on the opposite\npage {282}, now to be examined, exhibits the subject to the eye.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIn some moderately warm and uniform climates of the earth, such as the\nAzores or Western Isles in the Atlantic, the two first mentioned\nnecessaries, viz. fit temperature and pure air, are so constantly present\nthat the inhabitants no more think of them as necessaries to be laboured\nfor than they think of the gravitation which holds their bodies to the\nearth as such a necessary.  But in colder, or changing climates, to\nprocure house-shelter, clothing, and fuel, for cold weather becomes a\nvery considerable part of the necessary business of life.  And where food\nis dear, that is to say, obtainable only as the reward of much labour, as\nis true in England, the amountof labour which individuals can perform\nwith safety to their health, is often not sufficient to supply all the\nurgent wants.\n\nExposure to temperature lower than what suits the human constitution is\nso severely felt, that persons, even before fixed disease has arisen as a\nconsequence, cannot remain indifferent to it; and how little soever some\nminds are disposed to reflect or speculate on such subjects, there are\nfew who are not aware that all the diseases which in this and other\nclimates are called winter diseases, as catarrhs, quinsies, pleurisies,\ncroups, rheumatisms, &c. &c. are consequences of error in regard to\ntemperature.  But only persons whose attention has been specially\ndirected to the subject become fully aware of the fatal influence of that\nwant of fresh air which the closeness or otherwise faulty construction of\ndwellings occasions.  The immediate effect is little felt, although the\ninsidious enemy is unfailingly producing diseases perhaps more\ndestructive even than those from cold, above enumerated.  Impaired bodily\nand mental vigour, and the scrofulous constitution which renders persons\nmore liable to many diseases and among these to consumption, the\ndestroyer at present of about a sixth part of the inhabitants of Britain,\nmay be cited as part of the effects.\n\nIn England, as yet, many singular and hurtful misconceptions prevail on\nthe subjects of both warming and ventilating.  The object of a little\nwork which I published some time ago on these subjects, was to substitute\nfor the misconceptions correct knowledge, and to describe some new and\nsimple means of obtaining the objects sought.  A considerable change,\nhowever, in common opinions and habits is not easily effected, and the\nco-operation of many labourers will be required to accomplish all that is\nhere wanted.  In a new edition of the book, now in preparation, I have\nattempted to convert some remarkable errors that have been committed in\npublic situations into useful warnings or lessons for the future.  It is\nbut recently that even the members of our Houses of Parliament became\naware that many of their body formerly had lost health, and even life,\nfrom want of a complete ventilation of the Houses, easy to be effected.\nAnd at present the havoc made in the crowded workrooms of milliners,\ntailors, printers, &c. and the injury done to young health in many\nschools, from similar want of knowledge, are most painful to contemplate.\nWithout the requisite knowledge very expensive attempts are made with\nlittle or no benefit; with that knowledge, the desired ends may be\ncompletely attained at little cost.\n\nThe great error committed in regard to ventilation has been the want of\nan outlet in or near the cieling of rooms, for the air rendered impure in\nthem by the breathing of inmates and the burning of candles, lamps, gas,\n&c.  At present the only outlet of English rooms is the fire place or\nchimney opening near the floor.  But all the impurities above referred to\nrise at once towards the cieling, because of the lessened specific\ngravity of air when heated, and there they would at once escape by a fit\nopening.  Where there is no such opening, however, they become diffused\nin the upper air of the room, and can escape only slowly by diving under\nthe chimney-piece as that air is changed.  Thus the air of a room above\nthe level of the fire-place, whenever there are people or lights in the\nroom, must always be loaded, more or less, with impurity.  The purest air\nof the room is that near the floor, being the last that entered, and the\ncoolest, therefore and heaviest specifically; and with this the fire is\nfed, while the hotter impure air remains almost stagnant above, around\nthe heads and mouths of the company.  To remove the evil here referred\nto, I have shown, that even with an open fire, if the throat of the\nchimney be properly narrowed by a register flap, an opening made near the\ncieling into the chimney flue, with a valve in it to allow air from the\nroom to enter the chimney, but allowing no smoke to come out--will serve\nvery effectually; and that where there is no open fire the ventilation\ncan, by the means described, be made still more complete.\n\nThe great error with respect to warming in rooms for many inmates has\nbeen to have all the heat radiating (none being given off by contact)\nfrom one focus or fire place, persons near to which consequently must\nreceive too much, and those far from which will receive too little; while\nthe supply of fresh air enters, cold, at a few openings chiefly, and\npours dangerously on persons sitting near these.  In common rooms, with\nopen fires, the evils described may be lessened considerably by admitting\nfresh air through tubes or channels which open either near the fire, or\nall along the skirtings so that the fresh air is equally distributed over\nthe room and mixed with the mass of air previously in it: but to have\nwhat is desirable, the air before distribution must be warmed by some of\nthe simple means now known, as of warm channels in the brick work around\nthe fire, or of the air being made to come into contact with the surface\nof properly regulated stoves, or tubes containing heated water.  I have\ngiven detailed accounts of these means in the publication above referred\nto; and I have contrived and described various regulators applicable to\nstoves and to the furnaces of hot-water apparatus, which give complete\ncommand over the rate of combustion, and save nearly all the ordinary\ntrouble of watching fires.\n\nThen, to give complete efficiency to both the warming and ventilating\napparatus described, I have had made a simple air-mover, or ventilating\npump, which may be worked by a weight, like a kitchen jack, or by a\ntreddle, like a spinning-wheel or turning-lathe; and which, in all states\nof wind and of temperature, will deliver by measure any quantity of air\ninto or out of any inclosed space.\n\nThe means of ventilating and of warming now referred to, may in different\ncases be adopted in part or in whole.  In the dwellings of the poor of\ncities, where the same room serves for all purposes,--working at a trade,\nsleeping, cooking, and is never unoccupied, a brick taken out of the\nwall, from near the cieling, over the fireplace, so as to leave there an\nopening into the chimney-flue, removes great part of the evil; and if a\nsimple chimney-valve, which I have described, allowing air freely to\nenter the chimney, but no smoke to return, be added, and there be an\nadditional opening made in some convenient part of the wall or window to\nadmit and distribute fresh air, where air enough cannot enter by the\ncrevices and joints about the door and window, the arrangement might be\ndeemed for such places complete.  Even in a milliner's or tailor's\ncrowded work room a larger opening of this kind into the chimney, with\nits balanced valve, and with a branching tube having inverted funnel\nmouths over the gas lamps, or other lights, and conveying all the burned\nair to the valved opening {287} in the chimney, is so great an\nimprovement on present practice, that many would deem it perfection.  To\nthis, however, may be added, at little cost, an opening for admitting,\nand channels behind the skirting for distributing, the fresh air; and to\nmake the thing really complete, there must be also the means, by a stove\nor by hot water pipes, of warming the air before its distribution; and\nthere must be the ventilating pump to inject and measure air when such\naction may be required.  During the winter, in many cases the chimney\ndraught would be sufficient to produce the desired currents of air\nwithout the pump.\n\nAll the means here spoken of have already been and are in satisfactory\noperation in various places.  The chimney-valves have been made by Mr.\nSlater, gas-fitter, 23, Denmark Street, Soho, and Mr. Edwards, 20, Poland\nStreet, Oxford Street.  The pump by Mr. Bowles, 58, Great Coram Street,\nand Mr. Williams, 25, Upper Cleveland Street.  The stoves by Mr. Edwards,\nPoland Street, Messrs. Bramah and Co. Piccadilly, Messrs. Bailey,\nHolborn, and others.\n\n                                                        I am, my dear sir,\n                                                         yours very truly,\n                                                                N. ARNOTT.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                      CHARLES WHITTINGHAM, CHISWICK.\n\n\nTHE FOUR NECESSARIES.\n\n   In fit Kind and          In Deficiency.            In Excess.\n       Degree.\n\n1.  AIR                 Suffocation             Excess of Oxygen.\n\n                        Unchanged Air.\n\n2.  TEMPERATURE         Cold (intense)          Heat (intense.)\n\n3.  ALIMENT:--\n\n   Food                 Hunger                  Gluttony, or Surfeit.\n\n   Drink                Thirst                  Swilling water.\n\n4.  EXERCISE:--\n\n   Of the body          Inaction or             Fatigue or\n                                                Exhaustion.\n\n   Of the mind          Ennui                   Want of Sleep.\n\n                        Certain depressing      Certain exciting\n                        passions, as fear,      passions, as anger,\n                        sorrow, &c.             jealousy, &c.\n\n   Of the mixed         Solitude                Debauchery.\nsocial aptitudes.\n\nTHE TWO NOXIOUS AGENTS.\n\n\n1.  VIOLENCE:--\n\nWounds,--Fractures,--Burns, &c.--Lightning.\n\n9.  POISONS:--\n\nAnimal, Mineral, Vegetable.\n\nCertain of these, such as _alcohol_ in its various forms, opium, tobacco,\n&c. which in large quantities kill instantly, when they are taken in very\nmoderate quantity can be borne with apparent impunity, and are sometimes\nclassed as articles of sustenance, or they may be medicinal, but if taken\nbeyond such moderation, they become to the majority of men destructive\nslow poisons.\n\nContagions,--as of plague, small-pox, and measles.\n\nMalaria of marshes, thickets, and of filth.\n\n\n\n\nFootnotes:\n\n\n{147}  See Appendix.\n\n{202}  \"There are several thousand gratings which are utterly useless on\naccount of their position, and positively injurious from their\nemanations.\"--Mr. Dyce Guthrie.  Health of Towns Report, vol. ii. p. 255.\n\n{209}  \"To give an idea of the principle of contour lines, we may suppose\na hill, or any elevation of land covered with water, and that we want to\ntrace the course of all the levels at every 4 feet of vertical height;\nsuppose the water to subside 4 feet at a time, and that at each\nsubsidence the line of the water's edge is marked on the hill; when all\nthe water is withdrawn, supposing the hill to be 24 feet high, it will be\nmarked with a set of six lines, denoting the contours of each of the\nlevels, exactly 4 feet above each other.\"--Mr. Butler Williams's evidence\nbefore the Health of Towns Commission.\n\n{214a}  See Mr. Toynbee's Evidence.  Health of Towns Report, vol. i. pp.\n87, 88.\n\n{214b}  See Dr. Arnott's Evidence.  Health of Towns Report, vol. i. pp.\n45, 46.\n\n{215a}  See Dr. Guy's Evidence.  Health of Towns Report, vol. i. p. 92.\n\n{215b}  In St. George's, Southwark, out of 1467 persons who received\nparochial relief, 1276 are reported to have been ill with fever.\n\n{233}  The mischief that may be done by associations for benevolent\npurposes, when ill-directed, is admirably shown in a pamphlet on the\nsubject of Visiting Societies by \"Presbyter Catholicus.\"  James Darling,\nLittle Queen Street, 1844.  One of the objects of this pamphlet is to\nshow that the command addressed to alms-givers \"not to let their left\nhand know what their right hand doeth,\" concerns the receiver as much as\nthe giver--that \"a man's alms will be converted into a source of almost\nunmixed evil, if their distribution become a subject of notoriety,\" which\nis the case in public charities.  This, like most general propositions,\nis not to be construed over strictly; but there is much truth in it,\n(especially if we take the word \"alms\" in its most restricted sense) and\nit deserves to be weighed carefully by all who wish to render their\nbenevolence most available.\n\n{282}  The tabular view has been moved to the end of the letter in this\nProject Gutenberg transcription.--DP.\n\n{287}  The author of this book has tried one of these \"valved openings\"\nrecommended by Dr. Arnott, and has found it answer very well.","title":"The Claims of Labour: An essay on the duties of the employers to the employed","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":55209}