Star.
London, England, 1822-02-22 00:00:00

every other class of the community. our land-holders
are our law makers. According to many of these,
the importation of corn is the cause of their present
distress!! while others of them maintain that the
only remedy for this evil will be high protecting du•
ties—or, to speak plainly,. a prohibit/ors of all impor-
tation of corn of foreign growth I
Others assert, that we owe all our present distress
to the operation of Mr. Pan's Bill—that is, to our
return to cash-payments in the common concerns of
commerce and general expenditure.
According to others—and these the most daringly
wicked in their doctrines—we owe our present dis-

tress to the bounty of PROVIRRNOR! That is, in plain
language, the goodness of our CREATOR, in super-
adding to the blessings of Peace those of abundance
and plenty, is the severest calamity which Ha could
have inflicted on a People, the great majority of
whom were before suffering under the mostdistressing
privations, and unable, by exertions-even beyond their I
strength, to satisfy the cravings of hunger.
And according to some, and these we consider,
generally speaking, as those who have best considered
the subject, the distress arises from excessive taxation.

Those who attribute the distress of. the Agricul-
turalists to the present Corn Laws, shew not only much
ignorance, but an unwarrantable, and even imprudent,
degree of cupidity. Ignorance,-...f0r in the nature of
things it is impossible that 'the irriportation of wheat,
three years ago—for it is now so long since the portt
were open—could affect the present prices. IgnO-
ranee,--because were the protecting price 100 shil-
lings—aye, or a hundred pounds per quarter—=their
firma distress could not have been arrested: Igno-
rance,—because excessive prices tend to diminish
consumption, compelling the labouring classes co go
with half-filled bellies; or, in other words, diminish
the consumption, which is the only absolute and unfal-
lacious stimulus to production. Ignorance,—because
when the people cannot, by their industry, command
a sufficient supply of food, they are compelled to en-
croach on the profits of the landowners and occu-
piers, by.seeking a supply from the Poore-rates, to
which they can no way contribute. And all this
arises from indulging an illegkimate cul idity, which
in its very operation defeats its own object.—
They wish for large prices, hut never make them-
, selves at all acquainted with the indispensable con-
comitants which must ever accompany them. With-
out the means of purchasing corn, the People can
never consume the quantity which they absolutely
need ; and if these means be -dr wined fi om them in
the shape of taxes upon everything they eat, or wear,
or in any way consume—to the extent, we verily
believe, of eighteen shillings in the ppm! on all the
products of human industry, can any person nho
has common selise not perceive that excessive tax-
ation ultimately falls ti,:ort the landlords or their
tenants, so far as the consumption of corn makes a
part of the general expenditure of the community.

But mark the inconsistency of some of these selfi,h
men! Tell them of the inability of the labia rers, who
are defrauded of their just wages, to obtain a sufficient
,upply of the indispensable necessaries of life with-
out' aid from the Poors'-rates, and they will instantly
propose a remedy—not in direct terms, to be sure;
for the doctrine in i:s fullest latitude would sanction
the direct murder of all paupers—namely, to lessen
the population ; that Nature has sent guests to a table
where all the seats are fully occupied already ; and
that this increase must be counteracted. Fools and
blind, to prefer the doctrine of MALTHUS to all the
dictates of Christianity and sound philosophy !
" Marriage is honourable in all," says the doc-
trine of " peace and good will to men." The
Alalthusians, on the contrary, tell us that this may
too rapidly increase our population, and conse-
quently endanger a scarcity of provisions ; for that
Me demand for sustenance must ever press on the means
of supply !—a mere truism, after all, which simply
amounts to this : that people will not grow corn only
for the purpose of having it wasted ; for the supply
will only be produced in proportion to the demand.
To make this quite plain take the proposition in its
simple terms—" the demand must ever press on the
supply"—it must ever do so, let the population be
what it will. There was a time when our population
amounted to only five millions. Will this quack Phi-
losopher—for he is nothing else—contend that the
press for supply was then less than when our popula-
tion amounts to fifteen millions? In fact, there would
only be then grown one bushel for every three that is
now raised. Nay, more ; it might be easily shewn,
were it necessary to our argument, that the pressure
on the supply must then have been greater than
it is now.

No matter, however, what may be the real fact,
these men think that nothing can be more plain than
that, if all the paupers were annihilated, they must be
gainers; for then no demand would be made upon
them in the shape "of Poors'-rates. But they forget
entirely that were our lower classes exterminated,
they would, comparatively speaking, have no cus-
tomers for their corn—for, unhappily, it is but too
true, that, the great mass of our labouring population
has been reduced to the state of paupers, and by
those very men too whose fields they cultivate,: and
on whose produtts they expend all their earnings—
i •
excepting only what is drained from them n taxes.
Yes, we say they have been reduced to this suite by
these very men, who, instead of paying them their fair
wages, send them regularly to the Parish Funds fur