The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-10-29 00:00:00

CORRESPONDENCE.

CHURCH RATES AND SACRAMENTAL WINE

TO THE EDITOR OF THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD.

,kt a vestry meeting held at Prescot some time
since, it was moved that counsel's opinion should be taken
as to the legality of supplying any but the parish church
with the sacramental wine out of the church rate, with the
hope, it would seem, of withdrawing that supply from three
other churches in the parish that did receive it.
Dr. Lushington was accordingly consulted on the subject,
Ind he has transmitted his opinion to the committee, which
is, that all episcopal churches or chapels in the parish are
entitled to the wine for sacramental use out of the church
rates.

The disappointment of the " liberals " may well be con-
ceived at this important decision, as there are three or four
other churches in the parish that will now be entitled to the
benefit of the wine, which before had to be found out of the
pew-rents ; at the same time they were paying their portion
of the rate, from which they derived no benefit. It is to be
hoped that all parishes similarly situated will take advantage
of this information, and claim the benefit to which they are
justly entitled.—l am, sir, your obedient servant,

St. Helens, 23d October, 1941

A CHURCHMAN

MUNICIPAL ELECTION

TO THE EDITOR OF THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD,

SlR,—The time has arrived for looking fairly in the face
whatever difficulties there may be in the way of that success
which every well-wishing conservative must desire to see
crowning those great efforts that have been made for the
past few years in our registration courts.
That those difficulties are neither few nor unimportant,
will not be denied by any one who has watched the progress,
the too successful progress of the enemy, in his endeavour to
place a pauper constituency on the registry ; and it behoves
us now, while it is called to-day, to bestir ourselves to cir-
cumvent the villany of a party who could fling patriotism to
the winds, and sacrifice the well-being of the town by legiti-
matising a spurious Irish Roman Catholic community of the
lowest grade, the most uneducated cast, and the worst mo-
rals, to claim relief equally with our own well-regulated and
honest, but poor and hard-working fellow-townsmen.
There is something so profligate and abandoned in that
diabolical act of the faction, as to call for the reprobation of
every right-thinking man. It proves at once that there is
no act too base for them to practise. The morals of the
town—nay the very existence of the borough—would be sa-
crificed if found opposing the selfish wish or the aggrandise-
ment of a party styling itself, par excellence, " liberal," and
boasting of the ardency of its desire for the liberty and the
happiness of the people, when the whole scope of its inten-
tions and the tenor of its acts are to brutalise and enslave.
We shall very shortly be called on to feel and acknowledge
the effects of this crowning unprincipled act of theirs, in the
shape of overwhelming poor-rates—rates that must be con-
tinued through a series of years, while the advantage to the
party for whom all this must be borne, is ephemeral only.
Surely this will rouse the town to a sense of duty : this surely
will excite even whigs to a rebellious reprobation of an act
worthy of strangers who had domiciled among us for the
declared purpose of ruin and demoralisation.
I call, therefore, on every individual who has at heart the
welfare of the town and the prosperity of its institutions, to
come forth as one man, and, in unity of purpose, smite the
faction to the earth on Monday next, that it become pros-
trate for ever. To accomplish this, it is indispensable that
an adequate and persevering canvass be at once, if it has not
already been, entered upon—that every voter be called on,
and each one made acquainted with the unprincipled act that
has swindled a pauper constituency of the worst class to
swamp our own legitimate home one, to frustrate its will,
and finally to consummate the degradation and the injury
by picking our pockets through the legal channel of a poor-
rate.

I would not have the enemy despised, nor the danger un-
heeded. This is not the way to meet a difficulty. But let
each of us devote the little remaining time to a serious de-
termination to work out a foil to the adversary ; and if he
have increased his chances of success by two thousand Irish
Roman Catholics distributed through the sixteen wards, let
it produce increased energies on our part, that not a solitary
conservative be overlooked nor unpolled.
To carry the mayor would be no Herculean task, seeing

the number of conservative members going out this, and the
number of wards carried by us the last, election. It may be
done, but not without effort ; and if it be not done, a charge
of apathetic feeling will rest somewhere. A new general
government ought to be the harbinger of a new local state of
things among us; but if each relies on that circumstance,
favourable though it be, to work out and carry the necessary

nformation into our council-room without setting his own

shoulder to the wheel, the die is cast, and repentance will
become the concluding act of Monday next, instead of mu-
tual congratulations and a joyous Peal upon the merry bells.
To our posts, then, every man of us ! remembering, that the
ensuing will be the most important election that has taken
place since the first under the New Municipal Act.

TO MR. MICHAEL ASHCROFT, FARMER, BANK-
HALL, AND CANDIDATE FOR EVERTON AND
KIRKDALE WARD.

DEAR was going to begin my epistle by com-
paring you to Cincinnatus, but then I thought that, in the
first place, I should occupy too much time and space in
attempting to instruct you as to who the said Cincinnatus
was ; and, secondly, that after all my instructions, you would
remain as ignorant as ever, and that you would be able to
see no more semblance of similarity between you and the

Roman than there is between a donkey and a horse, or be-
tween a parsnip and a potatoe! Well, then, I shall endea-
vour, by the use of plain terms, to let you and " all whom it
may concern" know what I would be at in thus publicly
addressing one who has publicly announced himself a candi-
date for one of the public honours of our town.
And first as to your address, which is evidently the work-
manship of some crafty mechanic, though whether a ship-
wright or a cartwright, I leave others more knowing than
myself to determine : suffice it to know and broadly to state

.he fact, it is not yours ; but that is nothing as compared to
he other more disgraceful fact that it is evidently and de-
signedly written with a view to deceive electors less knowing

n. tn.yself

You 'address no particular class of the electors, whether
whig, radical, or tory : you have not even the boldness of
manliness to state what your principles are, and thereby you
expect, I presume, to catch the votes of some who take you,

. . .
as I lately did, to be a stanch conservative.
You will laugh at this, and, seein:; how common an at-
tendant you are, and how openly you express your opinions
at all the public places of Kirkdale, you will sneeringly ask
me how I came to he deceived by you. I will tell you.
Some time ago, while attending the same parish church with
you, hearing you profess at vestry dinners, and indeed on all
occasions, the warmest attachment both to Church and
State, and seeing you twice appointed to the really-conserva-
tive office of churchwarden, (for the proper discharge of
which a strictly-conservative oath was required of you,) I
could not possibly regard you but as a constutionally-con-
servative member of the State. Such—as I have lived long
enough to know—you certainly are not; for, let any man be

throw-n, as business has sometimes led me, into your com-
pany at your public places of resort, and he will hear you,
night after night, eruct the most noisy denunciations against
the Church and her ministers, as well as against all the time-
honoured and well-ordered institutions of our land ! These
denunciations are generally so violent and rabid, that I have
been often led to wonder at your friends not looking after
you; am now only astonished at their not sending you to a
safer place of keeping than to the Council Chamber.
Yes, dear Michael! trust me, such friends as these would
be friends indeed ; while those who are now pushing you

I:r;;;;;;lbefOrethe7pnbliC are but like those blackguards, in a
street, who, professing to help along a drunken man, are only
attracting a greater crowd to gaze at him, and are only caus-
ing him thereby to fall the more frequently, for their vulgar
merriment. In like manner, the vulgar radicals of Kirkdale
(there are a few such in Everton) are only making you their
catspaw, for certain purposes of their own, and you will both
know and rue it betimes. They are perfectly aware that you
do not possess one single qualification of any sort or descrip-
tion for the office of councillor; they openly declare behind
your back that—beyond the mere practical ability of growing
hay and turnips for their cattle, and of cultivating a few acres
of land for your own advantage—you are just as well acquaint-
ed with what is needful for the good or advantage of the ward
as one of your hinds, and that during the greater part of each
week you are so deeply immersed in the barley trade as not
to know, and less to care, whether their roads are in or out
of repair, whether their policemen do or neglect their duty,
or whether their lamps are dark or illumined ! Such being
their opinion of you, and such your identification with the
motley crew, let them by all means send so worthy a repre-
sentative of their interests to the Common Council ; let them
honour you with so distinguished a mark of their confidencc ;
and, confiding in you, let them reap the fruitful consequences
of your most wise, and skilful, and appropriate councillor-

ship!
But here let me offer you a word of advice, my quondam

friend and fellow tory ; instead of quoting, for your benefit,
the Latin proverb about the cobler and his last—the con-
struction of which would prove as great a stumbling block to
your understanding as would the science of municipallegis-
lation—l will just say, stick to your plough, and, while you
attend to the growth of turnips and the breeding of cattle,
leave to others who are better qualified the more difficult
task of rightly cultivating the growth and prosperity of the
town, and of properly watching her important interests and

increasing population.
Tell me not of some of those now in the Council with
whose pretensions and qualifications your own will at least
(and well you may say it) stand a comparison. No, no, Mi-
chael! all such tares, mushroom, and rubbish are now to be
cast out and excluded from the present bear garden of the
Town Council; and as you are " but a worm", totally unfit
to be tolerated in the elysium of unanimity and respectability,
which the united voice of the conservative electors will soon
render the Council Chamber, I would seriously advise you to
call your own little council together to-morrow evening, and
say to them, as I now say to yo 4,

VALE, VALE!

Kirkdale, October, 1841.
P.S.—The polling booth, it appears, is to be opened in
Kirkdale, instead of Everton. This decision of the Mayor
is altogether founded on the charitable principle that if, per-
adventure, Michael should not be able to go (or walk) to the
poll, the poll had better be brought to Michael !

MUNICIPAL ELECTION,

" Coming events cast their shadows before."—SHASKPEARE

TO THE EDITOR OF THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD.

have been rather amused of late, on reading the
various " liberal " papers and their remarks respecting the
approaching " municipal election" : indeed I perceive that,
as usual, there is not a few illnatured " sayings" as well as
" doings" on the part of the " radicals" and their aspiring
yet "reluctant" candidates, who since their " palmy days"
nevertheless appear somewhat crestfallen, if not doubtful as
to the result of their chance in the final " game" for " mu-
nicipal " honours. It is said, indeed, that straws thrown
up showeth " how the wind blows" ; and methinks, from '
the apparent movements or change in a few " respectable
wards" by known " spirited" individuals, it would almost
seem that already a " change has come over the spirit of
their dreams." For instance, there is that " indefatigable"
and always useful, although it is said " ill-used" gent, Mr.
John Holmes—with his " slender " yet modest " tail," re-
tiring " Quayle "—deserting their admiring friends in the
" aristocratic " Everton Ward, and seeking refuge in quar-
ters perhaps more suitable, if not more congenial, to their
refined, " spirited," and " independent" FEELINGS; al-
though whether the intended successor of the great" Joshua"
will be allowed his long-wished-for elevation in the council,
or continue to wear the " knight's" recent " blushing ho-
nours," depends not, it is said, upon "friendly "puffing, or
on the prophet " figs," but on the " withering GLANCE" of
the dignified condescension of an
" eloquent" personage,
whose great " talents " (at the "Angel") and other peen-
liar merits consist principally in his being rejected by the
much-abused "people," and afterwards introduced into the
" council chamber " as one of the "pitchforked " aldermen ;
but, alas ! notwithstanding this patriotic " ingenious device,"
it will not " come to good." Again, how poor Quayle,
whose sudden return from his much-loved " Isle of Man"
" retirement," or "fine"-al retreat—from his " Kirkdale "
friends—will succeed in " Scotland Ward," I leave that not
to sober Thornhill's " market toadies," but to the " gods"
and the manly unflinching IsAAc to prove on the " Ist Nov.
'41." However, methinks it was " too bad" for the quail-
ing " committee" to " earnestly PRESS " the valuable ser-
vices of the sagacious and talented Ashcroft, who " acceded

reluctantly" to cover their retreat, if not anticipated " de-
feat"; knowing that " Michael's " cards will not be found
" trumps" on the day of election, notwithstanding his libe-
ral " worship's " final act of PARTISANSHIP.

In conclusion, I must not forget the apparent mode taken
to induce even RESPECTABLE reformers to " come out" to
prop the " radicals'." sinking " cause." It is true that
the unprincipied tories " do not change their places ;
although that nearly thrice-beaten mild "patriot" Rathbone
" is everywhere by turns," nay, has again returned from his

" obscurity to aid the " tottering faction" by shel-
tering himself under the unbought " suffrages" and influ-
ence of the " Protectors" of New Bird-street, and doubtless
wilt be returned for " St. George Ward" with the same or
similar eclat that the once respected, yet now neglected
" Tinsel Atkinson" our " lion of North Toxteth," witnessed
and experienced on the 19th Nov. last. Still, how are the
" mighty fallen!" Yet, 'tis consolation to know in these
" piping times" of Reform,—,that

Every dog has his day ;
Brougham had his, also Grey.

Finally, notwithstanding Yates's" potatoe" philosophy the
other day in the " North Toxteth Ward," or the cruel
"liberality" of the York-street " Veteran Reformer," 1 do
hope that the Committee will not sleep at their post. The

day of retribution is at hand—the cr'sis is come—be up any
doing, and convince the " base whigs" that after the Ist of
November, their " tyrant majority" may commence chaunt-
iug " farewell, a long farewell to all Whig greatness." Wait-
ing your attention, I am, &c , ARGUS."
Toxteth Park, Thursday evening, Oct. 28, 1841.

OUR PORTFOLIO—No. VII.
MACHINERY AND MANUFACTURES

In spite of the Penny Cyclopcedia and all the labours of
the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, we do
perceive, now and then, that the question about Machinery
is not so perfectly well settled as the illuminati, the authors
of these productions, would certainly have it to be. We
doubt, notwithstanding all they have said, and all the light
we have derived from experience, that there is any one class
of operatives, even those of the most intelligent order, to
whom it would convey any pleasure to bear that a machine
had been invented which would supersede the necessity of
their labours ; and, with regard to the more philosophical,
or less interested portion of mankind, we do find that there
is by no means that universal consent among them which
might have been expected. Thus, in a recent number, we
observe the Morning Post holding forth as follows :
" The invention of machines as substitutes for human
labour—except in a country of which the population is inade-
quate to the work to be done—is clearly against the interest
of the labouring class. To use the language of the econo-
mists, the power to do labouring work is the capital' of the
labourers ; and, if you introduce machines which possess
this power to an enormous degree, you add enormously to
the amount of this labouring capital. And as the exchange-
able value of every thing is affected by its scarcity or abun-
dance, the exchangeable value of this labouring capital is, by
the introduction of this machine power, exceedingly reduced."
* * * " Thus it is that free-trade' men and machinery
men really work against the interest of the labourer, while
contributing to the advantage of those who have wealth."
This is a direct lunge at the machinery party, and bids
open defiance to all their boasted and much.confided-in im-

provements.
Here is another slashing cut at the body, though not so
direct, from the Herald: _ _

"The successive governments of this country have, during
the last twenty years, been afraid of looking the manu-
facturing system fully in the face : alarmed at the inherent
difficulties of the subject, they have neglected the great
questions growing out of that system ; they have legislated
on all other subjects but the evils of manufacturing opera-
tion; they have allowed those operations to be increased in
a geometrical progression, whilst the demand for manufac-
tures has only been augmented in an arithmetical ratio. The
condition of our manufactures at present is simply this :
The power of production greatly exceeds the power of con-
sumption, and whilst the former power has been unchecked,
the latter has been limited and contracted by the encroach-
ments of rivals. Our power of production is a very differ-
ent power from that of other countries; it is a mechanical
and therefore a non-consuming power, whilst theirs is a
human and consequently a consuming power."
But the machinists are amply supplied with defenders
Manchester has many " guardians" beside the one which
rejoices especially in the title ; we shall give one specimen,
however, from that local organ of the cotton metropolis :
" Those who have paid attention to the course recently
taken by tory writers and speakers, in reference to manufac-
tures, will have no doubt about the motives which lead to the
promulgation, at such a time, in such a quarter, of opinions
like these. The object is to divert the attention of the work-
ing classes from the corn-laws to machinery; and to rouse
hostility against the latter, at the risk of bringing about a re-
newal of the practices of luddism and 100m-breaking which
disgraced the country in former years. This, as it strikes
us, is a very desperate game to play; and it may probably be
turnedto the great disadvantage of the landowners, who seem
so ready to commence it. The labouring classes of the ma-
nufacturing districts have this broad and undeniable fact be-
fore them, that the rapid extension of machinery in those
districts has increased instead of diminishing employment.
Where, indeed, have there been the greatest extension of,
and the most striking improvements in, those contrivances
by which, in the first instance, labour is economized? Why,
in Lancashire. And have those improvements diminished
the population of Lancashire ? Have they lessened the num-
ber of people employed in the manufactures of the county ?
On the contrary, population has advanced with more rapid
strides than in any other part of the kingdom ; and this ad-
vance commenced with the introduction, and has kept even
pace with the improvement, of machinery. The increase of
employment has not only met the natural increase of the
population, but has provided for many thousands who flocked
into the county from other quarters.
So stands the dispute—and it is a very pretty quarrel in
whatever light we regard it. We thought, indeed, that it
had been long since argued and settled, and that no man
who takes up a spade to dig, would now be permitted to call
in question the use and advantages of machinery. The sum
of the matter we take to be this, that too little has been made

of the evils attendant upon it ; and now one party seeks to
hide them, or actually denies their existence ; the other
magnifies them beyond their true dimensions.
These evils belong to two stages of the history, namely,
the first introduction of a new machine which dispenses with
a large amount of manual labour; and, secondly, the ad-
vanced Period, or that in which large masses of people are
raised and brought together, who are quite dependent upon
machinery, and there are the alternate seasons of over-pro-
duction, or of unnatural stimulus. These evils, we think,
have not been sufficiently attended to, and the denial of the
first is revolting to the common sense of mankind. A ti,ty
of men, fit for no other employment but that to which thee
have been trained from early youth, are suddenly turned

irift by some mechanical cinCrivance which renders thvir

services :innecessary ; they suffer loss ; they complain, and
you tell them not to be mal-content or dejected, for that the
invention is quite a wonderful thing in itself, and must be of
the greatest service to the public at large. Here the griev-
ance is particular, and the remedy general ; the complaint
specific, and the answer vague and diffuse, and therefore, we

think, impertinent. How happens it that our parliament, or
perhaps we should say our House of Commons, which con-
descends to such a multifarious multiplicity of inquiries, has
never introduced any law or regulation on this point? The
inventor of a new machine obtains a patent to prevent all

otl-,er persons from availing themselves of the precious pro-
dnct of his ingenuity ; would it be deemed very obstructive,
or too great a cheek upon the spirit of the age, to put, in cer-
tain cases, some restraint upon the use of the machine even
by the inventor himself? We think not; but having given
what we conceive to be a very valuable hint, we shall leave
this matter in other hands.
We come to the other head, which is not the transition
state, but the full-blown machine, disappointing and per-
plexing its owners, not by failing to effect its purposes, but
by doing too much. With regard to the intermediate stage,
we are obliged to confess that we are amongst those who have
rather a respect. for the advantages of spinning jennies,
power-looms, mules, and all the other paraphernalia of fac-
tory operations. We are in .the habit of asking ourselves,
what would Lancashire be without them ? If the question
be, machinery, or no machinery ?—we are decidedly for ma-
chinery. Not that it is all good, and no harm—all sunshine
and no shower, either ; for where is unalloyed happiness to
be found at this side of creation ? But, under due regulation,
machinery we regard as quite a superlative aid to man, whom
sin has doomed in this life to earn his bread by the sweat of

his brow
We have no right to argue from the abuse of anything
Machinery, if properly used, is a help, and an ease to toil—
doomed mortality—and, therefore, in itself a valuable gift
and blessing. Machinery will not of itself bring happiness ;
that depends in conformity to the laws of Christianity. A.
people might be exceedingly miserable with the most power-
ful, the most splendid machinery; and very tolerably com-
fortable without any. The weapon itself is not affected by
such opposite states in the condition of those who have, or
those who have it not : we are only concerned to know that
it is in itself a good ; and that it is so, we feel that it would
be quite superfluous to offer any proofs. One or two, how-
ever, we shall refer to from a volume which happens to lay
before us—Mr. Baines' very clever and interesting History
of the Cotton Manufacture in Great Britain :
" Of the,fifteen hundred thousand individuals whom the
cotton manufacture now supports," says our author, " the
greater number are in the county of Lancaster. In the year
1700, Lancashire numbered only 166,200, (about the present
population of one of its seaports, and less than that of its
manufacturing metropolis,) in 1801, it had grown to
672,565, and in 1831, to 1,336,851, being an increase of more
than eight fold in 130 years.
At the beginning of the reign of George 111. (in 1760)
probably not more than forty thousand persons were sup-
ported by the whole cotton manufacture; machines have
been invented which enable one man to produce as much
yarn as two hundred and fifty or three hundred men could
have produced then,—which enable one man and one boy to
print as many goods as a hundred men and a hundred boys
could have printed formerly ; and the effect has been, that
now the manufacture supports fifteen hundred thousand per-
sons, or upwards of thirty-seven times as many as at the
former period !"
In another place he says—
" It may assist to form a conception of the British cotton
manufacturer, when it is stated that the yarn spun in this
country in a year would, in a single thread, pass round the
globe's circumference 203,775 times; it would reach 51 times
from the earth to the sun ; and it would encircle the earth's
orbit eight and a half times.
" The wrought fabrics of cotton exported in one year would
form a girdle for the globe, passing eleven times round the
equator.
" This manufacture furnishes nearly one-half of the ex-
ports of British produce and manufactures ; it supports more
than one-eleventh part of the population of Great Britain;
and it supplies almost every nation of the world with some
portion of its clothing.
" None of the kingdoms of Hanover, Wirteinberg, or
Saxony, has a population exceeding that engaged in the ma-
nufacture of cotton in this island.
" The receipts of our manufacturers and merchants for
this one production of the national industry, are equal to
two-thirds of the whole public revenue of the kingdom."
With regard to the character and quality of factory labour,
he says—
" That there have been instances of abuse and cruelty in
some of the manufacturing establishments is doubtless true ;
that the labour is not so healthful as labour h husbandry,
must be at once admitted ; and some children have unques-
tionably suffered from working beyond their strength. But
abuse is the exception, not the rule. Factory labour is far
less injurious than many of the most common and necessary
employments of civilized life. It is much less irksome than
that of the weaver, less arduous than that of the smith, less
prejudicial to the lungs, the spine, and the limbs, than those
of the shoemaker and the tailor. Colliers, miners, forgemen,
cutlers, machine-makers, masons, bakers, corn-millers, pain-
ters, plumbers, letter-press printers, potters, and many other
classes of artisans and labourers, have employments which,
in one way or another, are inure inimical to health and lon-
gevity than the labour of cotton-mills. Some classes of pro-
fessional men, students, clerks in counting-houses, shop_
keepers, milliners, &c., are subject to
mtoalds great, and, h
itnaui the
cases, to much greater, confinement
mill operatives.'
We might quote many more interesting passages from the
same work, to show the vast extent of this manufacture, and
its importance to all classes ; but these may suffice for the
present.
With regard to some of the evils connected with a highly
artificial and advanced state of the manufacturing system—
over-production and its remedies—they form a subject well
worthy the attention of the statesman ; but they supply no
satisfactory argument against the system itself. To another
opportunity, however, we must defer a few observations
which have occurred to us on the subject.