The Statesman.
London, England, 1822-01-11 00:00:00

i*R srirk OF TH
[CONCLVDSD FROM OVR PAM* Or TEOTKOOWL3'.

When the affairs of mannfactore and rommerie
n ere found to have so--k into a degree of calamity so
readful as to ezrite not only Ilk commisseiation of
the Country towards the suffering artisans, bet ap-
prehensions from the goading agonyof their distresses
—the mere change from peace to war was assigned as
rases sufficient to account for their evils. Hut the
•tivision of our trade amour; colintri-s, which being.
-o keeer the seats of war had addressed themselves
.4 new toils of industry—the cessation of the comt
-lerce and employments of war which must seeress-
:ly throw a vast number of bands into the general
mart increasing the competition and depreciating the
hire of labour ;—theme facts, se visible in themselves,
were unnoticed by Administration till they became
known by their terrible effects. For five years were
tater causes 'offered to have their way, nor was any
enquiry set on foot, till Minister', instigated at length
by the voice of complaint, and by facts too powerful to
hr resisted, are compelled to grant (net originate)
enquiry. Then and not till then, when usilllond bad
undergone the extremity of suffering and privation,
then it was discovered that English commerce has
been impeded by laws so contradictory and uncer-
tain in their provisions, that the ablest merchants
wrest perplexed and their exertions paralyzed. It
is no 'eager ago tbao at the close of ISt% that
we produced irrefutable evidence of the Ministerial
negligence and incapacity In regard to this greed to-
• pie. down indeed from the language of the very report
of which they themselves were, with matchless re.
• pentanee or with matchless effrontery. the framers.—
'ln the country the principles laid down is that
report bete made their way during the year that Is
. past. Bet otherwise the work has apparently steed
still. Its recommendations lie upon the floor of
that nether world. of which good resolutions sot
•' reformed, is said by our great moralist to form the
pavement. So much for the activity of Adminitira-
tion in• this capital respect. It is well that the low
price of subsistence at home and a demand some
what quickened from abroad, (probably by the
sums received in exchange for corn imported during
former tear',) have blunted the acute reception of
the evils of procrastination. Nothing toward the,
amelioration se devoutly to be wished however is yet
accomplished.
That all devouring evil. the poor's rate, which
notwithstanding the declaration in a report of the
House of Commons delivered some years since, that
it would go on to consume the whole produce of
the laud. That all devouring evil which demoralizes
and bows to the earth the industrious classes, and
which eats up the property of the middle and the
higher rank—that all devouring evil still remains un-
abated, and eves untouched.
Coneerning the affairs of arieralmre it is almost
unnecessary for us. to speak. except in the bdeb
• form.
The mischief, the great misebkf Is dose:
operative capital. or- the _Jargest, portion of its
bas already passed from tJa skillet sad :the
dilutions to others kande. The • boid•lmwMfilr
try" and the bolder yeomanry, ore " their dew'
try's pride," are pushed from their level is society,
and are sunk to the creatures of the bounty or the
forbearance of those above and those articled them.—
The hope of independence, that stimulates industry'
and charms even weary toil, is gone. Of what
nature the compromise between the owner and the
occupier of the soil, between the clergyman and the'
plodneer, between tbe master and the servant, between
the goverment and all these classes, is now to be-
come, no one can prognosticate. With *handset.
aril with cheapness, the whole rent of the land has die•
• appeared. With abundance and with cheapness en-
. qoestionably the greatest blessings. the labourer is be-
c•que a pauper. and the master almost ac insolvent,
the landlord a distressed if sot an embarrassed man.
With abundance and with cheapness, which here di-
minished the resources of every individual in the
i•••untry, in the proportion of from a third to a half of
I i 4 property and his income, the taxation, the enormous
t•zatioo, remains the same—say, attempts have been
made within the last two years to increase it in the re-
stion of one-sixteenth of the whole. The revenue how-
ever rises not under the meditated augmentatioe, but
14••••lares by its deficiencies that farther impositions are
cc unavailing to the State as they are oppressive to
ti 4 individual. But under such state of things and
11. tier such management what is to be expected to
arise ?
If for a moment we pass to foreign politics, Mere is
scarcely a state whose maxims of government are not
opposition to the intelligence of its subjects, derived
from the progress of letters, aid of civilization, end of
ti.e knowledge of the blessings conferred by freedom.
Souse are in the very vortex of revolution, and almost
ail seem but to have a choice between that dreadful al-
ternative and the less hopeful chitin and charnels of
eclputism. That a great proportion of the subjects
even of our neglected, abandoned, and misgoverned
i'iter island are struggling by outrages and violence.
e.a ractful to human nature, to throw off or to change
e regular bonds of society. and uproot the institu-
tions of popery, is but too apparent. And what part
is England prepared to take? Uwe may judge from
what has recently happened in respect of Naples and of
Italy, she is bent from her high and palmy state
amazed the cations of the earth, by necessity—if we
may judge by her declaratory denial and her practical
et-folksiest' of the " monarchial principle" of the Holy
A Mance, " that constitutional improvements can only
emanate from thrones"—if we may jedge by her recent
policy of domestic restriction and of state vengeance.
wreaked upon the venerable Earl PITZWILLIAM, and
l•orled against Sir Robert Baker and Sir Rol.erl Wilson
'—if we may judge by the permitted assumption of the
functions of the Constitutional instruments of authority.
• by clubs sod societies; if we may judge by all these
• symptoms, she has forgotten that she owes her fortune
' sod her fame to freedom, and is preparing to recognise
' the preference of the Sovereigns of the North for power
over law, for the will of the Monarch, rather than the
liberty of the subject.
From what quarter then may we look for the conies
of hope? Alas, hope is almost extinct—but if any thlog
can be effected. it must be by the virtue and the medtr
ration of the few, and the energy of the many. It is
clear Mai the arts of life are all in a sage of

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