Richmond enquirer. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1815-1867, 1817-05-23

out measure Dut, though Sndil n1VetnP
meaus of retaliation i'll my hands, never
will follow their base example.
Though | quit my country, far be 1t
from me TO look upon her cause as despe-
rate, and still farther be it from me TO wish
TO miuSe dependency into your minds.
/ eau serve Mat cause no longer by ren.ain-
ing here; but tie cause itself is so good,
so just, so manifestly right and virtuOus,
and ii has been cOmbatted by means 80
unusual, SO unnatural, and so violent,
that ii must triumph in the end. Be-
sides, the circumstances of the coun-
try all tend to favour the cause ofreform.
Not tenth part of the evils of the system
are YET in existence. The country gen
tlemen who have now been amongst our
most decided adversaries, will very soon
ha compelled, for theirown preservation,
to become our friends and feltow-labour-
ers. Not fragment of their property
Will be LETT, if they do not speedily besiif
themselves. They have been induced to
believe, that a reform ofthe parliament
datiDn; but they will very soon find, that
il will afford them the only chance of es-
caping both. The wonderis, that they
DO not see this already, or, rather, that
they have not SCENT for years past. But
they have been blinded by their foolish
pride; thatpride, which has nothing of
inind belonging toit, and which, accom-
panied with a consciousness of want OF
any NATURE. superiority over the labouring
classes, seeks to indulge itself i'll spe-
cies of vindictve exercise of power.--
There has come into the heads of these
people, cannot very we'll tell how, a no
ton, that ii is proper TO consider the Ia
bouring classes as a distinct cast. They
are called, nowadays, by these gentle
men, the Peasantry." This is new
term asapplied TO Englishmen. 1t is
French word, which, in its literal sense,
means country toiks. But, in the sense, i'll
which it is used in France and Flanders
and Germany, II means, not only eoun-
try people, or country folks, but also a
distinct and degraded class of persons, who
have no pretentions whatever TO look up
on themselves, in any sense, as belonging
to the same society, or community, as the
gentry but who ought always to be
kept down in their proper place" And,
IT has become, ofiate, the fashion TO con-
slder the laboring classes in England in
the same light, and 10 speak of them and
treat them accordingly, which never was
the case in any former age.
The writings of Nautilus, who consi-
ders men as mere animals, may have had
influence in the producing of this change;
and, We new frequently hear the working
classes called the population" Just as we
call the animals upon farm " the stock."
Ii is curious, too, that this cOniumely TO
such great mass of the people should
have grown into vogue amongst the coun-
try gentlemen and their families, at time
when they, themselves. are daily and hour
" losing the estates descending to them
from their forefatiiers. They see them
selves stript of the means of keeping [! at
hospitality, for which England was once
80 famed, and of which, there remains
nothing now but the Uord in the diction-
airy they see themselves reduced To close
up their windows, live i'm corner of
their houses, sneak away to London, crib
their servants in their wages, and hardly
able TO keep up a little fawdry show;
and, IT would seem, that for the contempt
which they feel that their meanness must
necessarily excite in the common people,
they eDdeavour TO avenge themselves,
and, at the same time, to disguise their
own humiliation, by their naughty and
insoient department towards the latter:
thus exhibiting that mixture of poverty
and of pride, which has ever been deem
ed better calculated than any other union
OF qualities to draw down upon the pos
feelings.
II is curious, also, that this fit of novel
aud ridiculous pride should have afflicted
the minds of these persons at the very
time that the working classes are become
slngularly enlightened. Not enlightened
III the manner that the sons Of Cant and
Corruption would wish them to be. The
conceited creatures i'm what is called high
life, and who always Judge of men by
their clothes, imagine that the working
classes of the people have their minds
quite sufficiently occupied by the reading
of what are called religious and moral
tracts" Simple, insipid dialogues and
stories, calculated for the minds of chill
dren seven or eight years old, or for those
OF savages Just beginning to be civilized.
These concelted persons have no idea
thai the minds of the working classes ev-
er presume to rise above the infamtle le-
vel. But these concerted persons are
most grossly deceived: they are the ode
luded" part of tue community deuded
by hlrelIug and corrupt press, and bv
the cOnceIt and insolence of their own
minds. The working classes of the peo-
pie understand well what they read they
dlvelnto all matters connected with poll
tics they have a relish, not only fOs IN
terestug statement, for argument, for dis
cussion but the powers of eioqnsnce are
by no means lost upon them and, in
many, many instances, they have. shown
themselves to posses infinitely greater
powers OF describing and Of reasoning,
than have ever been shown generally bv
that description of persons, who, with
Nautilus, regard them as mere animals.
In the report Of the secret committee Of
The House of Lords, it is observed, that.
since the people have betaken themselves
TO this reading and this discussing their