Year: 1870

Tom Bro'rn's" Fd1etreH Speech The


Ldbor Increment IN England-Co-


operation Gad Concliaiion-I The


Folly Of Strikes.


At the Cooper Institute. in New
York. Friday night, Thomas Hughes
gave his farewell lecture in this coun-
try. Ii contained history of the la
hor movement in which Mr.. Hughes
statement ofits condition and pros
poets. We give the lecture almost
entire.


In no other country in the world is
the belief in the future-in the certain
progress of our race toward better
state of things here, On this much
abused and patient old earth on which
we all find ourselves-so strong, so
undoubting, as in these United States.
You have no Saturnian age, decked
out by the imagination of poets, to
look back upon and to sigh for: you
have no wish for any such, so far As
have been able to discover. The key
note Of your highest inspiration has
been hope, and faith in man and his
destiny. LET the dead past bury its
dead, and come hither and work in The
living present, all who can find neither
room or work elsewhere" This take
to be your psalm of life to the poor of
all nations. and they are answering
and docking in. OF all crseds and races
and colors.


Men. my brothers, men, the workers, ever
working something new,


The things they have done but earnest OF the


things which they shall do. -


Well, then, you whose golden age
lies right in front, will, l am sure, re.
joice in any evidence, even from the
Old World, that confirms your own
faith in the future, and know of
nothing in history more cheering in
itself, or more calculated to confim
fain hearts and strengthen feeble knees,
than the advance in prosperity and
wisdom Of the working class in my
own country since 1 can remember
them. The great problem ofour time,
how those who live by the sweat of
their brow, and who must always form
the vast majority Of every human So
| ciety, can be put in their right place,
under conditions of life which Chris
tian civilization need not be ashamed
of, without injustice to the rest of the
great brotherhood, has 10 longer much
terror for lis at home. How far we
have succeeded in solving it / hope to
show you, SO far as it can be done in
the course of an hour and l shall be
indeed rejoiced if, on the eve of my de.
parture from your country, in which !
have seen and learnt SO much, and
have received such extraordinary kind.
ness, can tell your people anything
which may render their paths along
the same road somewhat less pcrilous
and stormy than ours has been.


In England the war between labor
and capital has lasted, with occasion.
al lulls, for upward Of five hundred
years. Far back in those dim old
Plantagenet times we find the traces
of that war on the statute-book, and
in the pages Of the Chroniclers. The
Statute of Laborers and other acts en-.
deavored to fix the rate of wages, and
the conditions under which handierafts.
men should be allowed to dispose Of
this labor. After the black death had
devastated the southern and eastern
counties, the most stringent laws were
passed in the hope of checking the
rise of wages which that fearful calam
ity had caused. Scarcely more than
one smith or carpenter in four was lefl
in some of the fairest and most popu
lous of English districts but king and
baron, and bishop and merchant could
see no reason why they should have to
pay more for the skill Of one survivor
The first great strike Of which we have