"customers are the farmers like to have for their "wool, corn, and cattle? such customers, and such a "consumption, cannot choose but advance the land"ed interest, and hold up the rents of the gentle men. "But of all men living, we merchants, who live "by buying and selling, ought never to encourage "beggars. The goods which we export are indeed "the product of the lands, but much the greatest part "of their value is the labour of the people: but how "much of these people's labour shall we export whilst "we hire them to sit still? The very alms they re"ceive from us, are the wages of idleness. I have "often thought that no man should be permitted to take relief from the parish, or to ask it in the street, "until he has first purchased as much as possible of ❝his own livelihood by the labour of his own hands; "and then the public ought only to be taxed to make "good the deficiency. If this rule was strictly observ"ed, we should see every where such a multitude of "new labourers, as would in all probability reduce the ❝price of all our manufactures. It is the very life of " merchandize to buy cheap and sell dear. The mer chant ought to make his outset as cheap as possi❝ble, that he may find the greater profit upon his "returns; and nothing will enable him to do this like the reduction of the price of labour upon all our "manufactures. This too would be the ready way to ❝ increase the number of our foreign markets: the ❝ abatement of the price of the manufacture would "pay for the carriage of it to more distant countries; "and this consequence would be equally beneficial "both to the landed and trading interests. As so 16 great an addition of labouring hands would produce this happy consequence both to the merchant and "the gentleman, our liberality to common beggars, and every other obstruction to the increase of la"bourers, must be equally pernicious to both." 66 Sir Andrew then went on to affirm, that the reduc tion of the prices of our manufactures by the addition of so many new hands, would be no inconvenience to any man: but observing I was something startled at the assertion, he made a short pause, and then resumed the discourse," It may seem," says he, “. a “paradox, that the price of labour should be reduced "without an abatement of wages, or that wages can "be abated without any inconvenience to the labour"er, and yet nothing is more certain than that both "these things may happen. The wages of the la"bourers make the greatest part of the price of every "thing that is useful; and if in proportion with the wages the prices of all other things should be abat"ed, every labourer with less wages would still be "able to purchase as many necessaries of life; where "then would be the inconvenience? But the price of "labour may be reduced by the addition of more "hands to a manufacture, and yet the wages of per"sons remain as high as ever. The admirable Sir "William Petty has given examples of this in somè "of his writings: one of them, as I remember, is that “of a watch, which I shall endeavour to explain so as "shall suit my present purpose. It is certain that a "single watch could not be made so cheap in pro"portion by only one man, as a hundred watches by a "hundred; for as there is a vast variety in the work, "no one person could equally suit himself to all the 65 parts of it; the manufacture would be tedious, and "at last but clumsily performed: but if an hundred "watches were to be made by an hundred men, the "cases may be assigned to one, the dials to another, "the wheels to another, the springs to another, and 66 every other part to a proper artist; as there would "be no need of perplexing any one person with too "much variety, every one would be able to perform "his single part with greater skill and expedition; and "the hundred watches would be finished in one fourth part of the time of the first one, and every one of them at one-fourth part of the cost, though the wa66 ges of every man were equal. The reduction of the "price of the manufacture would increase the demand "cf it, all the same hands would be still employed, "and as well paid. The same rule will hold in the "clothing, the shipping, and all other trades whatso"ever. And thus an addition of hands to our manufac"tures will only reduce the price of them; the la"bourer will still have as much wages, and will con"sequently be enabled to purchase more convenien"ces of life; so that every interest in the nation "would receive a benefit from the increase of our "working people. "Besides, I see no occasion for this charity to com"mon beggars, since every beggar is an inhabitant "of a parish, and every parish is taxed to the main"tenance of their own poor. For my own part, I can"not be mightily pleased with the laws which have "done this, which have provided better to feed than " employ the poor. We have a tradition from our "forefathers, that after the first of those laws was "made, they were insulted with that famous song "And if we will be so good-natured as to maintain "them without work, they can do no less in return than sing us The Merry Beggars.' "What then? am I against all acts of charity? God "forbid! I know of no virtue in the gospel that is in "more pathetic expressions recommended to our prac"tice. I was hungry and ye gave me no meat, thirsty ' and ye gave me no drink, naked and ye clothed me not, a stranger and ye took me not in, sick and in pri'son and ye visited me not.' "Our blessed Saviour "treats the exercise or neglect of charity towards a 66 poor man, as the performance or breach of this duty "towards himself. I shall endeavour to obey the will "of my Lord and master: and therefore if an indus"trious man shall submit to the hardest labour and "coarsest fare, rather than endure the shame of taking ""relief from the parish, or asking it in the street, this "is the hungry, the thirsty, the naked; and I ought "to believe, if any man has come hither for shelter "against persecution or oppression, this is the stran66 ger, and I ought to take him in. If any countryman "of our own is fallen into the hands of infidels, and "lives in a state of miserable captivity, this is the man "in prison, and I should contribute to his ransom. I "ought to give to an hospital of invalids, to reco"ver as many useful subjects as I can; but I shall "bestow none of my bounties upon an alms-house of "idle people; and for the same reason I should not "think it a reproach to me if I had withheld my cha"rity from those common beggars. But we prescribe "better rules than we are able to practise; we are "ashamed not to give into the mistaken customs of "our country; but, at the same time, I cannot but "think it a reproach worse than that of commonswear❝ing, that the idle and the abandoned are suffered in "the name of Heaven, and all that is sacred, to ex❝tort from Christian and tender minds a supply to a "profligate way of life, that is always to be supported, "but never relieved." Z. No. CCXXXIII. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 27. ..........Tanquam hæc sint nostri medicina furoris, As if by these my sufferings I could ease, VIRG. DRYDEN. I SHALL, in this paper, discharge myself of the promise I have made to the public, by obliging them with a translation of the little Greek manuscript, which is said to have been a piece of those records that were preserved in the temple of Apollo, upon the promontory of Leucate: it is a short history of the Lover's Leap, and is inscribed, " An account of per66 sons, male and female, who offered up their vows "in the temple of the Pythian Apollo, in the forty"sixth Olympiad, and leaped from the promontory "of Leucate into the Ionian sea, in order to cure "themselves of the passion of love." This account is very dry in many parts, as only mentioning the name of the lover who leaped, the person he leaped for, and relating, in short, that he was either cured or killed, or maimed by the fall. It indeed gives the names of so many who died by it, that it would have looked like a bill of mortality, had I translated it at full length; I have therefore made an abridgment of it, and only extracted such particular passages as have something extraordinary, either in the case, or in the cure, or in the fate of the person who is mentioned in it. After this short preface, take the account as follows. Battus, the son of Menalcas the Sicilian, leaped for Bombyca the musician; got rid of his passion with the loss of his right leg and arm, which were broken in the fall. |