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    A . or *i uDtKlt (iL/fltttllU r

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    on from age to age . Its rival , on the contrary , goes by fits and starts , takes kangaroo leaps , is one minute at a stretch gallop , and the next minute crawls . Fresh inventions—new machinery—improved processes of draining , of manuring—the formation of railways and other facilities of communication—intellectual advancement , adding to the skill of the workman—political reforms , ensuring his safety—moral reforms , strengtening his energyfinancial reforms , lightening his burden , or , by removing all restrictions on the import of foreign produce , enabling him to do the work he can best

    do ; above all , social reforms regulating his labour , economizing it , setting it free to work on the land — all these improvements in agriculture are so many leaps or springs of civilization , and some of them clear an amazing space of ground , and each spring gives a purchase for the next . And yet population , though for a moment almost caught up , is not distanced—is not even reached : it makes way with its steady run , and gets a-head , and seems as though it would always keep a-head—as though it had a mysterious power by which ,

    whenever it is hard pushed , it can quicken its speed , and keep its place in the race : and so it raises the price of food ; for , encreasing the cost of labour , it lowers the wage or reward of labour ; for , though capital , or the size of the wage-fund , may encrease equally with the number of labourers , or wagereceivers , yet , as the whole wage-fund is lessened in value—is worth less in produce—each man ' s actual share of it—his real wage , or the reward of his labour , must also be less : and so the encreased demand for food is met by an encreased supply of

    because prudence is powerless and passion allpowerful ; and , lastly , wherever there is most misery there is most recklessness . These , too , are facts , both scientific and historical ; not only laws of sociology , but also experimental truths . Pauperism , then , is a result of an over supply of labourers ; that is , of a reckless encrease of population , which reckless encrease is again a result of poverty : and thus , pauperism is at once its own cause and effect . Our labourers are running down the precipice ; they gain momentum as they run ; who , then , is to stop their course and save them from the abyss , or rather , save us ? For , let us not

    flatter ourselves , —they pull us after them ; we are all linked together , only they have the honour of going first . We are all of us on the same raft , rowing across life ' s stream—but the raft is in a whirlpool , and the waves sweep one by one into the torrent , and the drowning wretch pulls another after him , and soon there will be too few to row : and we stand cowering in fear , waiting the struggles of the sinking man , hoping that he will save himself , that his weakness will give him strength to swim . O let us rather take courage and hold out our oars , and try to haul our mates back ; and then , with " a strong pull and a pull all together , " we may yet hope to get our raft into still water .

    Yes , the only way to check this pauper-producing encrease of population , is to give to all men like motives to prudence j to give to the labourer the same motive to prudence , the same hope of rising , the same fear of falling as are felt by the landowner or capitalist . Give that , and we give civilization a fair start . This , then , is ray definition of the preventive check , and thus far with all my might would I apply it . Not by calling upon any class of men to sacrifice their feelings or ^ their passions for the sake of society ; but by giving all

    classes the like reasons to control them : not by making the poor the martyr-bachelors of the world , turning them into a new order of celibates , forcing them to vow themselves to Mammon ; not by putting them in an unnatural condition , or expecting them to act an . unnatural part ; but , confessing that they are now acting an unnatural part ( for nature intends to be prudent , and their prudence is deadstarved for want of hope and fear ) by giving them back their prudence , to make their plight as natural as our own , and then leave them to themselves , trusting , if not in nature , in Nature's God . But

    how can we give them back their prudence ? where shall we find hope or fear that shall reach the pauper ? The poor-law saves him from fear—of starvation , his only fear ; the law of demand and supply deprives him of hope ; he is a surplus labourer , and his wage is hopelessness . There is only one answer to this question , which Mr . Mill gives us : " A system of measures which shall extinguish extreme poverty for a whole generation , " and so raise the standard of living and the habits of the people , give them a home which they may fear to lose , a condition which they may hope to better . And to do this no sacrifice will be too

    severe , no tax too high , for so only can we stay the ever-flowing tide which threatens to submerge us all . We must lift the labourers out of the pit of pauperism , lift them up till they are on firm ground and walk as we do , or they will soon drag us after them . And this is no task for individuals , this lift ; it is only society which can make it , or ought to make it , for its interest , nay , its very existence depends on it . How , then , is society , acting through its government , to make this lift and save itself ? This is the social problem of the day , and there is

    only one way to solve it , and that is by society doing its duty , securing each labourer in the enjoyment of his right to labour , securing to each workman a fair day ' s wage for a fair day ' s work , and then , having gained a firm footing on the ladder of fortune , for winning the wage of industry is its first step , he will hope to rise to a height whence he will fear to fall : for fear follows hone as its shadow . So , then , if we do our duty in this matter we

    secure our interest ; no wonder ; it is generally man s interest to do his duty . If we realize , and in so far as we realize the Droit au Travail , we remedy the mistakes of the capitalist ; and in so doing we may hope to prevent the mistakes of the labourer , and to keep that social law the penalty of breaking which is the destruction of both labourer and capitalist . Surely , then , my motto for this _ letter is not too bold—Where there is a will there is ' a way—out

    of the pit of pauperism . —Yours truly , W . E . Forstbb . p . S . —One letter more I fear I must trouble you with , respecting objections , practical difficulties , and possibilities , and then I have done .

    paupers . Whence , then , this mysterious , this fearful power which haunts our march through Time as a mocking fiend , as it were Nature mocking at our triumph—triumphing in her own defeat , snatching from some the horn of plenty which civilization holds to their lips , and poisoning it to others with fear of the sufferer , or sympathy with his suffering ? Whence this power which clogs man in his course ?

    —whence , but from his own weakness ? He is unable to master the forces without him , because he is a prey to the forces within—because he is a slave to his instincts ; and he is a slave because his fellows have bound him hand and foot , and left him no power to free himself ; he is ruled by one part of his nature , and that the lowest and least noble , because his higher and more noble part is weighed down or stifled by the circumstances with which his fellows have surrounded him .

    « ' Where , then , is your difference with Mr . Mill ? " you may say : " after all , you agree with him ; your remedy is his—you , too , would sacrifice the instincts ; your plan , also , is the preventive check ; why , then , not follow it out boldly , even though it take you , as it did him , to * the stationary state' ? " But prevention is not destruction ; and that is just the difference . Harmonious

    development of all the faculties and powers of our nature involves the due subordination of some to others , but not the sacrifice of any . Doubtless , much of man ' s misery arises from his want of control of his instincts ; but whose fault is that , if his circumstances , or , rather , if his fellow-man—for man , alas ! but too often makes the circumstances of his fellow—take from him the power , that is , the

    mental and moral force to confrol them ? or , worse than that , take from him the will , by depriving him of the reward of control , and so teaching him that to use it is no use ? And how should we seek to cure this misery ? By striving—not to root out the instincts , but to restore the power—above all , the will—rightly to rule them ; not to kill the flesh , but to give life to the spirit ; and to do this , not by underrating man ' s chance of success in his conflict with the forces of matter , still less worsening that chance by depriving him of any part of his own force , but enabling him to fight his best by developing all his powers to the utmost , and so securing to each its due place .

    Here , then , lies the explanation ; ay , and I believe also the cure of many of our present evilsthe key to our prison door . What are the facts ? Pauperism must arise if population encrease faster than agriculture improve : that is a scientific fact , a law of sociology to which society must submit . With us population has thus encreased , and pauperism has arisen—nay , more , is itself encreasing ; for population hastens its stride , and pauperism seems its shadow : one wave may not roll quite so too

    far as another , but the tide ever flows . 1 hat , , is a fact ; a fact of our experience : but , population thus encreases , because men are reckless of its eiicrease : because their instincts are uncontrolled ;

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    There is no learned man but will confess he hath , mucr profited by reading controversies , his senses awakened , and his j udgment sharpened . If , then , it be profitable fox him to read , why should it not , at least , be tolerable foi his adversary to write . —Milton .

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    GIRLS' DAY SCHOOLS . IMPROVED LODGINGHOUSES FOR LADIES . Nov . 16 , 1850 . Silt , —Pleasant as it is to see so many skilful pens set to work by willing minds and benevolent hearts on suggestions for promoting the good of women , I should like to see some one taking up their cause at an earlier stage of life , and urging in a more practical manner rational schemes of preparation for our ladies ' colleges , without which they will very imperfectly fulfil their objects . I think it is observable that in all the different critiques to which , these colleges have

    been as yet subjected , the critics are labouring to show what they ought to be , supposing there were in existence an apparatus which yet remains to be called into being . There is not one of these reviews which does not object to the early age of admission into the college—not one which does not point to the college as the «* bright , consummate flower " of education . Here the philosophy of history is to be taught ; here the best authors read and criticized . Here the young lady , returning to her home after some years of school life , is to come to get rid of the newl

    difficulty of disposing of her large y acquired endowment of time and leisure . And truly , if such only were the objects of the college , and they were attained , I should think them very noble ones : it might save many a soul from sinking down into feebleness , rescue it from the infection of idle talk and frivolous habits , and kindle up aspirations after the good and great . But the misfortune is that these visions cannot be realized as they might be , because of the pressure upon the ladies' colleges of a large majority of pupilssome of them considerably above

    , the stipulated ages who have had very inferior educations , who now , for the first time , see a way opened for real solid improvement ( if it be right to use the word with regard to a career which , in fact , has never been begun ) , whom humanity forbids us to send away , and yet whose presence turns the college into a school , without the one advantage which generally belongs even to a school , otherwise mediocre ; that of prescribing the course ot education , and seeing that not more subjects are attended to at one time than the pupil is competent

    to master . Experience of this difficulty it is which has led the professors of the original college at 67 , Harley-street , to open preparatory classes , which serve in a measure to relieve them from the task of instructing the wholly uninformed in language , &e . ; for these classes , although opened nominally for children of nine years of age , are also open as far as room admits , to any young person previously conscious of her deficiencies who may have the good sense to place herself in them ns a nreliminarv measure to attending the college

    classes . Still , though this is a step in the right direction , it is a short and wholly inadequate step . It does not , in many respects , meet tho wants of parents or pupils . For young children , the allowance of time allotted to learning ( from ten o ' clock to one ) is sufficient , but for girls from ten or eleven to fourteen , we want good day-schools which shall give more than this , and give it in a more wholesome way—a portion luncheon and recreation

    of time being reserved for in the middle of the day , more freshness would bo given to tho lessons , and the parents would bo bettor satisfied with the terms , which appear to us now , if intended to include the class most in want of such schools , as much too high . If , indeed , opportunities of instruction such as I have in view were offered more largely to tho young people of London , I should entirely accord with the different critics who have « ft » rmri frmrt . non or even fifteen as the age below which

    no college pupil should be admitted . I believe tho colleges are leading us to this point—that the practical difficulty of knowing how to supply by the same machinery the wants of ignorant , ill-taught girls of fourteen and upwards , and at the same

    A . Or *I Udtklt (Il/Fltttllu R

    dDpra CnmmL

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    Nov . 30 , 185 O . J &fjC 3 Leafr £ r > 853

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    [ In this department , as am . opinions , however extreme are allowed an expression , the editor necessarily holds himself responsible for nonb . j

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• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 30, 1850, page 853, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1861/page/13/