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Untitled Article
English Comfort . € t A larger mass of varied ami manifold enjoyments may certainly be found in England than it is possible to procure with us . Not in vain have wise institutions long prevailed here . What especially soothes and gladdens the philanthropist is the spectacle of the superior comfort and more elevated
condition in the scale of existence , universally prevailing . What with us are called luxuries , are here looked upon as necessaries , and are diffused over all classes . Hence arise , in even the smallest and most ordinary details , an endeavour after elegance , an elaborate finish and neatness ; in a word , a successful combination of the beautiful with the useful , which is entirely unknown to our lower classes . €€
The distress , in truth , consisted in this ; that the people , instead of having three or four meals a day , with tea , cold meat , bread and butter , beefsteaks or roast meat , were now obliged to content themselves with two , consisting only of meat and potatoes . It was , however , just harvest time , and the want of labourers in the frelds so great , that the farmers gave almost
any wages . Nevertheless , I was assured that the mechanics would rather destroy all the machinery , and actually starve , than bring themselves to take a sickle in their hands , or bind a sheaf : so intractable and obstinate are the English common people rendered by their universal comfort , and the certainty of obtaining employment if they vigorously seek it . "—Vol . I . pp . 3—5 .
The Irish Church . " The most scandalous thing , however , is , that the Catholics are forced to pay enormous sums to the Protestant clergy , while they have entirely to maintain their own , of whom the state takes no notrce . This is manifestly o » e great cause of the incredible poverty of the people . How intolerable must it appear in a country like Ireland , where more than two-thirds of the
whole population are most zealously devoted to the Catholic religion 1 In the South the proportion is much larger . Most of the parsons do not even live in Ireland , but put some poor devil , with a salary of from 60 / . to 60 / . a year , to perform their duties ; these are the far-famed curates : the duties are indeed soon performed , as there are parishes which do not contain more than ten Protestants ; and , indeed , there is one in this neighbourhood in
which not one is to be ibund ; and not even a church—only an old ruin , in which the ' farce' of divine worship is once a year acted to empty walls , during which a Catholic , hired for the occasion , performs the office of clerk ! Meanwhile , the clergy are , year after year , wearing away the pavement of London and Paris , and living as unspiritual a life as possible . Even the higher clergy , who must at least reside at certain stated periods in their
episcopal and archiepiscopal sees , suffer none of their ill-gotten gains ( for what else can money so acquired be called ?) to return back again to the poor people from whom they have wrung It , but save all they can , that they may enrich their families . Can any body wonder that such institutions have tfretjuetitly "godded thfe unhappy people to despair and rebellion ? And yet at every struggle their chains are riveted tighter , and eat more deeply
Untitled Article
838 Tour of a German Prince .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1831, page 838, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2604/page/42/
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