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    Untitled Article

    , * If the cases could be resolved into persona , and otherwise accuratel y analyzed , two results would be made apparent : — 4 1 . That the number is not , when compared with the population , a large one . * 2 . That the number of really working men is a small one /

    The worst of the moral sensibility of the English public is that it is so irregularly and partially excited , that it penetrates so little below the surface , and that it so very often diverts attention and exertion from the root and trunk of national immorality to some petty branch or quivering twig . No doubt the sight of a tipsy mechanic or two , reeling through the streets , must be a nuisance

    to respectable tradesmen , with their wives and children , on their way to church or chapel . No doubt it is very desirable that the nuisance should be abated . But this will never be done by crusading against beer-shops and gin-shops , and attempting to imprison the poor in their own wretched abodes , with no leave of absence but a day-rule for divine worship . Such attempts only

    deal with the symptoms of the disease , and if successful in repressing them , merely drive that inward , and render it more virulent . The working classes cannot , any more than other classes , exist without occasional excitement . They have , in fact , more need of it than any other class . If they be deprived of it in one direction , it ought to be provided for them in another . If

    their drudgery be hard , it is the business of society to ensure its mitigation . If their pleasures be few , it is the business of society to multiply them . If their pleasures be gross , it is the business of society to refine their tastes . If their relaxation be mischievous , it is the business of society to cater for wholesome enjoyments . Any thing rather than condemn them to ' all work and no play / which can only wear out soul and body , and deprave heart and mind . Hear our author

    again—* Very few , indeed , are they among even the most ignorant of the working people who do not understand their own situation . The most unthinking , the least intelligent , with vexy few exceptions , feel acutely at times : they never reflect on their condition without a perfect con-BciousneBS , amounting to absolute certainty , that their mortal career

    will terminate in the most abject poverty and misery , and this has a marked effect upon them : few , indeed , are they who can at all times escape from depressing thoughts , and still fewer who can at all times bear up against them ; few , indeed , have the courag e even to contemplate , for ever so abort a period , their adverse

    circumstances . ' What can such men do , so limited in their means of enjoyment , so utterly incapable of filling up the leisure they Lave , in any rational pursuit ? —so impossible is it for them to find either employment or enjoyment for their intervals of idleness , like better instructed men ; and the only matter for surprise is , that they do not all become habitual drunkards and wholly callous to consequences . No one then need be aurpri * ed

    Untitled Article

    626 Improvement of the Working People .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1834, page 628, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2637/page/24/