History of the Middle and Working Classes, with a Popular Exposition of the Economical and Political Principles Which Have Influenced the Past and Present Condition of the Industrious Orders; Also an Appendix of Prices, Rates of Wages, Population, Poor-Rat (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAP. IV. Influence of the Reformation on Property, and the Condition of the Labouring Classes?Immense Wealth of the Religions Houses?Mistaken Notions on the Hospitality of the Conventual Bodies?Increase of Mendicity, and severe Laws for its Repression. The influence of the Reformation on the condition, of the labouring classes has been greatly exaggerated or misunderstood. That great event affected much more the property than the industry of the community; by causing a transfer of a large portion of the soil of thekingdom from the spiritual corporations into the hands of lay individuals. The effect of this new disposition of ecclesiastical possessions has been variously represented by writers. Discontent is inseparable from the reform of every established practice and institution. Those who profit by abuses, and those who benefit by their removal, must view in different lights and hold forth different representations of measures by which they are oppositely affected. Of the favourable influence of the Reformation on the progress of national wealth no doubt can exist at this day; since every one is aware that incorporate bodies are little -adapted to the successful pursuit of either commerce or agriculture; and it is evident from the Mortmain Act, passed in the reign of Henry VII., that government had become fully sensible of the hurtful tendency of the vast accumulations of the religious houses. It is not so much the excellence of our political institutions as the Reformation, which, by severing the property of the community from an indolent priesthood, has enabled the people to take the lead of the nations of Europe in the career of wealth and intelligence. Had the vast possessions of the clergy remained tied up in their hands, it must have formed an insuperable obst...