The Fortnightly (Volume 1) (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1865. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... OUR RURAL POOR. In bis recent financial statement, the Chancellor of the Exchequer declared that the condition of the country was "generally prosperous and satisfactory." For several years past the same assertion has been made--expressed, indeed, in more emphatic language--by platform orators and periodical writers. On hearing or reading their statements, one might imagine that the merry England of the olden time (of the existence of which it would be profane to doubt) had returned to bless us in this nineteenth century. I accept, without hesitation, the facts and figures which display the enormous and growing wealth of the country. No doubt our capitalists possess more capital than their fathers; no doubt our commerce is more extensive, and our trade more buoyant, than at any earlier period. But, unfortunately, progress in material power does not necessarily include social advancement or moral amelioration; and, indeed, this progress, if it be not felt through the whole body politic, may in the long run prove hurtful to the country. What if while our rich men are becoming more wealthy, the labourers, whose brains or sinews they employ, are growing more dependent and more hopelessly degraded? Happily this is a supposition which could not be sustained on a general survey of the kingdom. Many of our handicraftsmen are sharing, to a fair extent, the good fortune of their masters; but there are other men--a large and most important class--whose condition, instead of having improved with the advancement of the country, is, I think, less favourable than it was a hundred yeurs ago. I refer to the condition of our agricultural labourers. The pretty fallacies of pastoral poets cannot blind us to the fact that, at best, the life of the village hind is meanly prosaic, and ...