BLACKWOOD'S EDINBURGH MAGAZINE. No. CCVI. APRIL, 1833. PART I. THE FACTORY SYSTEM. THERE are few apophthegms more. pregnant than “ Charity begins at home." There it is born and bred. It gets its education by the fireside. One of its first lessons is, to rock the cradle of infancy, lisping or singing a prayer; another almost as early, to minister silently by the bed of age. And thus gradually expanding to its perfect growth, it becomes the religion of the hearth-the guardian genius of domestic life-the spirit that imbues and embalms all our best human affections. Thus trained within holy walls, it delights to walk through their neighbourhood. It makes as yet no long excursions, but keeps within the vicinage of its beloved birth-place. It is never at a loss to find there objects having a natural claim on its tender solicitude; and towards them its heart yearns "with loves and longings infinite." The circle of its cares continues to widen and widen; and it sees that they may eventually embrace the uttermost ends of the earth. But it never ceases to feel that the light within it, which assuredly is from heaven, must be concentrated before it be diffused-that otherwise there will ensue loss or extinction of the celestial flame. Charity is but another name for love. And love is founded "in reason, and is judicious," intuitively discerning ends and means, and achieving those by following these, as if obedient to a holy instinct. Its home is now its natal land. It hears the voice of God -the still small voice of conscience -bidding it busy itself with the con VOL. XXXIII. NO. CCVI. VOL. XXXIII. cerns of that region. In one great sense we are all brethren-brethren of mankind. "The blue sky bends over us all." But dearest-such is nature's fiat-is still the visible horizon! If we shut our eyes to the sights it encircles, our imaginations shall not prosper of those lying beyond; if we shut our ears to the sounds close beside us, can we hope to please Providence, by listening to those that come across the seas? Let us not seek to reverse the order of nature. Our duties extend from the shadow of our own house "to the farthest extreme of the poles." But all the duties that lie near, are comparatively clear and easy; the distant are often doubtful and difficult; and they who strive earnestly or passionately to effect first what should be attempted last, can have read to little purpose the New Testament. Let us not fly away as on wings on aerial voyages of discovery, while disregarded miseries are lying thick around our feet! Never at any time of our social state was there more for man to do for man than now. There has been a breaking up of the entire system. It may all be for our ultimate good. But this is certain, that the love of money is the ruling passion of the rich-of the poor, the mere love of life. Here we behold the splendour of ease, affluence, and luxury-there the squalor of toil, want, and hunger. The lower orders-for godsake quar◄ rel not with the word lower, for they are as low as tyranny can tread them down-are in many places as 2 E much parts of machinery as are spindles. Thousands are but cogs. The more delicate parts of machinery soonest wear out; and these are boys and girls. You can have no conception of the waste of infants. The weak wretches are soon worn out and flung away. True that they are not expensive. They are to be purchased from their parents at a low price. The truth is, they are too cheap. Their very bodies are worth more than they bring; and then there is one error in the calculation, which, great as it seems to us, has been seldom noticed, seldom has buyer or seller thought of inserting their souls. female sex. But instead of that, it was doubled in many cases, beyond what the most athletic and robust men in the prime and vigour of life can with impunity sustain. Our ancestors would not have supposed it possible, exclaims this benevolent, enlightened, and eloquent Statesman posterity will not believe it true, that a generation of Englishmen could exist that would labour lisping infancy, of a few summers old, regardless alike of its smiles or tears, and unmoved by its unresisting weakness, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, sixteen, hours a-day, and through the weary night also, till, in the dewy morn of existence, the bud of youth faded and fell ere it was unfolded. "Oh! cursed lust of gold!" Oh! the guilt which England was contracting in the kindling eye of Heaven, when nothing but exultations were heard about the perfection of her machinery, the want of her manufactures, and the rapid increase of her wealth and prosperity! This brings us at once into the Factories. It was the introduction of Sir Richard Arkwright's invention, Mr Sadler remarks, in his noble Speech on moving the second reading of the Factories' Regulation Bill, -that revolutionized the entire system of our national industry. Previously to that period, the incipient manufactures of the country were carried on in the villages, and around the domestic hearth. That invention transferred them principally to the great towns, and almost confined them to what are now called Factories. Thus children became the principal operatives; and they no fonger performed their tasks, as before, under the parental eye, and had them affectionately and considerately apportioned, according to their health and capacities; but one universal rule of labour was prescribed to all ages, to both sexes, and every state and constitution. But a regulation, therefore, it might have been expected, would have been adapted to the different degrees of physical strength in the young, the delicate, and especially the Yes-" true it is and of verity," that few of our political economists have suffered their eyes to see such things; and in that voluntary blindness have their hearts been hardened. But the wonder and the pity and the shame is, that the people of England have suffered themselves to be hood-winked by such false "friends of humanity." They have among them wiser instructors. Still they pin their faith to the dicta that drivel in dust from the cold hard lips of an oracle of dry bones, such as Peter Macculloch, when they may hear, if they will but choose to listen, responses from the inner shrine of the sacred genius of William Wordsworth! "I have lived to mark Of some stern Castle, mouldering on the brow The Abodes of men irregularly massed Like trees in forests-spread through spacious tracts, Hence a dread arm of floating Power, a voice "And yet, O happy Pastor of a Flock! The indignant Power to justify herself; For England's bane.-When soothing darkness spreads · While all things else are gathering to their homes, Of all-beholding Man, earth's thoughtful Lord; A fresh Band meets them, at the crowded door,— << < 'Triumph who will in these profaner rites Which We, a generation self-extolled, As zealously perform! I cannot share His proud complacency; yet I exult, Casting reserve away, exult to see An Intellectual mastery exercised O'er the blind Elements; a purpose given, A perseverance fed; almost a soul Imparted-to brute Matter. I rejoice, Measuring the force of those gigantic powers, Which by the thinking Mind have been compelled To serve the Will of feeble-bodied Man. For with the sense of admiration blends The animating hope that time may come And the Arts died by which they had been raised. Is that Philosophy, whose sway is framed There you have Poetry, and Moral Philosophy, and Christianity, and Political Economy, all in one-Truth -the pure bright ore of Truth. You know where to go for the dross of falsehood. What, then, is the object of that Bill, which Mr Sadler, alas, in vain! implored the House to sanction with its authority? The liberation of children and other young persons employed in the mills and factories of the United Kingdom, from that over-exertion and long confinement which common sense, as well as experience, has shewn to be utterly inconsistent with the improvement of their minds, the preservation of their morals, and the maintenance of their health-in a word, to rescue them from a state of suffering and degradation. And,would you believe it? many persons who believe the existence of the evils he has brought to light, oppose him on principle! The wiseacres are reluctant to legislate on such matters they hold all such interference to be an evil. They have learned a few words of French, and each parrot from his perch, as he keeps swinging himself to and fro in his glittering cage, ejaculates, "Laissez nous faire!" Mr Sadler condescends to argue with these weaklings of the flock. He challenges them to shew a case which has stronger claims for the interposition of the law, whether we regard the nature of the evil to be abated, as it affects the individuals, society at large, and posterity; or the utter helplessness of those on whose behalf we are called on to interfere; or the fact, which experience has left no longer in doubt; that if the law does not, there is no other power that can, or will, adequately protect them. But the same, and other persons, likewise ground their opposition on the pretence that the very principle of the Bill is an improper interference between the employer and the employed, and an attempt to regulate by law the market of labour. Words-words-words the mere mocking repetition of a doctrine of which they have not caught a glimpse, and yet blindfolded would apply! Men are free agents -quo' they. Mr Sadler seeks to make them slaves. Free-agents! dragging at their heels the clank of inextricable chains. Of whom do they speak? Of the full-grown? Then must they maintain, that in this country the demand for labour never fully equals the supply. Were.that the case, the employer and the employed might meet on equal terms in the market for labour. But as it is, must Mr Sadler, who is no Political Economist forsooth, (the cross-bred curs that dog the heels of Ricardo snappishly bark against him,) remind them that the unequal division of property, or rather its monopoly by the few, leaves the many nothing but what they can obtain by their daily labour; that that very labour cannot become available for the purposes of daily subsistence, without the consent of the capitalists; that the materials, the elements on which labour can be bestowed, are in their possession? Will they not but withdraw the fringed curtains of their eyes, and tell us who comes yonder ?" Crowds of people over-worked, followed by crowds who have no work at all. To use Mr Sadler's more forcible expressions, one part of the community reduced to the condition of slaves by over-exertion, and another part to that of paupers by involuntary idleness. Truly does he say, that wealth, still more than knowledge, is power; and power liable to abuse wherever vested, is least of all free from tyrannical exercise, when it owes its existence to a sordid source. Hence have all laws, human or divine, attempted to protect the labourer from the injustice and cruelty which are too often practised upon him. Yes! What else are Provisions for the Poor! They too, indeed, come under the ban of all who |