Whatever be the cause,it is notorious,that with the common people the appetite for strong drink is their prevailingappetite.When therefore,by the advance in wages,they obtain more than is sufficient for their bare subsistence,they spendthe surplus at the alehouse,and neglect their business.Is a man drunk one day?He will have little inclination to work thenext.Thus for every drunken fit two days are lost.By frequent repetition the habit is confirmed,and,by reducing thenumber of working days,their value is enhanced.In proportion to this loss,the price of labour will be raised.As long asmen have nothing to fear,either for themselves or for their families,this practice will prevail.Where the price of labour isadvanced,the industrious and the sober will by degrees acquire a taste for luxury.They will not be contented with baresubsistence,with a sufficient quantity of coarse yet wholesome food,with warm but homespun garments,and with healthybut unfurnished cottages:they will contract habits of refinement,which,when suffered to promote their industry,will beuseful both to themselves and to the public,but which in all cases,will have a tendency to keep up the price of labour,andto advance the price of all those articles which they consume.Even they who do not work must eat,and,by increasing thedemand for corn,will enhance its value,and consequently the price of labour.In this case action and re-action are equal,but not opposite.The high price of labour raises the value of provisions,and the high price of provisions enhances thevalue of labour.They are both increased by the present system of our poor laws,and have both a tendency to check theprogress of manufactures,and to hasten their departure.The most specious argument produced against granting a freetrade to the sister kingdom was,that,having labour cheap,and not being burthened with a poor's rate,she would be able toundersell us in the market,and thereby ruin our manufactures.Should England repeal the present laws,and make a betterprovision for the frugal,the sober,and the industrious,among the poor,Ireland could no longer boast of this advantage.
Manufactures always seek the cheapest countries.As they are leaving the southern countries and travelling to the north,soin time will they leave the north,and,to a considerable degree,quit the kingdom,unless some wise regulations areestablished for the better relief and government of the labouring poor.
The poor laws to a certain degree discourage improvements in agriculture;for it is certain,that more waste land would betaken into tillage,if gentlemen were not alarmed by the increasing burthen of the poor.Against the claims of the church,provision has been made by an exemption from tythes for seven years;but the demands of the poor admit of no exemption.
Monied men have greatly the advantage over the owners and occupiers of land,as being free from those heavy taxes,which the latter pay to the king,to the church,and to the poor.When the poor's rate amounts to ten shillings,or even tofour shillings in the pound,who will be at the expence of clearing,fencing,breaking up,manuring,cropping,the waste andbarren parts of an estate?Certainly no gentlemen can do it with a view to profit.In Scotland the sums are immense whichhave been expended for this purpose;but in England a man of property would choose rather to take the public for hisdebtor,than to be himself a debtor to the poor;more especially as it is not possible for him to conjecture what will be theextent of this unlimited rent-charge upon his estate.Were it not for this incumbrance agriculture would certainly be pushedmuch farther than it has ever been,and many thousand acres of the poorer commons,heaths,and moors,would be inclosedand cultivated.The best writers have complained,that by a tax,similar in its operation to our poor's tax,agriculture inFrance has been depressed,the assessment being made in proportion to their stock in trade.The conduct of the French inthis respect is not more absurd than ours.How widely different has been the operation of our land-tax.It has been a spur toindustry,because from the beginning the proportion has been never changed.To be consistent in principle,the legislatureshould either limit the sum to be collected for the poor,or if agriculture is to be effectually checked,they should equalizethe land-tax.Had this tax followed our improvements with a tight grasp,and with a watchful eye,like the church,and likethe poor,England would not at this day discover the smiling aspect which all foreigners admire,when they every wherebehold our vallies cloathed with flocks,and our hills with corn.A wise politician will study to remove every obstacle whichcan retard the progress of improvement:but such is the system of our laws,that the greater the distress among the poor,the less will be the inducement to cultivate our more stubborn and unprofitable lands.
