298

LIFE OF COBDEN.

[oHAD

1844. safely left to the unfettered play of individual competition
Zr. 40. The answer of modern statesmanship is, that unfettered individual
 competition is not a principle to which the regu”
lation of industry may be entrusted. There may be €O
ditions which it is in the highest degree desirable to impos
on industry, and to which the general opinion of the indus
trial classes may be entirely favourable. Yet the agsistanc
of law may be needed to give effect to this opinion, because
—in the words of the great man who was now preparing th
exposition of political economy that was to reign all ghrong?
the next generation,—only law can afford to every individual
a guarantee that his competitors will pursue the same cours?
as to hours of labour and so forth, without which he cannot
safely adopt it himself.®
Cobden, as we have already seen (pp. 115-16), when he
was first a candidate for Stockport, dissented from thes
theories. He could not adjust them to his general prin
ciple of the expediency of leaving every man free to car™y
his goods to whatever market he might choose, and to mak?
the best bargain that he could. The man who saw such
good reasons for distrusting the regulation of markets bY
Act of Parliament, was naturally inclined to distrust parli®
mentary regulation of labour. In the case of children, Cob”
den fully perceived that freedom of contract is only anothe®
name for freedom of coercion, and he admitted the necessity
of legislative protection. He never denied that restriction?
on the hours of labour were desirable, and he knew PJ
observation, both at home and abroad, that the hours of
labour are no measure of its relative productiveness. What
he maintained was that all restrictions, however desirable
ought to be secured by the resolute demands and inde

¢ J. 8. Mill's Political Economy was not begun until 1845, but it bee
abundant traces how closely he watched the course of legislation durics
the years immediately preceding.