954
lead me to despond over their future prospects. Nor do I
partake of that spurious humenity, which would indulge in
an unreasoning kind of philanthropy at the expense of the
independence of the great bulk of the community. Mine is
that masculine species of charity which would lead me to
inculcate in the minds of the labouring classes, the love of
independence, the privilege of self-respect, the disdain of
being patronized or petted, the desire to accumulate, and
the ambition to rise. I know it has been found easier to
please the people by holding out flattering and delusive
prospects of cheap benefits to be derived from Parliament,
rather than by urging them to a course of self-reliance; bub
while I will not be the sycophant of the great, I cannot
become the parasite of the poor; and I have sufficient confi
dence in the growing intelligence of the working classes to
be induced to believe that they will now be found to contain
a great proportion of minds, sufficiently enlightened by
experience to concur with me in opinion that it is to themselves
 alone individually, that they, as well as every other
great section of the community, must trust for working out
their own regeneration and happiness. Again I say to them,
¢ Look not to Parliament, look only to yourselves.’
«Tt would be easy for me to state reasons of a different
description why the legislature ought not to be suffered to
interfere with the freedom of the labour of the people:
How very obvious, however, must it be that any law
restricting the hours of labour would be inoperative so 8001
as it became the interest; of masters and workmen to violate
it! Where, then, would be the utility or wisdom of an
enactment which owed its power entirely to the free will of
the parties whom it professed to coerce? Surely they
might act as effectually without the necessity of infringing
and merely bringing into disrepute the law of the land !
But it is impossible to pursue the question to the extent of

APPENDIX.