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298 THE ' ^ liJ&Afi^&y:. [^TOto^Y,
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PAUPERISM AND PRODUCTION. " The Statesma...
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what. shall be done with the Crystal pal...
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Our Secret Diplomacy In Egypt And South ...
The eastern question is the cheval de bataille of Downin g-street . „ ¦ ,,, "¦' , '¦¦ ¦ " TTnder umbrellas of sham settlements , a perfect "Eglinton Tournament of operations and treatises has been kept up in those regions for years by successive Cabinets . . Palmerston " settled it all' * by his brilliant coup de main in 1840 , though lie brought , us to the Verge of a war by his audacity . We had
humiliated Turkey , '' our oldest ally , " in' 27 , at jtfavarino . " Go it , Ked !" ¦ was the royal signal for that untoward event , which blew into the air the fleet of our oldest ally , the fleet of Russia cheerfully assisting , and created a new kingdom for French and Russian influence to dispute , and for British Pacificos to bombard . To set up a beggarly constitution for the ungrateful and insolent Greek , we laid Turkey at the mercy of
Russian intrigues . In 1840 we are giving back to Turkey her misgoverned provinces ; setting Turkey up again in a large way of business , and humiliating our youngest ally , the astute and polite Mehemet Ali . We humiliate Egypt , by sacrificing the best ruler she has known for centuries to the capricious delegation of the sovereign of the Ottoman Empire . We cripple by force of arms , and by force of protocols , the keen and compliant ruler , who protects the transit of our Indian Mail whilst we are blockading his ports . To
be brief—in 1852 , when the successor of old Mehemet AH , a friend , almost calling himself an Egyptian Englishman in heart , consenting to make a railway for us across the Desert , we are again obliged , by the inflexible and fatal logic of our diplomacy , to arrest operations in which British interests are so deeply concerned , in obedience to the obligations which we helped " our oldest ally" to establish , and to confiscate the growing prosperity of Egyptj to the harassing exactions and obstructive pedantries of the Porte .
It is clear to . alt , that under these harsh dictations of the Sultan to the Viceroy , lurks the deeper game of a more secret and more successful diplomacy than ours . Space forbids us to enlarge upon this most important subject : but we have said enough to suggest grave considerations on the virtues < ff a secret and tortuous diplomacy , which , professing non-intervention , is perpetually intervening all the world over : but at the wrong season , and in the wrong place , and for some petty dynastic , rather than national purposewhich sets up and strikes down , protects and humiliates friends and foes almost at random ,
and always with , untoward success : which is the tool when it thinks to be the ally o £ a diplomacy more secret than itself—which garrisons the Tagus to enable a Coburg to sleep in peace , whilst our commerce is languishing at Buenos Ayres , and our influence is helpless in Egypt , and the Foreign Secretary favours us with a geographical and political sketch of Bolivia and Paraguay , and with a graphic account of the Flight of Rosas and his daughter ! Now what is the moral of all this P What but to obtain a really national Government , which shall stand b y true allies , and act in the face of the sun by high and national principles P
298 The ' ^ Lij&Afi^&Y:. [^Toto^Y,
298 THE ' ^ liJ & Afi ^& y :. [^ TOto ^ Y ,
Pauperism And Production. " The Statesma...
PAUPERISM AND PRODUCTION . " The Statesman erects his Poor-Law Unions , and the Philanthropist his houses of refuge , and yet the destitution continues . " Because , lot us reply to the Times , the Statesman has heretofore neglected the direct , the just , the solo remedy for social destitution— -production . ' We continuo our quotations : . " Does it not appear at first sight a strange result of the terrible statistics of society , that upon an average 1 person out of 20 of the inhabitants of this luxurious metropolis is every day destitute of food and employment , and every night without a place for shelter or repose ? * * # It is stated in the Rogistrar-Gonoral'H annual report for 1849 , ' that . nearly one human' being died wcolcly in this wealthy metropolis from actual starvation . ' In the corresponding report for 1851 wo find tlmt 28 adults died from starvation , and 252 infants from want of breast-milk or want of Food . In the month of December , 1851 , five adults died from starvation , and 29 infants from inanition . " The Times supposes the " rospootable ratepayer" to say that those things need not bo , or that they cannot be helped . They need not bo , because a starving person should apply for relief as " casual poor j they cannot be helped , because " in bo yast a population instances must of cOurso
occur of persons who will carefully tide their shame and their wants from everjTeye , until the ^ r sink down exhausted in some lone spot to die .. But why should the starving be ashamed to ask relief P That is a constituent part of the real question . He is ashamed , because relief is made * not onl y systematically repulsive ,, but systematically shameful . The poor are treated as things to be repelled , and the so-called Poor-Law is one , not to aid , but to constrain the poor—even " the deserving poor . " We suspect , however , that the framers of the present law assumed the nonexistence of anything to be called " deserving poor . "
The recourse to fill this gap in the regular law is " charity ; " but even that has become depraved , Charity , properly so called , is the help of man to man ; whereas the systematic charities of our day are but a machinery for easing the instinctive consciences of the well-to-do ; and in that promising trade enterprising scions of the middle class embark for a livelihood ; providing " institutions" and " boards" for the sickly souls of the wealthy , just as others provide circulating library novels or dogmatic tracts for their minds , water-cures or baths for their poor bodies .
We say this without the slightest disrespect to the institution which suggests the article in the Times : it is a most excellent momentary provision in such behalf , while the law fails of its duty . By parenthesis , also , lei us say that charity would still have its proper work to do . The law must deal with generals ; charity ought to deal with particulars—with individual cases—with , error ,
weakness , misfortune , casting the unhappjr into a lower social station—with the many special cases where man can help man , and shield him from the rougher necessities of all general laws . But the poor at large do not want charity . A man is poor either because he is incapable , because he is idle , or because he is without opportunity to earn his bread . A man temporaril y sick or crippled had better be helped through his trouble without delay ; it is the best economy : therefore such relief ought to be free , prompt , and effectual ; not as charity , but as a social right , under the law . A man is idle , either because he has no fair opportunity , or because he
is incorrigibly ill-disposed . ! In the former case , as at the Sheffield farm , a fair opportunity will redeem him ; in the latter , he is not a subject for a Poor Law , but for a law to restrain vagrant offenders against society . A man who is without work ought to be supplied with it ; and where so much land is unoccupied or half occupied , as is the case in this country , there can be no real difficulty in wedding labour to land , and setting the able-bodied poor " upon work , " as the 43 rd of Elizabeth provided . In default of that , your able-bodiedpoor will try to get his bread out of some other man ' s employment—that is , he will either steal , orbea dependenton the rate-payer , or go into the labour-market and offer all hia labour for half
his neighbour's loaf . These processes actually go on ; and thus we actually make the paupers that cost us so much every year ; make the thieves that we don't know what to do with , but are trying all we can to foist upon Australia and other colonies ; and make whole classes of half-paid labourers a reserve -for the recruitment of our pauper army—an army of paupers on half-pay All this is done , because the fashion of the daythe fashion , we hope soon to call it , of yesterday —is , to rule ceconomy entirel y in accordance with views based on the laws of trading exchange ; forgetting that the laws of a secondary and
intermediary process cannot be the codo for the primary and essential process , tho distribution qf productive industry . The practical administrators of the Poor-JJaw arc learning bottor from the imperfect ojperation of the law itself ; the Poor-Law Association of Manchester is improving tho lesson ; wo wish to extend it to society at largo—especially to all who arc subject to that competition of tho Eaupers on half-pay , which is dragging down all ranches of industry to their own level . Pro- ,
duction is tho source of all national wealth . —Production made to keep pace with population—Production kopt in a condition that it shall bo accessible to all—Production so distributed that it shall first and assuredly produco tho necessaries of life . Fasten upon that objoet ; survey our still half-occupied fields of industry ; see tho numbers whoso hands arc available for themselves and their follows , and you will have no difficulty in relieving industry from the burden of tho paupers onliftlf-pay , in . teaching tho ablo-rbodied
destitute to . support themselves , and to aid in supporting the helpless . m Meanwhile , during our industrial anarchv honour to every provisional institution that alt ' viates the evils which it cannot present '
What. Shall Be Done With The Crystal Pal...
what . shall be done with the Crystal palace ? Pbeserve it * . or destroy it P Retain , on its pre sent site , the wonderful building which sheltered the arts and industry of the world , the scene of last year ' s brilliant and stupendous gatherings of all ranks and nearly of all nations ; or remove it bit by bit , or sell it to the French , or consign it piecemeal to the auctioneer ? For the public , the question is simplified to this : Shall the Crystal Palace remain in Hyde Park or notP And as the time is limited when an affirmative answer would be effectual , the course of the public is also simplified : the public can say , preserve it , and it will be preserved ; or say nothing , give no sign , and it will be swept away . But the word must be spoken now—or never . Undoubtedly there would be a certain grandeur in destroying the fabric—in sweeping away , and treating as secondary , the mere outward shell of the Great Exhibition . It has served its purpose ; a great deal of the admiration called forth by it has faded away ; if now removedVno unpleasant ideas of failure can arise ; it was adapted to the use for which it was devised , and it may not be adapted to certain other uses to which men would put it . Take it away , and it \ dll always be pleasantly * remembered ; preserve it , and it may come to be contemned .
In this statement there is an amount of conditional truth . The buirding may come to be condemned , unquestionably ; but will it , or rather shdllit ? That is the question . The strongest argument in favour of its retention is the Conservative argument ^ that it exists . There , in Hyde-park , you _ have , in the words of Mr . Cole , a " covered space "—the ^ thing most wanted in London . There you may have , says Sir Joseph Paxton , a winter garden , at once useful and beautiful . Pull down the Palace of
Glass and , when do you expect to get another set upP Your " covered space" becomes a grassy parade-ground for the elite of the Rotten-row Light Brigade ; your Winter garden , or winter or summer sauntering - place , vanishes into the future , for its locus will be gone . . It is very questionable whether an adequate amount of public interest could be excited which would lead to the erection of sucli another building ; and certain it is , that the pressure for money at the Treasury , the adverse , feeling of the House of Commons and the public , would prevent any grant X- _^__ j « - —_— _ J ~ ¦ X * a __ J-l— — . A . __«&& - » Ann + V »^ "v ** v » rlt A T \ l I n 11 ^ uuui
Hieing nmut ? -iur iuui jjuajjubc m . ^ pv~—funds . So that , on the whole , it would bo better to retain the Crystal palace , and use it for purposes of instruction and amusement . Museums might be formed there ; children and young persons mig ht play there ; even Rotten-row might have its covered ride ; there might be a gymnasium , including a fencing-school , in one portion , and , it necessary , an establishment for the Peace Society in another . All this might be done ; and » ir Joseph Paxton ' s great idea , a Winter Garden , also successfully carried out ; while the building rtseii would remain ' as the fittest monument ot flic
Great Exhibition of 1851 . ..,, Besides thoso regular uses to which tho DuilciinL might bo put , there are certain other occasion ^ uses for which it would seem to bo adapted . / ° * instance , where so appropriately could ^ ftt ; ion , Jubilees bo ^ ol cl P Wo do not refor to QucepJ birthdays and royal rejoicings , but to the tf _ and enduring events of English history . ! « ££ arc heroes enough in science and art , and li turo and statesmanship , whoso names and acw » »¦ recorded in our annals , to furnish P erP ° "lu national feasts . Imagine a Caxton . JuD 1 I ^\ Shakspoaro jubilee , a Newton jubilee , a vv < and Arkwright jubilee , leasts in honour or J Poets , of tho Historians , of the Merchants , ol « men of science , and last , not least , of the Aim *' of Enghind-and wlicrc could national »»« £ " ' K iwi
like these bo held so well as in tlie , ry »* * -r If there wore any Christianity in tho lone wJi could Christmas and Eaater , the sublime rojow » of every Christian community , bo lcop tso *«» thoreP . nunnt its But tho public gives no sign , going . » ° " to trade and its pleasures , and casting no tnouK (( ^ tho future . The Commissioners appointed
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), March 27, 1852, page 14, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_27031852/page/14/
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