persons whose blind cry for Reform had rendered it unavoidable.

Now, the discouragement of British agriculture consequent on a free trade in corn would be permanent, although the benefit to the inhabitants of towns could only be temporary. After the destruction of a large portion of British agriculture had been effected, by the immense inundation of foreign grain, prices would rise again to their former level, because the monopoly would then be vested in the hands of the foreign growers; and the bulky nature of grain renders it physically impossible to introduce an unlimited supply of that article by sea transport. But the condition of British agriculture would not be materially benefited by the change; because prices would rise solely in consequence of the British grower being, for the most part, driven out of the field; and could be maintained at a high level only by his being kept from an extensive competition with the foreign cultivator. Should the British farmers, recovering from their consternation, recommence the active agriculture which at present maintains our vast and increasing population, the consequence would be, that prices would immediately fall to such a degree, as speedily to reduce them to their natural and unavoidable state of inferiority to the farmers of the Continent.

In considering this subject, there are two important circumstances to be kept in view, proved abundantly by experience, but which have not hitherto met with the general attention which they deserve.

The first of these is, that, in agriculture-differing in this respect from manufactures-the introduction of machinery, or the division of labour, can effect no reduction whatever in the price of its produce, or the facility of its production; and perhaps the best mode of cultivation yet known is that which is carried on by the greatest possible application of human labour, in the form of spade cultivation. The proof of this is decisive. Great Britain, with the aid of the steamengine, can undersell the weavers of Hindostan with muslins. manufactured out of cotton grown on the banks of the Ganges; but it is undersold in its own markets by the wheat grower on the banks of the Vistula, or in the basin of the Missis

sippi. It is in vain, therefore, for a state like England, burdened with high prices and an excessive taxation-the natural consequence of commercial opulence-to hope that its industry can, in agriculture as in manufactures, withstand the competition of the foreign grower. Machinery, skill, and capital can easily counteract high prices in all other articles of human consumption; in agriculture, they can produce no such effect. This is a law of nature which will subsist to the end of the world.

The second is, that a comparatively small importation of grain produces a prodigious effect on the prices at which it is sold. The importation of a tenth part of the annual consumption does not, it is calculated, lower prices a tenth, but a half-and so on with the importation of smaller quantities. This has always been observed, and is universally acknowledged by political economists. Although, therefore, the greatest possible importation of foreign grain must always be a part only of that required for the consumption of the whole people, yet still the effect upon the current rate of prices would be most disastrous. The greatest importation ever known was in 1801, when it amounted, in consequence of the scarcity, to an eighteenth part of the annual consumption; but the free introduction of much less than that quantity would reduce the price of wheat in the first instance, in an ordinary year, to 45s. the quarter.

The repeal of the Corn Laws, therefore, is calculated to inflict a permanent wound on the agricultural resources of the empire, and permanently injure all the numerous classes who depend on that branch of industry, and confer only a temporary benefit, by the reduction of prices, on the manufacturing labourers. The benefit is temporary, and mixed up, even at first, with a most bitter portion of alloy; the evil lasting, and unmitigated by any benefit whatever.

But it is precisely because this repeal is calculated to effect this temporary and immediate, however ultimately ruinous, reduction of prices, that its adoption may be calculated upon as a matter of perfect certainty by the Reformed Parliament. Great bodies of men never look beyond the immediate consequences of their actions. If it was other

wise, vice, improvidence, and intoxication would be banished from the world-for nothing is more certain than that all these things are ultimately hurtful to those who indulge in them; notwithstanding which, the march of intellect has effected no diminution whatever in their indulgence. If men had looked beyond the immediate effects of present objects, the Reform candidates would never have been supported at the recent elections by the rural freeholders; for nothing is more certain than that, in bringing them into the legislature, they were laying the surest foundation for their own ultimate ruin. But men never do this.

History, equally with recent experience, demonstrates that large bodies, even of the most intelligent men, never look beyond present consequences; and it is not to be supposed that the £10 householders will form an exception to the general rule.

But if the argument of the Reformers were really well founded, that the repeal of the Corn Laws, which they so strenuously support, would permanently and materially lower the price of grain, the consequences would be still more disastrous; and such a consummation would hasten a catastrophe, which it is much to be feared no human efforts, under the new constitution, will be able permanently to

avert.

Let it be conceded that the hopes of the Reformers are realised; that, by drawing our supplies from the shores of the Vistula and the Seine, instead of those of the Thames and the Forth, the price of wheat is permanently lowered from 60s. to 30s. a quarter, or about half its present standard. Let it be supposed that the stagnation, want of employment, and misery, consequent upon a large portion of our agricultural labourers being thrown out of employment, is got over; that funds destined for the payment of our mortgage creditors are somehow or other provided from other sources; and that the tradesmen and artificers who now depend on the land for their employment, have contrived to get other customers, who have supplied the place of those whom they have lost. Let all this be supposed, and then let it be coolly considered what effect such a change must have on the engagements of individuals and of the state.

If wheat be permanently lowered from 60s. to 30s. a quarter, or in any considerable though lesser degree, the first consequence must be, that the money price of every article must fall. As the price of grain necessarily determines the money wages of labour, and they form the chief element in regulating the price of every other article of life, it follows that a great, a sensible reduction in the price of grain must necessarily affect the price of all other articles, and the money income of every man in the kingdom. Indeed, this is so far from being disputed by the Reformers, that it forms the chief argument adduced by them for the repeal of the Corn Laws they contend that, by lowering the wages of labour, and the money price of every article of consumption, the British manufacturers will be better able to withstand foreign competition in the supply both of the home and the foreign market.

Such a change of prices might be innocuous, if individuals and the public could begin on a new basis, and there were no subsisting money engagements, which must be provided for at the reduced rate of incomes. But how is such a state of things to go on, when individuals and the State are under so many engagements, which cannot be averted without private or public bankruptcy? This is the question which, in a complicated state of society such as we live in, where industry is so dependent on credit, is the vital one to every interest.

There is hardly an individual possessed of property in the country who is not immediately or ultimately involved in money engagements. The landlords are notoriously and proverbially drowned in debt, and it is calculated that twothirds of the produce of the soil finds its way ultimately into the pocket of the public or the private creditor. Farmers are all more or less involved in engagements either to their landlords or to the banks who have advanced their money; merchants and manufacturers have their bills or cashaccounts standing against them, which must be provided for, whatever ensues with regard to the prices of the articles in which they deal; and private individuals, even of wealthy fortunes, have provisions to their wives, sisters, brothers, or children, which must be made up to a certain money amount,

if they would avert the evils of bankruptcy. Now, if the views of the Reformers are well founded, and a great reduction is effected in the price of grain, and consequently in the money income of every man in the kingdom, through the free trade in corn, how are these undiminished money obligations to be made good out of the diminished pecuniary resources of the debtors in them? Mr Baring has estimated that the change in the value of money, consequent on the resumption of cash-payments, altered prices about 25 per cent; and everybody knows what widespread, still existing, and irremediable private distress that change produced. What, then, may be anticipated from the far greater change which is contemplated as likely to arise from a free trade in grain?

But, serious as these evils are, they are nothing in comparison with the dreadful consequences which would result to public credit from the change, and the widespread desolation which must follow a serious blow to the national faith.

It is well known with what difficulty the payment of the annual charge of the national debt is provided for, even under the present scale of prices; and how much those difficulties were increased by the change of prices, and the general diminution of incomes, consequent on the resumption of cash-payments. Indeed, such was the effect of that change that, had it not been counterbalanced by a very great increase, both of our agricultural and manufacturing produce at the same time, it would have rendered the maintenance of faith with the public creditor impossible. Now, if such be the present state of the public debt, even under the unexampled general prosperity which has pervaded the empire since the peace, and with all the security to the public faith which arises from the stable, consistent, and uniform rule of the British aristocracy, how is the charge of the debt to be provided for under the diminished national income arising from the much hoped-for change of prices consequent on the Reform Bill and repeal of the Corn Laws, and the increased national impatience, arising from the consciousness of the power to cast off the burden for ever?Great and reasonable fear may be felt, whether, under any