Critical, Historical, and Miscellaneous Essays; Vol. 6: With a Memoir and IndexMacaulay, Thomas Babington Macaulay, Baron
History
Critical, Historical, and Miscellaneous Essays; Vol. 6: With a Memoir and Index
Macaulay, Thomas Babington Macaulay, Baron
English literature -- History and criticism; Great Britain -- History
But it seems the industry of these emigrants, and indeed of the free
Blacks generally, is not regular or steady. These are words of which
Major Moody is particularly fond, and which he generally honours with
Italics. We have, throughout this article, taken the facts as he states
them, and contented ourselves with exposing the absurdity of his
inferences. We shall do so now. We will grant that the free blacks do
not work so steadily as the slaves, or as the labourers in many other
countries. But how does Major Moody connect this unsteadiness with the
climate? To us it appears to be the universal effect of an advance
in wages, an effeet not confined to tropical countries, but daily and
hourly witnessed in England by every man who attends to the habits
of the lower orders. Let us suppose, that an English manufacturer can
provide himself with those indulgences which use has rendered necessary
to his comfort for ten shillings a week, and that he ean earn ten
shillings a week by working steadily twelve hours a day. In that case,
he will probably work twelve hours a day. But let us suppose that the
wages of his labour rise to thirty shillings. Will he still continue
to work twelve hours a day, for the purpose of trebling his present
enjoyments, or of laying up a hoard against bad times? Notoriously
not. He will perhaps work four days in the week, and thus earn twenty
shillings, a sum larger than that whieh he formerly obtained, but less
than that which he might obtain if he chose to labour as he formerly
laboured.
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