To return, now, Gentlemen, to the scheme for squeezing rents out of the bones of the labourer, is it not, upon the face of it, most monstrously absurd, that this scheme should be resorted to, when the plain and easy and just way of insuring rents must present itself to every eye, and can be pursued by the Parliament whenever it choose? We hear loud outcries against the poor-rates; the _enormous_ poor-rates; the _all-devouring_ poor-rates; but what are the facts? Why, that, in Great Britain, _six millions_ are paid in poor-rates, _seven millions_ (or thereabouts) in _tithes_, and _sixty millions_ to the fund-people, the army, placemen, and the rest. And yet nothing of all this seems to be thought of but the _six_ millions. Surely the other and so much larger sums might to be thought of. Even the _six_ millions are, for the far greater part, _wages_ and not poor-rates. And yet all this outcry is made about these _six_ millions, while not a word is said about the other _sixty-seven_ millions. Gentlemen, to enumerate all the ways, in which the public money is spent, would take me a week. I will mention two classes of persons who are receivers of taxes: and you will then see with what _reason_ it is, that this outcry is set up against the poor-rates and against the amount of wages. There is a thing called the _Dead Weight_. Incredible as it may seem, that such a vulgar appellation should be used in such a way and by such persons, it is a fact, that the Ministers have laid before the Parliament an account, called the account of the _Dead Weight_. This account tells how five millions three hundred thousand pounds are distributed annually amongst half-pay officers, pensioners, retired commissaries, clerks, and so forth, employed during the last war. If there were nothing more entailed upon us by that war, this is pretty smart-money. Now unjust, unnecessary as that war was, detestable as it was in all its principles and objects, still, to every man, who really did _fight_, or who performed a soldier's duty abroad, I would give _something_: he should not be left destitute. But, Gentlemen, is it right for the nation to keep on paying for life crowds of young fellows such as make up the greater part of this _dead weight_? This is not all, however, for, there are the widows and the children, who have, and are to have, _pensions too_. You seem surprised, and well you may; but this is the fact. A young fellow who has a pension for life, aye, or an old fellow either, will easily get a wife to enjoy it with him, and he will, I'll warrant him, take care that _she_ shall not be _old_. So that here is absolutely a premium for entering into the holy state of matrimony. The husband, you will perceive, cannot prevent the wife from having the pension after his death. She is _our widow_, in this respect, not his. She marries, in fact, with a jointure settled on her. The more children the husband leaves the better for the widow; for each child has a