As the Anti-Corn Law gained ground the labor reformers met with a new form of opposition. Lord Ashley was taunted with inconsistency in seeking the welfare of the factory workers, while neglecting to remedy the no less servile condition of the agricultural laborers. Manufacturers as high-minded as Cobden and Bright did not scruple to say--as doubtless they believed--that the outcry against the manufacturers sprang from the desire of the landowners to harass the opponents of "the tax on bread." John Bright answered Lord Ashley's arguments for the ten hours' clause in the bill of 1844 in a speech as vindictive as it was eloquent. Though Ashley was again defeated, at this time the new Factory Act, which was passed, carried farther the principles of the original law. In 1845 his calico print-works measure brought relief to thousands of weary little hands, and in 1847 the long- worked-for and earnestly prayed-for Ten-Hours Bill became a law. Lord Ashley had resigned his seat in Parliament, but had not relaxed his efforts in behalf of the bill which he had borne on his heart for fourteen years. When the news came that the bill, after going through the Commons with flying colors, had passed the critical stage in the Upper House, Lord Ashley's feelings found vent in this entry in his journal: "I am humbled that my heart is not bursting with thankfulness to Almighty God--that I can find breath and sense to express my joy. What reward shall we give unto the Lord for all the benefits he hath conferred upon us? God, in his mercy, prosper the work and grant that these operatives may receive the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the Lord! Praised be the Lord! Praised be the Lord in Christ Jesus!" The operatives received the news with tumultuous joy, for the act brought substantial relief to fully three hundred and sixty thousand persons, more than two-thirds of all the operatives then employed in the textile industries of the kingdom.