Page:A protest against the extension of railways in the Lake District - Somervell (1876).djvu/38

 of them all is rooted in the selfishness that seeks its own advantage at the cost of the well-being of others. We have to cut down that, and cast it out; and for such conquest no Acts of Parliament will avail.

I am touching the edge of a great subject, and must forbear. But, depend upon it, we are none of us guiltless in this matter. We are shocked, every now and then, by the description of such a village as Ardsley; or startled to hear that some of the 'marvels of cheapness,' which so delight us, are wrung from the gasping poverty of children, or, ground by the pressure of hunger, out of dying men; but we do not enough remind ourselves that by the patronage we give to the production of cheap and specious rubbish,—by our encouragement of those sharp tradesmen, who wring their 'extraordinary bargains' often out of the dire necessities of those from whom they buy,—by our grudging or refusal of a just price for honest and good work,—by our every act of wastefulness, or wanton gratification of the thirst for luxury,—aye, and often by the beggarly meanness that takes the chattels of a poor tradesman, and impoverishes him by shamelessly-deferred payment,—we are aiding and abetting, by all the means in our power, the spread of the squalor and wretchedness which we profess to abhor.

To say that—barring a few isolated cases of