Page:British Weights and Measures - Superior to the Metric, by James W. Evans.djvu/58

50 we should abandon it for an inferior scheme, and every high consideration of our national welfare bids us to "hold fast to that which is good," and particularly when there is nothing better to replace it.

At the close of his long and laborious life, Mr. Gladstone said: "I do not like changes for their own sake. I only like a change when it is needful to alter something bad into something good, or something which is good into something better." Those who ask for the change have absolutely failed to prove that they offer us something better than what we possess. Standing as I do on neutral ground, with only public interests to serve, giving many years of close professional attention to the question, without reservation I would advise that the fundamental change should not be made. The alteration sought would be oppressive upon the people, and the price of uniformity would be enormous inconvenience which none living would see the end of. The people who trade abroad are the very ones most able to meet any difficulties which now arise, and the interests of home traders, in their widest and best sense, should not be sacrificed to meet the wishes of the few. Our system is the best in the world, and should be maintained. In matters of administration, improvements can be effected. These should be in the direction of protecting the consumers of goods, and the honest vendors of them. Legislation upon such matters urgently calls for reform, and no doubt will come in due season. That, however, is apart from the question I have been debating in this work, and my purpose will have been amply served if I have been successful in throwing some light upon a little known subject, and, above all, in leading my readers to the conclusion I have long since arrived at—that our system is, fundamentally, the best in existence, the most convenient for the needs of man, and that it would be an act of stupendous and costly folly, to change to the metric system.