Page:Paul Clifford Vol 3.djvu/287

Rh cheateries of trade, or the honoured falsehoods of a profession. Nay, I might have supported the laws which I have now braved; like the Counsel opposed to me, I might have grown sleek on the vices of others, and advanced to honour by my ingenuity in hanging my fellow-creatures! The canting and prejudging part of the press has affected to set before you the merits of 'honest ability,' or 'laborious trade,' in opposition to my offences. What, I beseech you, are the props of your 'honest' exertion,—the profits of 'trade?' Are there no bribes to menials? Is there no adulteration of goods? Are the rich never duped in the price they pay,—are the poor never wronged in the quality they receive? Is there honesty in the bread you eat, in a single necessity which clothes, or feeds, or warms you? Let those whom the law protects consider it a protector: when did it ever protect me? When did it ever protect the poor man? The government of a state, the institutions of law, profess to provide for all those who 'obey.' Mark! a man hungers!—do you feed him? He is naked!—do you clothe him? If not, you break your covenant, you drive him back to