Page:The Moral and Religious Bearings of the Corn Law.djvu/18

18 in ten thousand ways. "Why, what a cruel absurdity it seems to talk to a man of intellectual improvement, of cultivating and recreating his mind, when he is ill-housed, ill-clothed, his meals deficient in quantity, and not of a nutritive or stimulating quality, when he has no opportunity for collecting his wandering thoughts, his narrow abode forming no refuge from noise and distraction, his temper incessantly jarred, books not within his reach, or only with difficulty scarcely to be surmounted, and body and soul worn down by carking cares! Is this man in a condition to exert himself for the cultivation of his faculties, and apply to the study of history, of science, or of poetry? The first thing is to put him into such a condition that his mind can have free and fair play; to have him better housed, better clothed, better fed, and then let him begin his mental race, like a giant rejoicing in the freshness of his strength, feeling his new advantages, and gradually rising from the improvement of his physical condition to improvement in his mental condition also."

Poverty exerts a most pernicious influence in checking the education of the young. Accounts from all parts of the country show that education is impeded by the want of work and the high price of food. Nor is it marvellous. They who have the disposition to provide for the education of the people are not so able to do it, and what is a matter of far more importance, the people are not so able to find it for themselves. They will be more likely to take care that their children attend school, if it cost them something, than if it be gratuitous. But if they have not money, they cannot pay for it. The bodily wants are more palpable and urgent than those of the mind, and it is not likely that those who have scarcely anything to eat will contribute a portion of their scanty pittance to secure the instruction of their young. But the inability to pay is only a part of the case. There is an inability still greater to clothe. But the grievance of all is, that the young are so early made