Page:The Three Prize Essays on Agriculture and the Corn Law - Morse, Greg, Hope (1842).djvu/31

 circumstance of a continued high price proves the existence of a continued deficiency; and it may fairly be inferred, that at least one or two millions of quarters of wheat are annually prevented by our corn law from coming into the country and being consumed. Whether this amount of corn was first produced, and then thrown into the sea, to raise the price of the remainder, or whether it is prohibited entering the country by law, is precisely the same thing.

It is not so much my object to prove that the money price of labour should be high, as that the actual condition of the labourer with reference to his command over the necessaries of life must increase with the increase of wealth in a country, and that with each increase of wealth the distribution will be more equal, by the labourer obtaining a larger share of the products of the earth for his own use than before.

The common sense and experience of mankind would tell us that cheap bread is better for a poor man than dear bread; and the first and most obvious answer to the question, why should it be so? is, because it is plentiful—its abundance is the cause of its cheapness. But it is asserted that the labourer's wages are generally reduced to such a price as to enable him to get but little more than the same amount of food at all times, with scarcely any increase in years of abundance. That this is very nearly the case in England is a lamentable fact, and partially but not wholly true. But it is not of what the condition of the labourer is, but of what it might be, that I have to speak. It is not that instances can be quoted which show that people in a state of political servitude and dependence may be constantly and permanently degraded in their situation, whatever may be the price of the necessaries of life. Of these there are unfortunately too many instances; but that other circumstances being equal, the condition of the working man must be advanced by the increased production of any article of his daily consumption, it is impossible to deny; that wages rise with a falling price of corn is the rule,—that they fall is the exception to the rule.

With regard to the distribution of the particular article of corn, through the various classes of society, it may be observed, that there is not much more consumed in the houses of the wealthy in years of abundance than in years of scarcity. The corn over and above the quantity consumed by the farmer or the producer of corn, must be brought to market and sold in course of