Page:Thoughts on the causes and consequences of the present high price of provisions.djvu/10

[ 2 ] universal dissatisfaction, and inflame the minds of the people to seek redress by such infamous and dangerous methods. This they endeavour, too successfully, to effect, by daily representing in the public papers, that this calamity arises from the artifices of monopolizers, regraters, forestallers, and engrossers, encouraged, or at least connived at, by ministers desirous of oppressing the people, and parliaments unattentive to their complaints. It is hard to say, whether the ignorance of these writers, or their malevolence, is superior; or, whether the absurdity of their principles, or the mischief of them, is the greatest: but one may venture to affirm, that our people, notwithstanding the present scarcity, are still better fed than taught. This undoubtedly makes it necessary, at this time, that the true causes of this evil should be explained to them; which, if it lessens not their wants, may in some measure abate their ill-founded indignation. To