496
Chapter 25
répression; que ces rapports ne produisent la richesse bourgeoise, c’est-à-dire la richesse de la classe
bourgeoise, qu’en anéantissant continuellement la richesse des membres intégrants de cette classe et
en produisant un prolétariat toujours croissant.” [From day to day it thus becomes clearer that the
production relations in which the bourgeoisie moves have not a simple, uniform character, but a dual
character; that in the selfsame relations in which wealth is produced, poverty is produced also; that in
the selfsame relations in which there is a development of productive forces, there is also a force
producing repression; that there relations produce bourgeois wealth, i.e., the wealth of the bourgeois
class, only by continually annihilating the wealth of the individual members of this class and by
producing an evergrowing proletariat] (Karl Marx: “Misère de la Philosophie,” p. 116.)
26
G. Ortes: “Delia Economia Nazionale libri sei, 1777,” in Custodi, Parte Moderna, t. xxi, pp. 6, 9, 22,
25, etc. Ortes says, l. c., p. 32: “In luoco di progettar sistemi inutili per la felicità de’popoli, mi
limiterò a investigare la regione della loro infelicità.” [Instead of projecting useless systems for
achieving the happiness of people, I shall limit myself to investigating the reasons for their
unhappiness]
27
“A Dissertation on the Poor Laws. By a Well-wisher of Mankind. (The Rev. J. Townsend) 1786,”
republished Lond. 1817, pp. 15, 39, 41. This “delicate” parson, from whose work just quoted, as well
as from his “Journey through Spain,” Malthus often copies whole pages, himself borrowed the greater
part of his doctrine from Sir James Steuart, whom he however alters in the borrowing. E.g., when
Steuart says: “Here, in slavery, was a forcible method of making mankind diligent,” [for the non-
workers] ... “Men were then forced to work” [i.e.,to work gratis for others], “because they were slaves
of others; men are now forced to work” [i.e., to work gratis for non-workers] “because they are the
slaves of their necessities,” he does not thence conclude, like the fat holder of benefices, that the wage
labourer must always go fasting. He wishes, on the contrary, to increase their wants and to make the
increasing number of their wants a stimulus to their labour for the “more delicate.”
28
Storch, l. c., t. iii, p. 223.
29
Sismondi, l. c., pp. 79, 80, 85.
30
Destutt de Tracy, l. c., p. 231: “Les nations pauvres, c’est là où le peuple est à son aise; et les
nations riches, c’est là où il est ordinairement pauvre.” [The poor nations are those where the people
are comfortably off; and the rich nations, those where the people are generally poor]
31
“Tenth Report of the Commissioners of H. M. Inland Revenue.” Lond., 1866. p. 38.
32
lbidem.
33
These figures are sufficient for comparison, but, taken absolutely, are false, since, perhaps,
£100,000,000 of income are annually not declared. The complaints of the Inland Revenue
Commissioners of systematic fraud, especially on the part of the commercial and industrial classes,
are repeated in each of their reports. So e.g., “A Joint-stock company returns £6,000 as assessable
profits, the surveyor raises the amount to £88,000, and upon that sum duty is ultimately paid. Another
company which returns £190,000 is finally compelled to admit that the true return should be
£250,000.” (Ibid., p, 42.)
34
“Census, &c.,” l. c., p. 29. John Bright’s assertion that 150 landlords own half of England, and 12
half the Scotch soil, has never been refuted.
35
“Fourth Report, &c., of Inland Revenue.” Lond., 1860, p. 17.
36
hese are the net incomes after certain legally authorised abatements.
37
At this moment, March, 1867, the Indian and Chinese market is again overstocked by the
consignments of the British cotton manufacturers. In 1866 a reduction in wages of 5 per cent. took
place amongst the cotton operatives. In 1867, as consequence of a similar operation, there was a strike
497
Chapter 25
of 20,000 men at Preston. [Added in the 4th German edition. — That was the prelude to the crisis
which broke out immediately afterwards. — F. E.]
38
“Census, &c.,” l. c., P. 11.
39
Gladstone in the House of Commons, Feb. 13th, 1843. Times, Feb. 14th, 1843 — “It is one of the
most melancholy features in the social state of this country that we see, beyond the possibility of
denial, that while there is at this moment a decrease in the consuming powers of the people, an
increase of the pressure of privations and distress; there is at the same time a constant accumulation of
wealth in the upper classes, an increase of the luxuriousness of their habits, and of their means of
enjoyment.” (Hansard, 13th Feb.)
40
Gladstone in the House of Commons, April 16th, 1863. Morning Star, April 17th.
41
See the official accounts in the Blue book: “Miscellaneous Statistics of the United Kingdom,” Part
vi., London, 1866, pp. 260-273, passim. Instead of the statistics of orphan asylums, &c., the
declamations of the ministerial journals in recommending dowries for the Royal children might also
serve. The greater dearness of the means of subsistence is never forgotten there.
42
Gladstone, House of Commons, 7th April, 1864. — “The Hansard version runs: ‘Again, and yet
more at large — what is human life, but, in the majority of cases, a struggle for existence.’ The
continual crying contradictions in Gladstone’s Budget speeches of 1863 and 1864 were characterised
by an English writer by the following quotation from Boileau:
“Voilà l’homme en effet. Il va du blanc au noir,
Il condamne au matin ses sentiments du soir.
Importun à tout autre, à soi-même incommode,
Il change à tout moment d’esprit comme de mode.”
[Such is the man: he goes from black to white. / He condemns in the morning what he felt in the
evening. / A nuisance to everyone else, and an inconvenience to himself, / he changes his way of
thinking as easily as he changes his way of dressing]
(“The Theory of Exchanges, &c.,” London, 1864, p. 135.)
43
H. Fawcett, l. c., pp. 67-82. As to the increasing dependence of labourers on the retail shopkeepers,
this is the consequence of the frequent oscillations and interruptions of their employment.
44
Wales here is always included in England.
45
A peculiar light is thrown on the advance made since the time of Adam Smith, by the fact that by
him the word “workhouse” is still occasionally used as synonymous with “manufactory”; e.g., the
opening of his chapter on the division of labour; “those employed in every different branch of the
work can often be collected into the same workhouse.”
46
“Public Health. Sixth Report, 1864,” p. 13.
47
l. c., p. 17.
48
l. c., p. 13.
49
l. c., Appendix, p. 232.
50
l. c., pp. 232, 233.
51
l. c., pp. 14, 15.
52
“In no particular have the rights of persons been so avowedly and shamefully sacrificed to the rights
of
property as in regard to the lodging of the labouring class. Every large town may be looked upon as
a place of human sacrifice, a shrine where thousands pass yearly through the fire as offerings to the
moloch of avarice,” S. Laing, l. c., p. 150.
53
“Public Health, Eighth Report. 1866.” p. 14, note.