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Two errors, it seems to me, less different in their result than in their nature, may be committed in legislating for our Poor; the one, the seeking to patch up and amend a system which is defective in its very principle; and the other, the too rashly embracing of visionary schemes. By the first, we may give permanency to evils which a firmer policy could remove; by the second, we may be so entangled in costly and unavailing projects, as to be forced, after a time, to retrace our steps.

Of those plans of provision for the poor which have been made known, that of Mr Owen seems to be treated by the public with the greatest favour. The favour, however, is perhaps more due to the benevolence of the author, than to the merits of his design. To me, at least, it appears, that though Mr Owen may have succeeded in a partial experiment, his system, as the permanent one of a great and populous nation, would be impracticable in the ultimate execution, and would lead, in the attempt, to innumerable evils.

In the opinion of this gentleman, so great has been the lessening of the need of human labour by the use of machinery, and so diminished will be the demand for the products of our industry by the cessation of war, that we shall never be able to employ our whole people as in the times that are past: we must now afford them employment for no other purpose than to keep them from vice and idleness. To this end it is proposed, that we shall form societies of 1200 or 1500 persons, and purchase an equal number of acres of land, to be cultivated entirely by human labour. The time that can be spared from this occupation by the men, and a part of the time of the women and children, are to be employed in certain manufactures, from the profits of which the whole expenses of the establishment are to be defrayed, and the inhabitants supported in a little Utopian commonwealth.

Now it is known, that all the energy and frugality of a farmer, aided by the use of animal power, of machinery, and of capital, are often insufficient to make the earth repay the expenses of cultivating, sowing, and manuring it. How vain, then, must appear the hope, that that object will be effected, if the expense be increased more than fivefold! Gardens are indeed cultivated profitably by the spade; but the system of gardening has narrow limits, being bounded by the demand for the produce, and still more by the means and cost of procuring manures. If we will calculate, too, how little of the time of Mr Owen's poor could be spared from the labours of tillage, we must suppose the profits of manufactures to be great indeed, to support, even on the scantiest fare, such a numerous society.

But even if we can believe that such an establishment could repay its expenses and support its members; and if all the objections could be obviated which arise from the vast numbers if those institutions which would need to be formed, to maintain our excrescent population, and from the turning of so many thousand acres from profitable cultivation into the most wasteful system of management that can be devised; still I maintain, that the system is founded on principles very different from those which will ever enable us to better the condition, and eradicate the vices, of the labouring poor.

The argument for resorting to this system is founded upon an assumption unsupported by experience, and without evidence or probability to support it—namely, that the simplification of labour by mechanism, and the ceasing of the demand for warlike stores, will render it impossible for us to employ, as hitherto, our manufacturing population. That many thousand labourers, artisans, and traders, derived their chief or entire subsistence from the preparation and sale of those commodities which the demands of war called forth, is true; but shall we believe that the opening of so many markets formerly closed against us, and that the prosperity which we may reasonably hope from a commerce interrupted only by the rivalship of less skilful and less wealthy nations, will not indemnify us for the loss of our warlike manufactures? The cheapness with which the objects of luxury and use, can be supplied, have never yet failed