is in
the fitness of things that pauperism, which we English have declared
to be illegal, should neither be fondled nor caressed. To be ill-used
profitably there must be something pictorial in your case; it must have
its reliefs of light as well as shade. There must be little touches,
a bright "has been," sunny spots of a happy past Without the force
of these contrasts, there is no possibility of establishing the grand
grievance which is embodied in ill-usage.
Now, Mr B. C. who brought on this motion was a sorry artist, and the
whole sum and substance of his case was, that as we secured the services
of eminent and able men, we ought to pay them "properly." Why, in that
one word "properly" lay the whole question. What constitutes proper
payment? Every career in life carries with it some circumstance either
of advantage or the reverse, which either compensates for the loss of a
material benefit, or is requited by some addition of a tangible profit.
The educated man who accepts three hundred a-year in the Church is
not recompensed, or considered to be recompensed, by this miserable
pittance. It is in the respect, the influence, the power, and the
reverence that attach to his calling he is rewarded. Place a layman in
the parish beside him with that income, and mark the difference of their
stations! The same of the soldier. Why or how does seven-and-sixpence
diurnally represent one the equal of the best in any society of the
land? Simply by a conventional treaty, by which we admit that a man,
at the loss of so much hard cash, may enjoy a station which bears no
imaginable proportion to his means.
On the other hand, there are large communities who, addressing
themselves to acquire wealth and riches, care very little for the
adventitious advantages of social state. As it is told of Theodore Hook,
at a Lord Mayor's feast, that he laid down his knife and fork at the
fifth course, and declared "he would take the rest out in money;" so
there are scores of people who "go in" for the actual and the real. They
have no sympathy with those who "take out" their social status partly
in condition partly in cash, as is the case with the curate and the
captain.
Almost every man, at his outset in life, makes some computation of how
much his career can pay him in money, how much in the advantages of rank
and station. The bailiff on the estate makes very often a far better
income than the village doctor; but do you believe that AEsculapiu
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