food and warmth! The Godlike could not and cannot be paid; but
the Earthly always could. Gurth, a mere swineherd, born thrall of
Cedric the Saxon, tended pigs in the wood, and did get some parings of
the pork. Why, the four-footed worker has already _got_ all that this
two-handed one is clamouring for! How often must I remind you? There
is not a horse in England, able and willing to work, but _has_ due
food and lodging; and goes about sleek-coated, satisfied in heart. And
you say, It is impossible. Brothers, I answer, if for you it be
impossible, what is to become of you? It is impossible for us to
believe it to be impossible. The human brain, looking at these sleek
English horses, refuses to believe in such impossibility for English
men. Do you depart quickly; clear the ways soon, lest worse befall. We
for our share do purpose, with full view of the enormous difficulty,
with total disbelief in the impossibility, to endeavour while life is
in us, and to die endeavouring, we and our sons, till we attain it or
have all died and ended.

Such a Platitude of a World, in which all working horses could be well
fed, and innumerable working men should die starved, were it not best
to end it; to have done with it, and restore it once for all to the
_Joetuns_, Mud-giants, Frost-giants, and Chaotic Brute-gods of the
Beginning? For the old Anarchic Brute-gods it may be well enough; but
it is a Platitude which Men should be above countenancing by their
presence in it. We pray you, let the word _impossible_ disappear from
your vocabulary in this matter. It is of awful omen: to all of us, and
to yourselves first of all.

CHAPTER IV.

MORRISON'S PILL.

What is to be done, what would you have us do? asks many a one, with a
tone of impatience, almost of reproach; and then, if you mention some
one thing, some two things, twenty things that might be done, turns
round with a satirical tehee, and "These are your remedies!" The state
of mind indicated by such question, and such rejoinder, is worth
reflecting on.

It seems to be taken for granted, by these interrogative philosophers,
that there is some 'thing,' or handful of 'things,' which could be
done; some Act of Parliament, 'remedial measure' or the like, which
could be passed, whereby the social malady were fairly fronted,
conquered, put an end to; so that, with your remedial measure in your
pocket, you could then go on triumphant, and be troubled no farther.
"You tell us