"There is one disease which alone must be sufficient to seal our fate. The system of public funded debts has taught the man of wealth the idea of irresponsible property; a thing which never can exist, but the very belief of which is enough to bring down a judgment on the people by whom it is entertained. The landed proprietor has tenants and labourers, and neighbours and parishioners; all of whom, within a certain district, may look to him for protection, for assistance, for advice; and, at least, for some notice and countenance. Even the tradesman and the merchant have their connexions and correspondents--their clerks, their travellers, their shopmen, their warehousemen, and apprentices, as well as their customers. But the holder of funded property, owns no claim from any one. In due time, after his name is written down in a great book, kept at the Bank of England, he receives his income at the day—or his banker receives it for him-without asking or thanking any one for it, and spends it when and how he pleases, at London, or Rome, or elsewhere. There is no one who can say, 'Sir, I am your tenant, or your tenant's labourer;' or, I worked on your honour's estate, and recollect your father and grandfather.' No one person has any greater claim than another upon such a man; that is, no one has any claim at all. All sense of obligations and duties are forgotten; and, looking with triumph down upon the landed gentleman, who laments the low price of corn and the bad seasons, and finds that his tenants, as well as his farm-houses, must be propped, and the poor must be provided for, and happiness must be diffused over a sphere and circle to which he is bound indissolubly, he says, with exultation: There is no human being that has any claim upon me, and my income is as sure as the nation ;' or, rather, should he say, as sure as the system can possibly be kept together.' Envy has naturally followed so independent a conviction; all other persons have rivalled the expenses and the habits of the fundholder; his selfishness, therefore, of necessity-his disregard for others his separation from the lower and dependant classes his entire irresponsibility, has produced this evil. The consequence is, that the landed gentry are wholly unable to live on their landed estates, and more unable than unwilling, for they cannot afford the style and luxury which they ape, and at the same time fulfil the calls of duty; and, therefore, the claims of their station are a clog upon them. Instead of the duties and obligations of other stations being ingrafted on the funded income, the irresponsibility and selfishness of the fundholders are grafted on the landowner, and the duties and obligations are torn from the landed estate. In consequence, towns are resorted to, where your next neighbour is not known as |