Various

“ It is the trafficker in sympathies, it is the dealer in haunts and homes, at whom the finger of scorn should be pointed. It is the trader in touching recollections, only to be soothed by gold, that should be denounced. It is the peer who made the historic memories of his mansion a plea for replenishing an impoverished estate; it is the farmer who made the sacred associations of home an excuse for receiving treble its value; it is the country gentleman who made his opposition the lever by which he procured the money from the proprietors' pockets, who should be shamed. ”

“ If the day, with all the tyranny of its sunshine and its innumerable insects, be enjoyable in the tropics, the night is still more so. The stars shine out with diamond brilliancy, and appear as large as if seen through a telescope. Their changing colours, the wake of light they cast upon the water, the distinctness of the milky way, and the splendour, above all, of the evening star, give one the impression of being under a different firmament from that to which we have been accustomed; then the cool delicious airs, with all the strange and stilly sounds they bear from the desert and the forest ”

“ At first sight, it seems quite unaccountable that an enlightened people should ever have devised or sanctioned a system which so obviously exposes the bench to the risk of corruption; and one is at a loss to reconcile a reverence for the law with an ordinance that subjects her minister to the ordeal of canvassing and cajoling all and sundry—perhaps the very men who may next day be in the dock before him. But the root of the anomaly is not hard to find. Into the purest of republics ambition and cupidity—the love of office and the love of dollars—will force their way. ”

“ We never have underrated the difficulty of a change such as we contemplate; but no difficulty attending that, is for a moment to be put into the balance against the general welfare of the country, if, on reflection, and on considering your own position, you shall be of opinion that the interests of the country demand that change. But, at any hazard, we cannot afford to go down-hill. To bring us, as the Manchester men contemplate, to the Continental level in point of wages as well as expenditure, is to seal the ruin of the British empire, burdened as it is ”

“ The wolves sprang, but, miscalculating my speed, sprang behind, whilst their intended prey glided out into the river.
"Nature turned me towards home. The light flakes of snow spun from the iron of my skates, and I was now some distance from my pursuers, when their fierce howl told me that I was again the fugitive. I did not look back; I did not feel sorry or glad; one thought of home, of the bright faces awaiting my return, of their tears if they should never see me again, and then every energy of body and mind was exerted for my escape. I was perfectly at home on the ice. ”

“ The prosperity of this country does not depend upon the amount of wares which it sends or forces abroad, though that is the doctrine which is constantly clamoured in our ears by the political economists—a generation of ridiculous pretenders, of whom it is only necessary to know one, in order to form an accurate estimate of the mental capabilities of his tribe. It depends on our own labour, on our own internal arrangements, and on that reciprocity between man and man, and between class and class of our fellow-subjects, which is the only real security for the peace and tranquillity of a kingdom. ”

“ The theory of absolute freedom of exchange expunges altogether the idea of nationalism, and regards man, not as a member of this or that community, but as the denizen of a great universal republic. Local and historical associations—ties of kindred and of birth—are only so many obstructions in the way of human progress; and an Englishman is nothing more than the subject of certain animal wants and instincts, the gratification of which he must be left to seek wherever he finds the materials most abundant. Such is Free Trade in its true scope and ultimate tendency. ”

“ Often we pass by the tented homes of the desert tribes, with their flocks and herds tended by busy maidens, now screaming wildly after their restless charge—now singing songs as wild, but sweeter far. Then comes sunset with its massed clouds of purple, blue, and gold; the air is full of bleatings as the flocks all tamely follow their shepherds home. On the tenth day after leaving Aleppo, we descend into a plain covered with some dusty olive-trees: we come to a hill with a low wall, and a castle on its summit. ”

“ What is the nature of the inducements that annually impel so large a number of our countrymen to forfeit the character of British subjects, and prefer a domicile among those who are aliens in laws, interests, and system of government?
We hardly know how to venture upon anything connected with the ominous subject of emigration, at a moment when the crowds leaving our shores, at the rate of nearly a thousand every day, are such as to startle the most apathetic observer, and shake the faith of the most dogmatic economist in the truth of his speculations. ”

“ For the present then we leave it, thoroughly persuaded that, under a form of government which acknowledges no distinctions between classes and interests, so shameless a violation of the plainest principles of equity cannot long be permitted to continue, and cordially joining in the wish that no object of less momentous interest—no schemes of impracticable retrenchment—no wily bait of extended suffrage—no flourishing of the old red rag of reform, may be suffered to distract the attention of the public, from the one great paramount practical reform—a readjustment of Taxation. ”

“ Labour depends entirely upon wages, and wages upon the market price of the article produced. If from the introduction of foreign labour, in the shape of products, the price of any article is forced down below the cost of production, then wages begin to fall, and in the end production is extinguished. Why is it that foreign countries have imposed heavy duties upon our exported articles of manufacture? Simply for this object—that their own manufacturers, who give employment to large numbers of their population, may not be undersold by ours, nor those means of employment annihilated. ”

“ Reared amongst the noble pines of Maine, he says, even as a child, he could never hear, without feelings of jealousy, the oak extolled as monarch of the forest. Admitting it to excel in strength, he vaunts, upon the other hand, the superior grandeur and girth of the pine, its value in building, the breadth of its planks, their clearness, beauty, and freedom from knots, the numerous uses to which it is applicable, its excellence as fuel, its perfect adaptation to all the joiner's purposes. ”

“ There is no more curious page in history than that which records the rise of British manufactures towards the close of last century. Invention after invention, whereby manual labour was superseded by machinery, and the power of production almost indefinitely multiplied, paved the way for that monopoly which our manufacturers enjoyed for at least a quarter of a century, during which time every other country in Europe except our own was devastated by war, and the peaceful arts forgotten or overthrown. ”

“ Even if you are alone in a carriage, you cannot indulge in that luxury without rendering yourself liable to a fine; and, if your appetite should overcome your prudence, and you should venture to set the law at defiance, before you have inhaled two whiffs, a railway guard appears as if by magic at the window—for those fellows have the scent of the vulture, and can race along the foot-boards as nimbly as a cat along a gutter—and you are ordered to abandon your Havanna. ”

“ Here, you see, is a confession of opinion by a leading Free-Trader, that even the cheapening of food, by which he means the reduction of the wages of labour, will not suffice ultimately to secure us the supremacy of the foreign markets. He is perfectly right. In this insane, and we believe almost entirely unprofitable competition with the rest of the world, we must infallibly be overcome. No cheapness of food can countervail the pressure of our heavy taxation. ”

“ The reason why Protection is still a living principle—the reason why it finds so many supporters among the learned and the thoughtful—the reason why it is progressing step by step towards triumph—is because, in the minds of those who advocate it, there is a strong and deep-rooted conviction that you already know that the opposite system has entirely failed to realise the predictions of its advocates, and that you feel that its permanency is contrary to your interest, and to that of the great body of the people. ”

“ Mr Francis tells us of many, "who, beginning life as navigators, have become contractors; who, having saved money, have become 'gangers,' realised capital and formed contracts, first for thousands, and then for hundreds of thousands. These are almost a caste by themselves. They make fortunes, and purchase landed estates. Many a fine property has passed from some improvident possessor to a railway labourer; and some of the most beautiful country seats in England belong to men who trundled the barrow, who delved with the spade, who smote with the pick-axe, and blasted the rock." ”

“ What field, then, remains for the aspiring spirit but the law?—and what wonder if the sixteen thousand attorneys, who, we are told, find a living in the States, and take a leading part in the management of all public business, should vote "the higher honours of the profession" far too few to be retained as perpetual incumbencies? Hence has sprung the device of popular election to, and rotation in, the sweets of office, which, by "passing it round," and giving everyone a chance, is designed to render it as generally available as possible. ”

“ In short, the harmony of interests is regarded in America as the grand point of aim for the statesman. With us, our most important home interests, on which depend the welfare of by far the greater part of our population, are sacrificed to prolong a struggle in which our exporting manufacturers cannot possibly be the victors, and from which, even at present, they derive little or no profit.
Now, let us ask you to consider for one moment, what is the natural effect, upon the whole of us, of a forcible diminution of prices, and depreciation of produce. ”

“ Who so true? so good?"
"Good—I grant it!" exclaimed Riccabocca. "What then? 'Da cattiva Donna guardati, ed alla buona non fidar niente,' (from the bad woman, guard thyself; to the good woman trust nothing.) And if you must trust," added the abominable man, "trust her with anything but a secret!"
"Fie," said Violante, with arch reproach, for she knew her father's humours too well to interpret his horrible sentiments literally—"fie on your consistency, Padre carissimo. Do you not trust your secret to me?"
"You! A kitten is not a cat, and a girl is not a woman. ”

“ If, in the new Parliament, all idea of a return to the Protective System is abandoned, we may prepare ourselves for that most dismal conflict which can convulse a country—a war against taxation, and ultimately against property. ”

“ In the first place, we wish you to observe that the cheapness of manufacturing products does not of itself induce consumption. There must be buyers as well as sellers in order to constitute a market, and the tendency of our late legislation has been to diminish the means of the former. It by no means follows that, if we have cheap food and cheap manufactures, the relative position of all classes can be maintained. Never forget that our burdens all the while remain at a fixed money rate, and that, as the value of produce is lowered, the weight of those burdens is aggravated. ”

“ Those who could not leave their homes got on the housetops, but the great mass of the population spread itself along the line-wall, the Grand Parade and Alameda, and the heights skirting the chief slopes of the Rock. Moors and Jews, Spaniards and English, citizens and soldiers, men, women, and children, of all ages, grades, and nations, ranged themselves indiscriminately wherever they could obtain a view of the sea. ”

“ The plain on the eastern coast spread out broad and fair: here verdant meadows, there masses of fruit-laden trees; while between the mass wandered the mountain streams, hastening on to their homes in the fair bosom of the lake. Van itself swept round its castle, which stands on a curious rock that rises abruptly from the plain; but the lake, indeed, was the queen of the view—blue as the far depth of ocean, yet unlike the ocean—so soft, so sweet, so calm was its surface. ”

“ We, who have, from the very first, anticipated the baneful effects of this attack upon British industry—we, who have no more connection than any of yourselves with territorial aristocracy, and who consider the welfare of the people as the grand object which it is the duty of the Government to promote—ask you to apply your own reason to the facts which are before you and in your reach, and to decide and act accordingly. ”

“ Canada thrown into a state of revolt, succeeded by a smothered feeling of discontent; Ireland depopulated; the magnificent resources of India undeveloped; and the British farmer reduced to the dire necessity of paying rent out of capital. I also perceived that the change in our commercial policy had substituted a cosmopolitan cant in the place of patriotism and nationality. To become the friend of every country but his own had become the pride and the glory of statesmanship. Foreign goods were admitted, duty free, into our ports, in the vain hope of reciprocity being established ”

“ And when, by the grossest act of political perfidy that was ever perpetrated—an act which future times, if not the present, will stigmatise with deserved opprobrium—the last and most important change, save that which subsequently assailed our maritime interest, was suddenly effected, it was the declared opinion of the majority that the new system must at least have a trial, until its real results were developed, and until it became apparent to the nation whether or not Free Trade would operate for the advantage of the people, as its advocates and promoters had predicted. ”