hausting toil of their long hours of labor to the saloons and drink as the only accessible relief from the monotonous slavery of their lives. Ten to twelve, and even eighteen hours of work a day in shop, factory, or field, for six months in the year, drives the laborer out of bed whilst it is yet dark, to a hasty breakfast, then to toil till it is again dark, and into another night before the supper can be taken. In the morning the father leaves his children still in bed, and at night, when he gets home, they are again, or should be, in bed. He does not see enough of his family by daylight to become really acquainted with its members. In the long days of summer the laborer has greater opportunities to see his children. The wife is as much a slave as the husband and father. The dwelling is a home of poverty and destitution, without a single comfort or attraction of any kind. The only wonder is that saloons do not multiply more rapidly, and that intemperance is not more prevalent. At a great temperance gathering at Liverpool recently, Cardinal Manning spoke of wretched homes being the greatest temptation to drink. He went to the very heart of the whole matter. Out of the two conditions of idleness on the one hand and excessive toil on the other have grown the great evils of poverty and intemperance with which we are now cursed. There can be no hope of improvement till the causes which produced these evils have been removed. The moral condition and family relations of the workingman can not be improved so long as he is a slave to toil for the full time that he is out of bed. He must have time for rest and improvement, as well as means to make

his home comfortable. The condition of the idle man, in everything that relates to improvement, is worse than that of the unresting toiler.

With these facts, apparent to everyone who will give them a moment's thought, I ask, which is most desirable, the continuance of the conditions of extreme toil on the one hand, and idleness on the other, with the results which are now everywhere seen around us, or the distribution of the work to be done among all, in such manner that everyone may have regular employment, with abundant time for rest, recreation, and improvement, and the means of making homes that are comfortable? These are matters not to be dismissed with a curt word and a sneer, but challenge earnest attention.

The first and most considerable real difficulty is, that much the greater portion of the unemployed labor of the country is unskilled. This fact will be seized upon by the opponents of the measure, and be magnified and distorted in every possible form. Yet, though it be a real difficulty, it will not diminish by procrastination. It must be met and overcome. It certainly is not insuperable. Under the present system of almost universal production by machinery, the first and great thing to learn by the unskilled is the method of controlling or attending upon a single machine, which may be more or less perfectly accomplished in a few weeks. The acquiring the management of a machine, in its constant repetition of the same operations, within a limited range, is widely different from what the learning of a trade was fifty years ago, where everything was wrought by hand. But

whatever the difficulties may be, they must be overcome. The existence of the great mass of unskilled labor that we now have, is the inevitable result of the operations of society, under present developments, and society can not escape the consequences. Therefore, the quicker the difficulty is met, and unskilled labor is converted into that which is skilled, the better it will be for all.

Another difficulty will be found in the fact that for the last eighteen years we have been educating a large body of tramps-we may safely say, armies of them

who have no habits of industry nor love for work. Vagabondage has so long been their habit that they Their condition must be

have learned to love it.

changed, cost what it may. It is another of the penalties that society must pay for its transgressions. The tramp, also, is an inevitable growth out of present conditions. But the difficulty will not prove so great as many will seek to make it appear. The shortened hours of labor under the law, and the advance in wages that is sure to follow, will have a powerful influence on the tramp, however fixed his habits. The task of educating that class to habits of industry, under the new conditions, will not be as great as it now is to control and provide for them under the present state of things. The wholesome application of a stringent vagrant law would also operate beneficially in the cases of the otherwise incorrigible. They would not be long in learning that six hours of free labor, each day, will be far easier than ten hours of enforced toil.

The hope of constant employment, with shortened

hours and liberal compensation, will develop a mass of anxious, competent, intelligent applicants for work, old and young, male and female, that will pull off the scales from many eyes that will not now see the great desire which everywhere exists for work that is not slavery, and a compensation that will buy comfort.

These two classes of difficulties, real and imaginary, are all that merit discussion, and they would be overcome in the first year of the operation of the six hour law.

Having secured to our people the blessings that are sure to come out of the proposed change, it is a matter for grave consideration whether it be desirable to longer keep our doors wide open, and fill our country with the poor of Europe. Is it not a duty that we owe to our children to check the great influx from abroad, and save to them the room for expansion that is being so rapidly curtailed by the alien? It certainly appears that when we have shown to the world how a nation may become prosperous from the development of its own industries, and the proper division of its labor, we shall have rendered to humanity the greatest service that can be expected from us, and that America might very properly be preserved for Americans.

But there is another matter that should be considered in this connection; and that is the one so earnestly dwelt upon by Herbert Spencer in his last utterances before returning to his native land. He named it the Gospel of Relaxation.

CHAPTER XV.

THE GOSPEL OF RELAXATION.

[BY HERBERT SPENCER.]

ERBERT SPENCER, at the reception which

H was tendered to him, in New York, on the

evening preceding his departure for England, made some most timely remarks to the gentlemen who were his entertainers. They were some of the most widely known men of our country, representing the learned professions, merchants, and financial interests; but not a member of the great body of the people was present. Therefore it is possible that no part of what he said was intended to pass over the heads of his immediate listeners, and to reach the great audience of the masses. But his criticisms and suggestions were so perfectly in line with the objects sought in this volume, that I can not forbear the pleasure of transferring them to these pages. He said:

"Already in some remarks drawn from me, respecting American affairs and American character, I have passed criticisms which have been accepted far more good naturedly than I could reasonably have expected; and it seems strange that I should now again