This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1904 edition. Excerpt: ...the vexed question of the merits and demerits of a peasant proprietary I do not propose to enter. It is surely unnecessary to say that the older generation of English free traders would have welcomed such a result with delight, if it could possibly have been brought about in this country. Mill, their master, ...
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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1904 edition. Excerpt: ...the vexed question of the merits and demerits of a peasant proprietary I do not propose to enter. It is surely unnecessary to say that the older generation of English free traders would have welcomed such a result with delight, if it could possibly have been brought about in this country. Mill, their master, as every one knows, devoted two long chapters of his great treatise to the subject, and conceived it to be " established that no other existing state of agricultural economy has so beneficial an effect on the industry, the intelligence, the frugality and prudence of the population, nor, therefore, is on the whole so favour able both to their moral and their physical welfare."1 For Germany, at any rate, as things are--while on the one side, the world is still so far from a "solution" of " the labour problem" either in manufactures or on great estates, and on the other side, the adaptability of the great estates to the conditions created by over-sea competition in food supplies is still so doubtful--most thoughtful observers regard the growth of the independent peasantry as a relatively satisfactory development. Without further argument, I shall henceforth put myself on their side, and assume that the facts that we have witnessed constitute a real "progress." We may observe in passing that while Germany thus came out of the acutest period of agricultural depression with an actual growth of its independent peasantry, the scanty remnants of a like class in England were exposed to the unmitigated pressure of American competition, and were to a large extent wiped out of existence.2 1 Mill, Principles, bk. ii., ch. vii., 5. Of. Stephen, Life of Fawcett, p. 165. 2 See Final Report of the Royal Commission...
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