Principles and observations on many and various subjects, for the health of nations and individuals / by John Moodie.

  • Moodie, John.
Date:
1848
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Principles and observations on many and various subjects, for the health of nations and individuals / by John Moodie. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    9 the hands of a few men who were not always the best judges, either by wealth, acquirements, information, talent, or education, who was the best person to be sent to the Legislature ; it was not measures which they advocated and sent to Parliament, it was the external figure of a man, and very frequently his money. It is not to be thought that the persons who sent the member to Parliament fairly represented the wealthy and enlightened class, or even the majority of the nation. The Town-councils before the Reform Bill were not composed of educated men, as by remembering and looking at them in any town before that date, or even at the present time, any one will see they were not fit judges who to elect; and there was there- fore need of a more enlarged and enlightened body to send mem- bers to Parliament, and most are now agreed that an enlargement of the electors was necessary. As to the exact amount many yet differ in opinion, but so far as it at present has gone, all seem to agree in favour of it, either by their open approval or tacit acqui- escence ; but as to the further extension of the Reform Bill there is little doubt there will be great differences of opinion, and there is little doubt there will be again a distinction of parties with regard to its further extension, or as some would say, its full development; as they consider they have not got the Reform Bill, but only a trial or progressive portion of it, and that universal suffrage is the only and great end or fulfilment of the Reform Bill. It is likely there will be very great opposition to this, but even this is doubtful, as measures are now-a-days passed near the termination of a Parliament, as the members wish to please their constituents and to regain their seats, and as their minds have been getting gradually accustomed, and are getting more so, in favour of the measure, and they at length lose sight of its bad effects, as they at one time considered it to have, but from being accustomed to hear debates so often in its favour, it gives them a lukewarmness as to their opposing it, and being combined with self-interest, they agree to the measure, and suppose that something will prevent its injurious effects. However, that has yet to come, and it may be very long before it does occur, but at present the matter seems to be at rest, and all parties who do not advocate extreme measures, as the Chartists, &c, are agreed as to what already has been granted, and so there is no division of par- ties with regard to this measure. Thus are two great parties merged into one, at least they have no particular principles which divide them, they may differ as to some measure or the means by which they may attain it, but the measure does not contain within it any of the great leading principles of legislation which affects the whole nation. (An extension of the franchise has been outvoted the other day.) Corn-Laws. The corn-laws or the principles of free trade for a long period attracted and divided the attention of two large bodies in the State, and, at length, this measure was set at rest by the majority gaining it; but this measure has not the approval, nor the tacit acquies- cence of all; there are still a large number who disapprove of it, and a very great number agreed to it, not from conviction, but who thought there was no other way of doing than agreeing to it, and who did it because they thought there was a chance of their not being injured by the measure ; we may easily know this from the