tions, and the banquet of a night is made to exhaust the revenues of a year, and to impoverish the inheritance of the children. The vanity of dress gives encouragement to the prohibited introduction of foreign wares, which cannot be accomplished without fraud and without imminent peril, and in the jealousy of one class of the opulent for certain assumed privileges, the tables of another are incompletely furnished, unless there be an indirect connivance in wrong and robbery, and even upon occasion in manslaughter. This domestic luxury com

...

P "It was impossible for gentlemen to disguise from "themselves, that the present Game Laws were an in"tolerable nuisance. That the increase of poaching "had been their only effect, he held in his hand some returns, which, if the House would permit him to read "them, would strongly demonstrate. They were returns "of the number of committals in Bedford, for "offences against the Game Laws during the last ten 66 years. In 1809 there were four; in 1810, two; in 66 1811, fourteen; in 1812, five; in 1813, five; in 1814, "thirteen; in 1815, twenty-four; in 1816, thirty-three; " in 1817, sixty-one; in 1818, eighty. He particularly "called the attention of the House to the growing and enormous increase of the last four years." Speech of the Marquis of Tavistock, on the Game Laws' Amendment Bill. May 14, 1819.

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mands a retinue of pampered menials, corrupted and corrupting each other, new and expensive equipages, the arrangements of splendid furniture, and various articles of personal expense, which consume the treasures of the most wealthy, and leave no funds for the exercise of private liberality, even if there were leisure for compassionate reflection on the mass of private necessity. This luxury and its fatal consequences are not confined to any particular class of the community. In the lowest rank it betrays itself in unbecoming apparel, and in the fatal and demoralizing use of ardent spirits,

9 From an official document included in the Police Report for 1817. p. 454. it appears, that the duty paid upon British spirits alone, between the years 1803 and 1816, both inclusive, amounted to 29,738,0681. 1s. 10d. The duty of the last seven years exceeds that of the preceding seven years by 4,411,9681. 2s. 91⁄2d. and the duty of the year 1816, that of the year 1803, by 709,486l. 6s. 44d. This is sufficient proof of the increased consumption of spirits, notwithstanding the flattering reports of increased sobriety, of which the appearance may be easily accounted for. For the effects of drinking spirits in a moral view, see Police Report for 1817. p. 506–514. 516-523; see p. 517. 532, 533. 547. for its effects upon

and terminates in the abject dependence of pauperism; in the middle rank, it seeks a profuse establishment, and tends to bankruptcy; in the highest, it is pampered with foreign indulgences, and brings on such embarrassments as render the peer a pensioner on his dependents. The flagitious accumulations of debt, and the shamelessness of insolvency', are such as convey a strong reflection on the character of a Christian nation. The extravagance of the fraudulent debtor is too often tempted by the easy credulity of a designing creditor, while

the parochial assessment, of which, in two very populous districts of the metropolis, it is supposed, by very competent witnesses, that "full one third," or "the "larger proportion is spent at the gin-shop."

"During the first three years of the Act, that was "down to March 8, 1815. the debts amounted to “6,000,000l. and the dividends to one farthing in the "pound. It was then supposed, that this was through "the carelessness of creditors themselves, and the law 66 was amended to meet the evil: but from March 8, "1815. to March 1, 1817. the number of debtors was 66 9000, and the amount of debts nearly 9,000,000l. "He had stated the dividend to be in the former case "one farthing: he ought to have stated it the quarter of "a farthing. The effect then of the amendment was,

the trader, with a capital which is entirely nominal, or which bears no conceivable proportion to the extent of his speculations,

"that it raised this dividend to a halfpenny." Mr. Waithman's Speech, Feb. 1, 1819. in moving for accounts relating to the insolvent debtors' court, from which it appears, that "the number of insolvents' "estates, which the provisional assignee has assigned "in each year since the commencement of the Act to "assignees, appointed by the court for the relief of in"solvent debtors" was,

"There is a another species of fraud carried on at "this time to a great extent, and to the very material "injury of tradesmen, which is what is called swind"ling, practised by men by combining and confede" rating together; one plays the clerk, another the prin"cipal; one day he is a master, the next he is a ser"vant; he is a trader one day, a merchant the next; "and by thus appearing under every species of disguise, "they obtain goods from tradesmen to a very distress"ing amount, especially from young tradesmen, who "are naturally very anxious to do business: they are in "crowds, and there being actually no false pretence, the

adventures the fair fame of mercantile integrity on the distant chance of personal aggrandizement, and in his eventual failure experiences no distress, and merits no compassion; while the occurrence is too common to excite condemnation or surprise.

Hath the age or country in which these things are practised the form or the power of godliness? a love of pleasure, or a love of God? They, who in old time delivered the precepts, and exhibited the practice of true religion, would have admonished the age which concurred in these things, that "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, " and the pride of life, are not of the Fa

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ther, but of the world." They would with tears of sorrow and of shame have denounced the victims and the patrons of these vanities as "enemies of the cross of

"magistrate cannot do any thing with them, till "there is an indictment found for a conspiracy." Police Report for 1817. p. 736. Add to this, the iniquity of what are called "mock auctions," and the whole system of dealing upon bills of credit and fictitious capital.

t 1 John ii. 16.