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TRADES.SOCIETIES: THEZR OBTECTS AND POLICV. 1-
length approaching moderation. I only wish that shopmen,
clerks, and others could more readily unite in obtaining a
shortening of the houra of attendance, the length of which
duces their opportunities of improvement, rest, and relaxation
without equivalent benefit to the public. I am perfectly ready
to admit that as the power of mncbinery increases, as the
industry of the country improves generally, and wealth becomes
not only greater but more diffused, a general shortening of the
hours of labour may be one of the best objects in view and one
of the best means to further progress. An Eight Hours Bill has
b-n attemptod in America, and has been more than whispered
here, and it is iu no way an illegitimato object to keep in view.
But it must be pursued with great moderation and deliberation,
for many reasons. By reducing the productive powers of
machinery one-fifth, it would place the manufacturers of this
couut,ry at a great disadvantage compared with thoso on the
Continent,, who now possess tho best English machinery, or
other machiuory equal to it, and who cau cvon now occasionaIly
send garu into the Manchester market.
f3ut what I wish especially to point out to you is that o,
man's duty to himself after all should givs place to his duty to
his children and his wife. It is right for a man or for anyone
who works to desire to reduce his working hours from ten to
eight, but I t'hink he should abstain from doing so until his
children are put to school, and kept there till they are woll
educated and likely to do better than their parents. It will
be a happy day for England when the working-classes shall
agitate thoroughly, not for an Eight Hours BiIl, but for compulsory
education and further restrictions in the employment of
children. Our children first, ourselves after, is a policy I
should Iike to see Unions adopt; and I am glad to see that the
Trades Unionists' hsociation is not unmindful of the subject
of education in their prospectus.
In a great many instances I think that workmen are not
half careful enough of their safety and welfare. In the -8
of the coal-mines especially, I am sorry to see ths complaints
and agitation of unionists directed rather to raising the wages
a d regulating the mode of weighing the coal, ek., than to