an estate of freehold of 40s. per annum value, nor being worth in goods 10l. nor being heir to 10l. per annum, or 401. in goods; nor being a necessary or convenient servant lawfully retained; nor having a convenient farm, or holding, nor otherwise lawfully retained, shall be compelled to be retained to serve in husbandry, by the year, with any person using husbandry within the same shire. Every such person refusing to serve upon request, or covenanting to serve, and not serving; or departing from his service before the end of his term, unless for some reasonable cause to be allowed before a justice of the peace, mayor, &c. or departing at the end of his term without a quarter's warning given before two witnesses, may be committed by two justices of the peace to prison, there to remain without bail or mainprize, till he shall become bound to his master, &c. to serve, &c.* Nor shall any master in any of the arts and sciences aforesaid, retain a servant for less than a year ;† nor shall any master put away a servant retained by this act within his term, nor at the end of the term without a quarter's warning, under the penalty of 40s.‡‚ Artificers, &c. are compellable by a justice of peace, or the constable or other head officer of a township, to serve in the time of hay or corn harvest. The penalty of disobedience is imprisonment in the stocks by the space of two days and one night.§ 'Women between the age of twelve and forty, may be obliged, by two justices, to enter into service by the year, week, or day; or may be committed quousque.'|| The legislature having thus appointed what persons shall serve, have gone farther, and have directed a method of ascertaining how they shall serve; for which use principally is that excellent constitution of 5 Elizabeth,¶ That the justices of the peace, with the sheriff of the county, if he conveniently may, the mayor, &c. in towns Chap. iv. sect. 5. 6. 9. + Ib. sect. 3. Ib. sect. 28. corporate, shall yearly,, within six weeks of Easter, assemble together, and with the assistance of such discreet persons as they shall think proper to call to them, and respecting the plenty or scarcity of the time, and other circumstances, shall, within the limits of their commission, rate and appoint the wages of artificers, labourers, &c. by the year, month, week, or day, with or without meat and drink.' Then the statute enumerates several particulars, in the most explicit manner, and concludes with these general words: And for any other kind of reasonable labour and service.' These rates are appointed to be engrossed in parchment, and certified into chancery, before the twelfth day of July; and before the first day of September, several printed proclamations, containing the rates, and a command to all persons to observe them, are to be sent to the sheriff and justices, and to the mayor, &c. These proclamations are to be entered on record with the clerk of the peace, to be fixed up in the market-towns, and to be publicly proclaimed in all the markets till Michaelmas.* And if any person, after the said proclamations shall be so sent down and published, shall, by any secret ways or means, directly or indirectly, retain or keep any ser vant, workman, or labourer, or shall give any greater wages, or other commodity, contrary to the true intent of the statute, or contrary to the rates assessed, he shall forfeit 51. and be imprisoned by the space of ten days.† 'And every person who is retained, or takes any wa ges contrary to the statute, shall be imprisoned twentyone days. And every such retainer, promise, gift, and payment, or writing and bond for that purpose, are made absolutely void. 'Every justice of peace, or chief officer, who shall be absent at the rating of wages, unless the justices shall allow the reasonable, cause of his absence, forfeits 10l.'§ That this statute may, from time to time, be carefully *Chap. iv. sect. 16. Ib. sect. 19, 20.. † Ib. sect. 18. Ib. sect. 17.. 6 and diligently executed, the justices are appointed to meet twice a year, to make a special and diligent inquiry of the branches and articles of this statute, and of the good execution of the same, and severely to correct and punish any defaults; for which service they are allowed 53: per day.'* No inconsiderable allowance at that time! But all this care of the legislature proved, it seems, ineffectual; for forty years after the making this statute, we find the parliament complaining, That the said act had not, according to the meaning thereof, been duly put in execution; and that the rates of wages for poor artificers, labourers, and other persons, had not been rated and proportioned according to the politic intention of the said act.' A neglect which seems to have been occasioned by some doubts raised in Westminster-hall, concerning the persons who were the subjects of this law. For the clearing therefore any such doubt, this subsequent statute gives the justice an express power to rate the wages of any labourers, weavers, spinsters, and workmen or workwomen whatsoever, either working by the day, week, month, year, or taking any work at any person's hands^ whatsoever, to be done by the great, or otherwise.' And to render the execution of this law the more easy, the statute of James I. enacts, 1. That in all counties where general sessions are kept in several divisions, the rating wages at such respective general sessions shall be as effectual within the division, as if they had been rated at the grand general session.'§ 2. The method of certifying the rates in chancery, appearing, I apprehend, too troublesome and tedious, such certificate is made no longer necessary, but the rates being assessed and engrossed in parchment, under the hands and seals of the justices, the sheriff, or chief officer, of towns corporate, may immediately proclaim the same.'|| And whereas wool is the great staple commodity of this. + Preamble to 1 Jac. c. vi. Chap. iv. sect. 37. 38. Ib. sect. 5. Preamble to 1 Jac. c. vi. sect. 6. kingdom, and the woollen trade its principal manufacture, the parliament have given particular attention to the wages of artificers in this trade... For, 1. By the statute of James I.,* No clothier, being a justice of peace in any precinct or liberty, shall be a rater of wages for any artizan depending upon the making of cloth.' 2. Clothiers not paying so much wages to their workmen or workwomen, as are rated by the justices, forfeit 10s. for every offence.'t 3. By a late statute, All persons any wise concerned in employing any labourers in the woollen manufactory, are required to pay the full wages or price agreed on, in money, and not in goods, truck, or otherwise; nor shall they make any deduction from such wages or price, on account of any goods sold or delivered previous to such agreement. And all such wages are to be levied, on conviction, before two justices, by distress; and for want of distress, the party is to be committed for six months, or until full satisfaction is made to the party complaining. Besides which the clothier forfeits the sum of 100%.'§ 4. By the same statute, All contracts, by-laws, &c. made in unlawful clubs, by persons brought up in, or exercising the art of, a wool-comber or weaver, for regulating the said trade, settling the prices of goods, advancing wages or lessening the hours of work, are declared to be illegal and void; and any person concerned in the woollen manufactures, who shall knowingly be concerned in such contract, by-law, &c. or shall attempt to put it in execution, shall, upon conviction before two justices, suffer three months imprisonment.' But long before this act, a general law was made, ¶ to punish all conspiracies for raising'wages, limiting hours of work, &c. among artificers, workmen, and labourers; and if such conspiracy was to extend to a general advance of wages all over the kingdom, any insurrection of a number *Ib. sect. 7. 12 Geo. I. c. xxxiv. sect. 3. + Ib. sect. 7. ¡ Ib. sect. 4. T 2 & 3 E. VI. c. xv. of persons, in consequence of it, would be an overt act of high treason. From this cursory view it appears, I think, that no blame lies at the door of the legislature, which hath not only given the magistrate, but even private persons, with his assistance, a power of compelling the poor to work ; and, 2dly, hath allotted the fullest power, and prescribed the most effectual means for ascertaining and limiting the price of their labour. But so very faulty and remiss hath been the execution of these laws, that an incredulous reader may almost doubt whether there are really any such existing. Particularly as to that which relates to the rating the wages of labourers; a law which at first, it seems, was too carelessly executed, and which hath since grown into utter neglect and disuse. Hath this total disuse arisen, in common with the neglect of other wholesome provisions, for want of due attention to the public good? or is the execution of this law attended with any extraordinary difficulty ? or, lastly, are we really grown, as Sir Josiah Child says, wiser than our forefathers, and have discovered any fault in the constitution itself; and that to retrench the price of labour by a law is an error in policy? This last, seems to me I own, to be very strange doctrine, and somewhat of a paradox in politics; however, as it is the sentiment of a truly wise and great man, it deserves a fair discussion. Such I will endeavour to give it; since no man is more inclined to respect the opinions of such persons, and as the revival of the law which he opposes, is, I think, absolutely necessary to the purpose I am contending for. I will give the passage from Sir Josiah at length. It is in answer to this position, That the dearness of wages spoils the English trade. Here,' says he, 'the author propounds the making a law to retrench the hire of poor men's labour (an honest charitable project, and well becoming an usurer!) the answer to this is easy. First, Į |