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times. It is an indication of the sad prevalence of a spirit of selfishness among us, when men and women who have power to enforce their wishes, are so ready to sacrifice the highest interests of others merely to gratify a whim of their own.

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The fourth commandment and the whole spirit of Christianity require us to do our very utmost to allow every one connected with us the full enjoyment of the day of rest. Before a master detains a servant from church; before one hires a cabman on a Sunday; before one asks the servants of a cemetery, or one's neighbours and friends, to attend at a funeral on that day-let the question be asked of conscience, Is this really necessary? Am I justified in breaking in on the Sabbath of these people? Am I doing to others what I would have them to do for me? We never yet met with the man who did not count it a hardship and an evil to be required to work on the Lord's day, except in a case of necessity clear and strong. Ask the sailors who never get a Sunday on shore-ask railway servants-ask gravediggers, or cabmen, or brewers, or bakers, or any class of men who are required to work on the Sunday; with one voice they will say, It is a hardship and an evil. It is a golden rule, "Do unto others as ye would that they should do to you." Ask no man to give up his Sunday, or part of his

Sunday, to you, unless you would be ready to give up the same to him. The first commandment of the law is, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart;" and the second is like unto it, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." No man loves his neighbour as himself who deprives him of his Sunday, but refuses to surrender his own.

In conclusion, we cannot express a better wish for our working friends, than that they may all know, in the highest sense, the blessings of a holy Sabbath. As often as it returns, may it carry their thoughts back to a risen Saviour, a completed redemption, the conquest of death, and the spoiling of the grave; may it carry them forward to a joyful resurrection, and an eternal life, to be spent amid the rest that remaineth for the people of God!

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INTRODUCTION.

THE object of the following pages is to furnish information likely to be useful to that numerous and increasing body of persons, especially among those commonly called the working classes, who, at the present day, are turning their attention to Co-operation, as an approved means for promoting the permanent welfare of themselves and their posterity.

It contains a concise, but I believe intelligible, and complete statement of the law relating to the formation of Companies of Limited Liability, and of so much of the law relating to their dissolution, as it is desirable that the members should generally know, together with model rules for the constitution of such companies.*

Companies of this description offer, in my opinion, the best instrument in existence for enabling Co-operators to effect their objects; a point on which I am desirous of insisting, because some zealous Co-operators feel, as I am told, a dislike to constitute themselves into a joint-stock company at all, considering this form of union to be fit only for persons who desire to grow rich by other men's labour; and prefer to form Industrial or Provident Societies, as being institutions of a more truly co-operative character. I do not blame their feeling, but I believe their conclusions to be mistaken. A Limited Liability Company is a very different kind of thing from the old Joint-Stock company. Its very aspect has a more social character. In law it is, in the fullest sense, a 66 body corporate." This name calls up the thought of an intimate union of different members, of which none can do its part without the help of the others, a thought pre-eminently social. And the thing completely answers to its name.

The old joint-stock company was costly to form. When formed it was dangerous to deal with; for if its affairs went on ill, its members were liable to find all their property swallowed up in a gulf of bankruptcy, of which they had no power to steer clear. Then it was entirely a trading association. That valuable social right, the right to hold land as the common property of its members, it did not possess, except by the special licence of the Board of Trade, but was driven, if it wanted to acquire land, to employ a cumbrous and expensive machinery of trustees.

All these disadvantages are removed by the present law. 1st. As to the expense. The cost of the formation of a company, whose capital is not above £1,000, omitting the expense of preparing its rules, is as follows:

Registration Fee, and Articles of Association
Stamps, necessary.....

probable (dependent on the length of the rules)...

£ s. d.
5 5
3 10 0
10 0

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* At present the law is spread over more than one Act of Parliament, a circumstance which does not alter its value, though it makes such a collective view of its provisions as is presented in these pages, the more necessary. A bill for the consolidation of the provisions of the law was introduced this year by the Government, and passed by the House of Lords, though from the pressure of other business it was withdrawn in the Commons. The Government have announced their intention of introducing a similar measure next year, when it will probably become law. But the consolidation, though very convenient to lawyers, will not dispense with the need of a statement, exhibiting in a condensed form the provisions important to be known by those who would form or manage a living company, separated from such as are important only to those who have the melancholy duty of burying dead ones.

INTRODUCTION.

The registration fee increases with the amount of the capital, at a rate stated in the summary, clause 5. But the increase is so moderate, that the fee on a company whose capital is £10,000, is only £7 10s.; and that on one whose capital is £25,000, only £10. 2nd. As to liability. Each member can limit his risk to the amount which he agrees to put into the Company. And this he can do, because he is considered as so completely part of the body, that its debts cannot be treated as his debts. So that the only debt which he can be required to pay, is the debt which he has voluntarily taken upon himself when he became a member, the engagement to pay his share, contracted by him towards his brother members. 3rd. As to property. All property of the Company vests in it as a body corporate, that is in all the members for the time being, not in any one particularly; and since the legislature has put no restriction on this right, the company can hold houses or lands in its own name without any resort to trustees, as it can sue in its own name for any debt due to it. 4th. In order to facilitate commercial transactions, the Legislature has provided that such a company may bind itself, without using its common seal, by writings signed by its proper officer, or by the verbal agreement of such an officer, in every case where an individual can bind himself at law, either by a writing not under seal, or by a verbal engagement without writing.

Thus a limited company possesses a constitution, in its nature at once eminently social and well adapted for business; and in all these respects, excepting the cost of registration, it is very superior to an Industrial or Provident Society. Its superiority is yet more apparent in the considerations next to be noticed.

A limited company is able to unite two objects, which in an Industrial or Provident Society are scarcely reconcileable. It can do justice as between its members, and all those with whom they have to deal, either as work people or as customers, and by the same operation it can do what is pre-eminently conducive to its own prosperity.

To do justice as between employers and employed, and as between sellers and buyers, is the foundation stone of Co-operation. Co-operation has no real meaning if this idea be excluded from it. To speak of it as if it resolved itself into men clubbing together to set themselves to work, or to supply their own wants, is quite to miss the deep root of principle lying in it; though, no doubt, it has a tendency to produce these results. Now, to do justice as between employer and employed, or as between buyer and seller, means to prevent either side from taking advantage of the other. This is the office of Justice; she steps between opposed interests, and holds the scales evenly to weigh their claims; she will not allow either party to make the balance turn on his side.

First, let us take the case of employers and employed. They are parties whose interests are directly opposed. It is the selfish interest of the employer to get as much work done, and pay as little for it as possible. It is the selfish interest of the employed to get as much pay and do as little for it as may be. How are these conflicting interests to be reconciled? The melancholy answer commonly given at the present day is by the strength of the two parties. "Let them fight it out;" not, indeed, with clubs or swords; that is a rough old way of settling such questions, unsuited to our broadcloth generation, with its blue-coated "peelers;" but with weapons which hit quite as hard, and cut full as sharp, weapons which bring poverty into quiet homes, and disease and death into starving families; with "Strikes" and "Locks-out;" unions to dictate to employer, and unions to dictate to employed; both alike false in principle, and neither affording any hope of permanently removing the cause of quarrel.

Here it is that Co-operation comes in, to ask of Justice for some way out of this miserable waste of strife. And Justice, as is her wont, demands before

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