The maxim, that men may safely be left to seek their own interest, and
are sure to find it, appears to require some slight qualification, for
nothing can be more certain, than that men are often the better of
things which have been forced upon them. Those who advocate the idea
in its rigour, forget that there are such things as ignorance and
prejudice in the world, and that most men only become or continue
actively industrious under the pressure of necessity. The vast
advantages derived from railway communication afford a ready instance
of people being benefited against their will. At the bare proposal to
run a line through their lands, many proprietors were thrown into a
frenzy of antagonism; and whole towns petitioned that they might not
be contaminated with the odious thing. In spite of remonstrances, and
at a vast cost, railways were made; and we should like to know where
opponents are now to be found. Demented land-proprietors are come to
their senses; and even recalcitrant Oxford is glad of a line to
itself.
Cases of this kind suggest the curious consideration, that many
remarkable benefits now experienced were never sought for or
contemplated by the persons enjoying them, but came from another
quarter, and were at first only grudgingly submitted to. A singular
example happens to call our attention. There is a distillery in the
west of Scotland, where it has been found convenient to establish a
dairy upon a large scale, for the purpose of consuming the refuse of
the grain. Seven hundred cows are kept there; and a profitable market
is found for their milk in the city of Glasgow. That the refuse of the
cow-houses might be applied to a profitable purpose, a large farm was
added to the concern, though of such land as an amateur agriculturist
would never have selected for his experiments. Thus there was a
complete system of economy at this distillery: a dairy to convert the
draff into milk, and a farm to insure that the soil from the cows
might be used upon the spot. But, as is so generally seen in this
country, the liquid part of the refuse from the cow-houses was
neglected. It was allowed to run into a neighbouring canal; and the
proprietors would have been contented to see it so disposed of for
ever, if that could have been permitted. It was found, however, to be
a nuisance, the very fishes being poisoned by it. The proprietors of
the canal threatened an action for the protection of their property,
and the conductors of the dairy were forced to bethink them of some
plan by which they should be enabled to dispose of the noxious matter
without injury to their neighbours. They could at first hit upon no
other than that of carting away the liquid to the fields, and there
spreading it out as manure. No doubt, they expected some benefit from
this procedure; and, had they expected much, they might never have
given the canal company any trouble. But the fact is, they expected so
little benefit, that they would never have willingly taken the trouble
of employing their carts for any such purpose. To their surprise, the
benefit was such as to make their lean land superior in productiveness
to any in the country. They were speedily encouraged to make
arrangements at some expense for allowing the manure in a diluted form
to flow by a regular system of irrigation over their fields. The
original production has thus been _increased fourfold_. The company,
finding no other manure necessary, now dispose of the solid kind
arising from the dairy, among the neighbouring farmers who still
follow the old arrangements in the management of their cows. The sum
of L.600 is thus yearly gained by the company, being not much less
than the rent of the farm. If to this we add the value of the extra
produce arising from the land, we shall have some idea of the
advantage derived by this company from having been put under a little
compulsion.
An instance, perhaps even more striking, was supplied a few years ago
by certain chemical works which vented fumes noxious to a whole
neighbourhood. Being prosecuted for the nuisance, the proprietors were
forced to make flues of great length, through which the fumes might be
conducted to a considerable distance. The consequence was surprising.
A new kind of deposit was formed in the interior of the flues, and
from this a large profit was derived. The sweeping of a chimney would
sometimes produce several thousand pounds. At the same time, nothing
can be more certain than that this material, but for the threat of
prosecution, would have been allowed to continue poisoning the
neighbourhood, and, consequently, not yielding one penny to the
proprietors of the works.[1]
It has pleased Providence to order that from all the forms of organic
life there shall arise a refuse which is offensive to our senses, and
injurious to health, but calculated, under certain circumstances, to
prove highly beneficial to us. The offensiveness and noxiousness look
very much like a direct command from the Author of Nature, to do that
which shall turn the refuse to a good account--namely, to bury it in
the earth. Yet, from sloth and negligence, it is often allowed to
cumber the surface, and there do its evil work instead. An important
principle is thus instanced--the essential identity of Nuisance and
Waste. Nearly all the physical annoyances we are subjected to, and
nearly all the influences that are operating actively for our hurt,
are simply the exponents of some chemical solecism, which we are,
through ignorance or indifference, committing or permitting. There is
here a double evil--a positive and a negative. When the Londoner
groans at the smokiness of his streets, and the particles of soot he
finds spread over his shirt, his toilet-table, and every nice article
of furniture he possesses, he has the additional vexation of knowing,
that the smoke and soot should have been serving a useful purpose as
fuel. When he passes by a railway over the tops of the houses in some
mean suburb, and looks down with horror and disgust on the pools and
heaps of filth which are allowed to encumber the yards, courts, and
narrow streets of these localities, to the destruction of the health
of the inhabitants, he has a second consideration before him, that all
these matters ought to be in the care of some easy-acting system, by
which, removed to the fields, they should be helping to create the
means of life, instead of death. We never can look upon a great
factory chimney pouring forth its thick column of smoke, without a
twin grief--for the disgust it creates, and the good that is lost by
it. Properly, that volatile fuel should be doing duty in the furnace,
and effecting a saving to the manufacturer, instead of rendering him
and his concerns a nuisance to all within five miles.
Troublesome as these nuisances are, there is such an inaptitude to new
plans, that they might go on for ever, if an interference should not
come in from some external quarter. It matters little whence the
interference comes, so that the end be effected. We cannot, however,
view the proceedings of a Board of Health in ordering cleanly
arrangements, or those of a municipal council putting down factory
smoke, without great interest, for we think we there see part, and an
important one too, of the great battle of Civilisation against
Barbarism. And this interest is deepened when we observe the benefits
which Barbarism usually derives from its own defeats. The
factory-owner, for instance, will find that, in applying an apparatus
by which smoke may be prevented, he will not merely be sparing his
neighbours a great annoyance, but economising fuel to an extent which
must more than repay the outlay. By repressing nuisance, he will be in
the same measure repressing waste.[2] Were there, in like manner, a
general measure for enforcing the removal of refuse from the
neighbourhood of human habitations, the rate-payers would in due time
see blessed effects from the compulsion to which they had been
subjected. Their groans would be succeeded by gladness, and they would
thank the legislators who had slighted their remonstrances. When the
cholera approached in 1849, our British Board of Health ordered a
general cleaning out of stables, and a daily persistence in the
practice. It was complained of as a great hardship; but the Board
ascertained that owners of valuable race-horses cause their stables to
be thoroughly cleaned daily, as a practice necessary for the health of
the animals; the Board, therefore, very properly insisted on forcing
this benefit upon the proprietors of horses generally. Can we doubt
that a similar policy might be followed with the like good
consequences at all times, and with regard to the habitations of men
as well as horses?
It would thus appear, that men may really be allowed a too undisturbed
repose in their views and maxims, and, if always left to seek their
own interests, would often fail to find the way. If, indeed, it were
true that men are sure to find out their own interest, no country
should be behind another in any of the processes or arts necessary for
the sustenance and comfort of the people; whereas we know the contrary
to be the case. If it were true, there should be no class in our own
country willing to sit down with the dubious benefits of monopoly,
instead of pushing on for the certain results of enlightened
competition. It could only be true at the expense of the old proverb,
that necessity is the mother of invention; for do we not every day see
men submitting idly and languidly to evils which can just be borne?
whereas, if these were a little greater, and therefore insupportable,
they would at once be remedied. An impulse _ab extra_ seems in a vast
number of instances to be necessary, to promote the good of both
nations and individuals. Now, whether this shall come in the ordinary
course of things, and be recognised as necessity, or from an
enlightened power having a certain end, generally beneficial, in view,
does not appear to be of much consequence, provided only we can be
tolerably well assured against the abuses to which all power is
liable. It may be well worthy of consideration, whether, in this
country, we have not carried the principle of _Laissez faire_, or
_leave us alone_, a little too far in certain matters, where some
gentle coercion would have been more likely to benefit all concerned.