An Enquiry into the Causes of the late Increase of Robbers/Section 1

by Henry Fielding

SECT. I

Of too frequent and expensive Diversions among the Lower Kind of People.

First then, I think that the vast Torrent of Luxury which of late Years hath poured itself into this Nation, hath greatly contributed to produce, among many others, the Mischief I here complain of. I am not here to satirize the Great, among who Luxury is probably rather a moral than a political Evil. But Vices no more than Diseases will stop with them; for bad Habits are as infectious by Example, as the Plague itself by Contact. In free Countries, at least, it is a Branch of Liberty claimed by the People to be as wicked and as profligate as their Superiors. Thus while the Nobleman will emulate the Grandeur of a Prince; and the Gentleman will aspire to the proper State of the Nobleman; the Tradesman steps from behind his Counter into the vacant Place of the Gentleman, Nor doth the Confusion end here: It reaches the very Dregs of the People, who aspiring still to a Degree beyond that which belongs to them, and not being able by the Fruits of honest Labour to support the State which they affect, they disdain the Wages to which their Industry would entitle them; and abandoning themselves to Idleness, the more simple and poor-spirited betake themselves to a State of Starving and Beggary, while those of more Art and Courage become Thieves, Sharpers, and Robbers.

Could Luxury be confined to the Palaces of the Great, the Society would not perhaps be much affected with it; at least, the Mischiefs, which I am now intending to obviate can never be the Consequence. For tho', perhaps, there is not more of real Virtue in the higher State, yet the Sense of Honour is there more general and prevalent. But there is a much stronger Reason. The Means bear no Proportion to the End: For the Loss of Thousands, or of a great Estate, is not to be relieved or supplied by any Means of common Theft or Robbery. With regard to such Evils therefore the Legislature might be justified in leaving the Punishment, as well as the pernicious Consequences, to end in the Misery, Distress, and sometimes utter Ruin of a private Family. But when this Vice descends downward to the Tradesman, the Mechanic, and the Labourer, it is certain to engender many political Mischiefs, and, among the rest, it is most evidently the Parent of Theft and Robbery, to which not only the Motive of Want but of Shame conduces: For there is no greater Degree of Shame than the Tradesman generally feels at the first Inability to make his regular Payments; nor is there any Difficulty which he would not undergo to avoid it. Here then the Highway promises; and hath, I doubt not, often given Relief. Nay, I remember very lately a Highwayman who confessed several Robberies before me, his Motive to which, he assured me, (and so it appeared) was to pay a Bill that was shortly to become due. In this Case therefore the Public becomes interested, and consequently the Legislature is obliged to interpose.

To give a final Blow to Luxury by any general Prohibition, if it would be advisable, is by no means possible. To say the Truth, bad Habits in the Body Politic, especially if of any Duration, are seldom to be wholly eradicated. Palliatives alone are to be applied; and these too in a free Constitution must be of the gentlest Kind, and as much as possible adapted to the Taste and Genius of the People.

The gentlest Method which I know, and at the same Time perhaps one of the most effectual, of stopping the Progress of Vice, is by removing the Temptation. Now the two great Motives to Luxury, in the Mind of Man, are Vanity and Voluptuousness. The former of these operates but little in this Regard with the lower Order of People. I do not mean that they have less of this Passion than their Betters; but the apparent Impossibility of gratifying it this Way deters them, and diverts at least this Passion into another Channel; for we find it puts them rather on vying with each other in the Reputation of Wealth, than in the outward Appearance of Show and Grandeur. Voluptuousness or the Love of Pleasure is that alone which leads them into Luxury. Here then the Temptation is with all possible Care to be withdrawn from them.

Now what greater Temptation can there be to Voluptuousness, than a Place where every Sense and Appetite of which it is compounded, are fed and delighted; where the Eyes are feasted with Show, and the Ears with Music, and where Gluttony and Drunkenness are allured by every Kind of Dainty; nay where the finest Women are exposed to View, and where the meanest Person who can dress himself clean, may in some degree mix with his Betters, and thus perhaps satisfy his Vanity as well as his Love of Pleasure?

It may possibly be said that these Diversions are cheap: I answer, that is one Objection I have to them: Was the Price as high as that of a Ridotto, or an Opera, it would, like these Diversions, be confined to the higher People only; besides the Cheapness is really a Delusion. Unthinking Men are often deceived into Expence, as I once knew an honest Gentleman who carried his Wife and two Daughters to a Masquerade, being told that he could have four Tickets for four Guineas; but found afterwards, that in Dresses, Masques, Chairs, &c. the Night's Entertainment cost him almost Twelve. I am convinced, that many thousands of honest Tradesmen have found their Expences exceed their Computation in a much greater Proportion. And the Sum of seven or eight Shillings (which is a very moderate Allowance for the Entertainment of the smallest Family) repeated once or twice a Week thruogh a Summer, will make too large a Deduction from the reasonable Profits of any low Mechanic.

Besides the actual Expence in attending these Places of Pleasure, the Loss of Time and Neglect of Business are Consequences which the inferior Tradesman can by no means support. To be born for no other Purpose than to consume the Fruits of the Earth is the Privilege (if it may be called a Privilege) of very few. The greater Part of Mankind must sweat hard to Produce them, or Society will no longer answer the Purposes for which it was ordained. Six Days shalt thou labour, was the positive Command of God in his own Republic. A Severity, however, which the Divine Wisdom was pleased somewhat to relax; and appointed certain Times of Rest and Recreation for his People. Such were the Feast of the unleavened Bread, the Feast of the Weeks, and the Feast of the Tabernacles. On which Occasions it is written, Thou shalt rejoice before the Lord thy God, thou and thy Son and thy Daughter, and thy Servant, and thy Maid, and the Levite that is within thy Gates, and the Stranger, and the Fatherless, and the Widow^[1].

All other Nations have imitated this divine Institution. It is true that among the Greeks, arising from the Nature of their Superstition, there were many Festivals; yet scarce any of these were universal, and few attended with any other than religious Ceremonies^[2]. The Roman Calendar is thinner strewed with these Seasons of Idleness. Indeed there seems to have been one only Kind of universal Sport and Revelling amongst them, which they called the Saturnalia, when much too great Indulgence was given to all Kinds of Licentiousness. Public Scenes of Rendezvous they had none. As to the Grecian Women, it is well known they were almost entirely confined to their own Houses; where the very Entertainment of their finest Ladies was only Works of the finer Sort. And the Romans, by the Orchian Law, which was made among many others for the Suppression of Luxury, and was published in the third Year of Cato's Censorship, thought proper to limit the Number of Persons who were to assemble even at any private Feast^[3]. Nay the Exhibitions of the Theatre were suffered only at particular Seasons, and on Holydays.

Nor are our own Laws silent on this Head, with Regard at least to the lower Sort of People, whose Diversions have been confined to certain stated Times. Mr. Pulton^[4] speaking of those Games and Assemblies of the People which are lawful, says, that they are lawful at certain Places and Seasons of the Year, allowed by old and ancient Customs. The Statute of Hen. VIII.^[5] goes farther, and expressly enacts, that no Manner of Artificer or Craftsman of any Handicraft or Occupation, Husbandman, Apprentice, &c. shall play at the Tables, Tennis, Dice, Cards, Bowls, &c. out of Christmas under the Penalty of 20s.

Thus we find that by divine as well as human Institution, as well by our own Laws as those of other Countries, the Diversions of the People have been limited and restrained to certain Seasons: Under which Limitations, Seneca calls these Diversions the necessary Temperament of Labour. 'Some Remission, says he, must be given to our Minds, which will spring up the better, and more brisk from Rest. It is with the Mind as with a fruitful Field, whose Fertility will be exhausted if we give it no Intermission. The same will accrue to the Mind by incessant Labours, whereas both from gentle Remission will acquire Strength. From constant Labour arises a certain Dulness and Langour of the Spirits; nor would Men with such Eagerness affect them, if Sport and Merriment had not a natural Sweetness inherent in themselves; the frequent Use of which however will destroy all Gravity and Force in our Minds. Sleep is necessary to our Refreshment, but if this be continued Night and Day, it will become Death. There is a great Difference between the Remission of any Thing and its Dissolution. Lawgivers, therefore, instituted certain Holydays, that the People might be compelled by Law to Merriment, interposing this as a necessary Temperament to their Labours^[6].'

Thus the Greek and Latin Philosopher, tho' they derive the Institution differently, the one alledging a divine and the other a human Original, both agree that a necessary Relaxation from Labour was the only End for which Diversion was invented and allowed to the People. This Institution, as the former of these great Writers tell us, was grosly perverted even in his Time; but surely neither then, nor in any Age or Nation, until now, was this Perversion carried to so scandalous an Excess as it is at present in this Kingdom, and especially in and near the Metropolis, where the Places of Pleasure are almost become numberless: for besides those great Scenes of Rendezvous, where the Nobleman and his Taylor, the Lady of Quality and her Tirewoman, meet together and form one common Assembly, what an immense Variety of Places have this Town and its Neighbourhood set apart for the Amusement of the lowest Order of the People; and where the Master of the House, or Wells, or Garden, may be said to angle only in the Kennels, where baiting with the vilest Materials, he catches only the thoughtless and tasteless Rabble. And these are carried on, not on a single Day, or in a single Week; but all of them during half, and some during the whole Year.

If a Computation was made of the Money expended in these Temples of Idleness by the Artificer, the Handicraft, the Apprentice, and even the common Labourer, the Sum would appear excessive; but without putting myself to that Trouble, I believe the Reader will permit me to conclude that it is much greater than such Persons can or ought to afford; especially as Idleness, its necessary Attendant, adds greatly to the Debtor's Side in the Account; and that the necessary Consequence must be Ruin to many, who from being useful Members of the Society will become a heavy Burden or absolute Nuisance to the Public. It being indeed a certain Method to fill the Streets with Beggars, and the Goals with Debtors and Thieves.

That this Branch of Luxury hath grown to its present Height, is owing partly to a Defect in the Laws; and this Defect may, with great Decency and Respect to the Legislature, be very truly imputed to the Recency of the Evil; for as our Ancestors knew it not, they may well be excused for not having foreseen and guarded against it. If therefore it should seem now necessary to be retrenched, a new Law will, I apprehend, be necessary for that Purpose; the Powers of the Magistrate being scarce extensive enough, under any Provision extant, to destroy a Hydra now become so pregnant and dangerous. And it would be too dangerous as well as too invidious a Task to oppose the mad Humours of the Populace, by the Force of any doubtful obsolete Law; which, as I have hinted before, could not have been directly levelled at a Vice which did not exist at the Time when the Law was made.

But while I am recommending some Restraint of this Branch of Luxury, which surely appears to be necessary, I would be understood to aim at the Retrenchment only, not at the Extirpation of Diversion; nay, and in this Restraint, I confine myself entirely to the lower Order of People. Pleasure always hath been, and always will be, the principal Business of Persons of Fashion and Fortune, and more especially of the Ladies, for whom I have infinitely too great an Honour and Respect to rob them of any their least Amusement. Let them have their Plays, Operas, and Oratorios, their Masquerades and Ridottos; their Assemblies, Drums, Routs, Riots, and Hurricans; their Ranelagh and Vauxhall; their Bath, Tunbridge, Bristol, Scarborough, and Cheltenham; and let them have their Beaus and Danglers to attend them at all these; it is the only Use for which such Beaus are fit; and I have seen in the Course of my Life, that it is the only one to which by sensible Women they are applied.

In Diversion, as in many other Particulars, the upper Part of Life is distinguished from the Lower. Let the Great therefore answer for the Employment of their Time, to themselves, or to their spiritual Governors. The Society will receive some temporal Advantage from their Luxury. The more Toys which Children of all Ages consume, the brisker will be the Circulation of Money, and the greater the Increase of Trade.

The Business of the Politician is only to prevent the Contagion fro spreading to the useful Part of Mankind, the ΕΠΙΠΟΝΟΝ ΠΕΦΥΚΟΣ ΓΕΝΟΣ^[7]; and this is the Business of Persons of Fashion and Fortune too, in order that the Labour and Industry of the rest may administer to their Pleasures, and furnish them with the Means of Luxury. To the upper Part of Mankind Time is an Enemy, and (as they themselves often confess) their chief Labour is to kill it; whereas, with the others, Time and Money are almost synonymous; and as they have very little of each to spare, it becomes the Legislature, as much as possible, to suppress all Temptations whereby they may be induced too profusely to squander either the one or the other; since all such Profusion must be repaid at the Cost of the Public.

Such Places of Pleasure, therefore, as are totally set apart for the Use of the Great World, I meddle not with. And though Ranelagh and Vauxhall, by reason of their Price, are not entirely appropriated to the People of Fashion, yet they are seldom frequented by any below the middle Rank; and a strict Regard to Decency is preserved in them both. But surely two such Places are sufficient to contain all those who have any Title to spend their Time in this idle, though otherwise innocent Way. Nor should such a Fashion be allowed to spread into every Village round London, and by Degrees all over the Kingdom; by which means, not only Idleness, but all Kinds of Immorality, will be encouraged.

I cannot dismiss this Head, without mentioning a notorious Nuisance which hath lately arisen in this Town; I mean, those Balls where Men and Women of loose Reputation meet in disguised Habits. As to the Masquerade in the Hay-market, I have nothing to say; I really think it a silly rather than a vicious Entertainment: But the Case is very different with these inferior Masquerades; for these are indeed no other than the Temples of Drunkenness, Leudness, and all Kind of Debauchery.

Notes

1. Exod. Chap. xxxiv. Deut. Chap. xvi.
2. The Gods, says Plato, pitying the laborious Condition to which Men were born, appointed holy Rites to themselves, as Seasons of Rest to Men; and gave them the Muses, with Apollo their Leader, and Bacchus, to assist in the Celebrations, &c. De Leg. I. ii. p. 787. Edit. Ficini.
3. Macrob. Saturnalia, lib. 2. c. 13. Note, This Riot Act passed in one of the freest Ages of the Roman Republic.
4. De Pace, fol. 25.
5. 33 Hen. VIII. c. ix.
6. Sen. De Tranquill. Animi, p. 167. Ed. Lipf.
7. Plato.