[Sidenote: Satire on recent legislation and the statutes of labourers.]
It is impossible not to recognise that the recent statutes of labourers was the target against which More's satire was specially directed, in the following paragraph:--
[Sidenote: Injustice to the labouring classes.]
'Let any one dare to compare with the even justice which rules in Utopia, the justice of other nations; amongst whom, let me die, if I find any trace at all of equity and justice. For where is the justice, that noblemen, goldsmiths, and usurers, and those classes who either do nothing at all, or, in what they do, are of no great service to the commonwealth, should live a genteel and splendid life in idleness or unproductive labour; whilst in the meantime the servant, the waggoner, the mechanic, and the peasant, toiling almost longer and harder than the horse, in labour so necessary that no commonwealth could endure a year without it, lead a life so wretched that the condition of the horse seems more to be envied; his labour being less constant, his food more delicious to his palate, and his mind disturbed by no fears for the future?...
'Is not that republic unjust and ungrateful which confers such benefits upon the gentry (as they are called) and goldsmiths and others of that class, whilst it cares to do nothing at all for the benefit of peasants, colliers, servants, waggoners, and mechanics, without which no republic could exist? Is not that republic unjust which, after these men have spent the springtime of their lives in labour, have become burdened with age and disease, and are in want of every comfort, unmindful of all their toil, and forgetful of all their services, rewards them only by a miserable death?
[Sidenote: Modern governments a conspiracy of the rich against the poor.]
'Worse than all, the rich constantly endeavour to pare away something further from the daily wages of the poor, by private fraud, _and even by public laws_, so that the already existing injustice (that those from whom the republic derives the most benefit should receive the least reward), is made still more unjust _through the enactments of public law_! Thus, after careful reflection, it seems to me, as I hope for mercy, that our modern republics are nothing but a conspiracy of the rich, pursuing their own selfish interests under the name of a republic. They devise and invent all ways and means whereby they may, in the first place, secure to themselves the possession of what they have amassed by evil means; and, in the second place, secure to their own use and profit the work and labour of the poor at the lowest possible price. And so soon as the rich, in the name of the public (_i.e._ even in the name of the poor), choose to decide that these schemes shall be adopted, then they become _law_!'[559]