THE DOCTRINE OF PROFITABLE EMPLOYMENT

The social and economic dislocation ensuing upon the war naturally manifested itself in certain areas in the form of unemployment. Legislative steps were presently taken to facilitate the reabsorption into industry of men whose war service had interrupted their term of apprenticeship, but the old industrial system was itself breaking down in face of the demands made by rapidly expanding trade: the beginnings of a laissez faire attitude were already evident both in the newer doctrines of certain contemporary pamphleteers and in the practical breaches of restrictive commercial and industrial regulations, everywhere apparent notwithstanding the attempts of municipalities, gilds and companies to reassert control. The fear of Dutch rivalry, moreover, pervaded economic life no less than political, and the resulting demand for cheap home production favoured low wages and stimulated the desire to employ pauper labour profitably to the nation. “The general leprosie of our piping, potting, feasting fashions, and mis-spending of our time in idleness and pleasure”, had been deplored by such writers as Thomas Mun in the'thirties of the century. “The poverty and misery of this Kingdome” were due, in the opinion of a converted highwayman of the' forties, to “Sodom's sin of Idleness”, for which the creation of workhouses “in all cities, market-towns and able parishes” was the prescribed remedy.