131. (2d.) In employing all the muscular power at our disposal we are to
make the employments we choose as educational as possible; for a
wholesome human employment is the first and best method of education,
mental as well as bodily. A man taught to plough, row, or steer well,
and a woman taught to cook properly, and make a dress neatly, are already
educated in many essential moral habits. Labor considered as a
discipline has hitherto been thought of only for criminals; but the real
and noblest function of labor is to prevent crime, and not to be
Reformatory, but Formatory.
132. The third great principle of employment is, that whenever there is
pressure of poverty to be met, all enforced occupation should be directed
to the production of useful articles only; that is to say, of food, of
simple clothing, of lodging, or of the means of conveying, distributing,
and preserving these. It is yet little understood by economists, and not
at all by the public, that the employment of persons in a useless
business cannot relieve ultimate distress. The money given to employ
riband-makers at Coventry is merely so much money withdrawn from what
would have employed lace-makers at Honiton; or makers of something else,
as useless, elsewhere.
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