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Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 15, Issue 779, 18 April 1870, Page 4

WHAT CONSTITUTES A COMFORTABLE HOME. Mr John Bright, in a speech delivered by him at the Birmingham Town Hall on the 11th of January, wound up in the following vigorous and eloquent words: —"It is a fact which every man should consider — and I have considered it often and often with great solemnity, and even with much pain during the thirty years that I have been in the habit of discussing public questions —it is a fact that no Government, that no Administration, that no laws, that uo amount of industry or commerce, that no extent of freedom can give prosperity and solid comfort to the homes of the people unless there be in those homes economy, temperance, and the practice of virtue. This which I am preaching is needful for all, but it is specially needful —most needful in some those whose possessions are the least abundant and the least secure. If we could subtract from the ignorance, the poverty, the suffering, the sickness, and the crime, which are now witnessed among us, the ignorance, the poverty, the suffering, the sickness, and crime which are caused by one single but most prevalent bad habit or drinking needlessly of that which destroys body a ad mind, and home and family—do we nor all feel that this country would "tee cM"ged? mi m changed for the

better, that it would be almost impossible for us to know it again ? Let me then, in conclusion, say what is upon my heart to say, what I know to be true, what I have felt every hour of my life when I have been discussing great questions affecting the condition of the working classes, let me say this to all people—that it is by the combination of a wise government and a virtuous people, and not otherwise, that we may hope to make some step towards that blessed time when there shall be no longer complaining in our streets, when our garners shall be full, affording all manner of store."