A Wheen Thochts.

Southern Cross, Volume 2, Issue 12, 23 June 1894, Page 7

A Wheen Thochts.

(By Scotch Thistle.) THE OPENING OF PARLIAM E N T. THE BORROWING QUESTION. COUNTRY LABOURERS. The sun rises in hope, and sets in disappointment. In the glory of youth we would reform the world ; in the experience of age we would fain know how to reform self. The years come, and the years go; and each generation finds (like the lost tribes) that what they seek lies still beyond. The human race is great in its desire to reform all iniquity, but alas ! it has equal zeal in the forming of that article. The rich enjoy while the poor sweat, and the poor man laughs while the rich curse; the rogue becomes rich, while honesty remains poor, while honesty springs from riches, and roguery advertises poverty; a lie may wear the mask of truth, while truth often appears a mass of lying contradictions; we hate most part of that which we love most, and we love most part of that which we hate most. If we would expend the same reforming zeal on self that we are anxions to expend on others, the millenium would be an accomplished fact.

The leading horses in the team of reform are again settling to work; let us pray that their confabbing will produce more than the usual rattling of dry bones. I suppose it will he throwing water on a drowned cat for me to offer any suggestions, nevertheless I feel it a patriotic duty to advise them. In the first place, let fair play and justice guide them to their conclusions ; and if Money Bags advises them that it would be expedient to vote in a certain direction, let them he patriotic enough to tell Money Bags to go to His Satanic Majesty. Let them rush to glory or the grave beneath the standard of “Ho more Borrowing.” Let them remember the advice of their chief who weaned us from our servile dependence on the money market; and| let them refrain from further wallowing in the mire. What use is there in borrowing money to make roads and railways when there are thousands and thousands of acres lying within convenient distance of roads and railways already formed being held for speculating purposes mainly, and little or no public benefit being derived from them. When the house we have built and supplied with all modern improvements has a few more tenants, it will be time enough to add another wing. In the meantime the accommodation is a little more than ample.

When the eight hours bill and the holiday bill come up for judgment I would recommend members to remember, that country toilers are not out of the pale of civilisation, and to bestow whatever privilege there is in it all over. If the Government wish to make country labour attractive and the towns less so, they take a strange way of doing it. If it is inconvenient to give a half-day every week to country workers, let it be half-a-day a fortnight or a day a month—anything that is workable or that will show that the taxation wrung from the country labourer entitles him to the privilege of justice, and to the same relaxation of toil that is given to town workers.

However, this east wind freezes my patriotism and my religion, so I will conclude with the hope that our members will “ dam ” their own eloquence a little more, and that of their neighbours a little less.