After discussing the details of his removal, his letter proceeded thus:—
“My first consideration was, as you suppose, for my children; and long and anxiously did I consider, as it will be a comfort to as many of you as have families to know. The only way to settle such a question is, to ascertain what are the objects of human life. This done, it is easy to settle where those objects may be best attained. What I desire for my sons and daughters is that life should train them to the greatest degree of benevolence and integrity, out of which is sure to spring the highest kind of piety; and these things, with outward plenty, make happiness. Now, it seems to me that that benevolence is of the most kindly and abundant sort which subsists among happy people; and that integrity is most secure where the interests of all are the same, instead of being opposed. I think that not all the advantages of society and what is commonly called education, which my children could have in England, will set against the freedom from temptation and from the corrupting sights of human misery which must there come in their way; poor as they must be here, and condemned to jostle their way in the world, and probably to lose a step or two of the rank which their father’s profession leads them to consider as their own. Education is made up of many things besides books, and even cultivated society; and I am much mistaken if, with such a field of exertion before them, and such motives to it, with abundance of God’s blessings and beauties poured out around them, in the midst of an affectionate and thriving people, and with their father at hand to teach much which they could not otherwise learn, the intellects of my sons and daughters may not become of a much higher order than they could amidst the struggle for subsistence which they must sustain at home. I judge for none but those who are circumstanced like myself; but I certainly feel that those who have several children for whom they can provide nothing more than that sort of education which will not be of use to them in a competition for bread, are the right persons to go abroad and make their home where, at the sacrifice of some of the privileges of high civilization, none of the troubles and moral evils of poverty can enter.
“You will have heard that Mr. Fellowes finds his well-meant plans somewhat difficult to manage, from the vast increase of claimants. I believe he still thinks that if there were People’s Farms enough, the relief might be made effectual, though he cannot explain what is to be done with so many delvers a hundred years hence, and will not say whether we are all to become delvers and spinners rather than a few of us cross the world to a more fruitful land. Your grandparents seem to like their settlement on his farm, and their employment of looking after some of the orphan children, and teaching them to dig and spin. Your presents and Ellen’s give them great pleasure, and add to their stock of little comforts. They sigh for you sometimes; and no wonder: but they console themselves with saying that your father will end his days among a thriving set of grandchildren who need never fear want. Mr. Fellowes is glad, I am pleased to see, to have some of his farm labourers go abroad as opportunity offers; and some of these will convey this letter to you.—So many inquiries have already been addressed to me since my determination was known, that I have strong hopes that persons of various classes will soon be on their way to the Dairy Plains.—Wherever colonization has succeeded best, the emigrating party has been composed of specimens of every rank and class; so that no one felt stripped of the blessings of the mother-country, but rather that he moved away in the midst of an entire though small society. If gentlemen go to one place, and labourers to another, the settlement is sure to pine, like that at the Swan River, and like too many more of the same kind. Whatever expense and trouble may be incurred in locating such imperfect materials of society must be well nigh lost. The true economy, the true benevolence, the true wisdom, of emigration is to send out a company as a swarm of bees goes forth,—under proper leaders, and in a state of organization. This is the doctrine I declare as often as I am questioned; and I am trying to convince such capitalists as talk of emigrating that, if done in such a mode as this, their removal becomes most like a removal from one county to another;—as if they went from Norfolk into Cumberland, or from Lancashire into the new scenery of Devonshire. Let us hope that some of them will make the trial.
“The greatest surprise to me is that some still go on talking of its being unpatriotic to leave one’s country. Surely it is patriotic to do whatever most benefits one’s country; and it is pretty clear that it is a benefit to rid ours of thousands of her burdensome children, to the great advantage, instead of injury, of her colonies.[colonies.] After all, a state is made up of individual members; and, therefore, whatever most benefits those individuals must benefit the state. Our duty to the state and our duty to ourselves are not opposing duties; if they were, there would either be no patriots, or no one would thrive. On the contrary, a man’s chief duty to his country is to provide honestly and abundantly, if he can, for himself and his family; and when this cannot be done at home, it is a breach of duty to stay and eat up other men’s substance there, if a living can be had elsewhere[elsewhere]. But I need not argue this matter with you, who have seen and adopted the true patriotism. I and mine will come and try what we can do to make the name of our native land honoured in distant regions as it is in our own hearts: and when the reckoning comes to be made of what, as a community, we of the Dairy Plains have done for the state of which we are members, let it be clear that we have loved and served her all the better for being removed from the gates of her workhouses into one of the palaces which God himself has built for her.”
Summary of Principles illustrated in this Volume.
Two kinds of colonization have been adopted by the British Empire;—Colonization for the reduction of our home-population,—or Voluntary Emigration;—and Penal Colonization.
The term Colonization is by some applied to a third process, which they wish to see introduced into this country; viz.—Home Colonization.
The objects of Voluntary Emigration, directed by the state, are threefold.