nd thou: undertake this
horrid 'living chaos of Ignorance and Hunger' weltering round thy
feet; say, "I will heal it, or behold I will die foremost in
it." Such is verily the law. Everywhere and everywhen a man has
to _'pay_ with his life;' to do his work, as a soldier does, at
the expense of life. In no Piepowder earthly Court can you sue
an Aristocracy to do its work, at this moment: but in the Higher
Court, which even it calls 'Court of Honour,' and which is the
Court of Necessity withal, and the eternal Court of the Universe,
in which all Fact comes to plead, and every Human Soul is an
apparitor,--the Aristocracy is answerable, and even now
answering, _there._

Parchments? Parchments are venerable: but they ought at all
times to represent, as near as they by possibility can, the
writing of the Adamant Tablets; otherwise they are not so
venerable! Benedict the Jew in vain pleaded parchments; his
usuries were too many. The King said, "Go to, for all thy
parchments, thou shalt pay just debt; down with thy dust, or
observe this tooth-forceps!" Nature, a far juster Sovereign, has
far terribler forceps. Aristocracies, actual and imaginary,
reach a time when parchment pleading does not avail them. "Go
to, for all thy parchments, thou shalt pay due debt!" shouts the
Universe to them, in an emphatic manner. They refuse to pay,
confidently pleading parchment: their best grinder-tooth, with
horrible agony, goes out of their jaw. Wilt thou pay now? A
second grinder, again in horrible agony, goes: a second, and a
third, and if need be, all the teeth and grinders, and the life
itself with them;--and _then_ there is free payment, and an
anatomist-subject into the bargain!

Reform Bills, Corn-Law Abrogation Bills, and then Land-Tax Bill,
Property-Tax Bill, and still dimmer list of _etceteras;_ grinder
after grinder:---my lords and gentlemen, it were better for
you to arise, and begin doing your work, than sit there and
plead parchments!

We write no Chapter on the Corn-Laws, in this place; the Corn-
Laws are too mad to have a Chapter. There is a certain
immorality, when there is not a necessity, in speaking about
things finished; in chopping into small pieces the already
slashed and slain. When the brains are out, why does not a
Solecism die! It is at its own peril if it refuse to die; it
ought to make all conceivable haste to die, and get itself
buried! The trade of Anti-Corn-Law Lecturer i