There wants nothing but money to set it going. I will explain myself clearly and fully by reading a paper. (Producing a large scroll.) "In the infancy of society—”

THE REV. DR. FOLLIOTT.

Pray, Mr. Mac Quedy, how is it that all gentlemen of your nation begin every thing they write with the "infancy of society?"

MR. MAC QUEDY.

Eh, sir, it is the simplest way to begin at the beginning. "In the infancy of society, when government was invented to save a percentage; say two and a half per cent-."

THE REV. DR. FOLLIOTT.

I will not say any such thing.

MR. MAC QUEDY.

Well, say any percentage you please.

THE REV. DR. FOLLIOTT.

I will not say any percentage at all.

MR. MAC QUEDY.

"On the principle of the division of

labor-"

THE REV. DR. FOLLIOTT.

Government was invented to spend a per

centage.

MR. MAC QUEDY.

To save a percentage.

THE REV. DR. FOLLIOTT.

No, sir, to spend a percentage; and a good

Ideal more than two and a half

per cent.

Two hundred and fifty per cent. that is

intelligible.

MR. MAC QUEDY.

"In the infancy of society❞—

MR. TOOGOOD.

Never mind the infancy of society. The question is of society in its maturity. Here is what it should be. (Producing a paper.) I have laid it down in a diagram.

MR. SKIONAR.

Before we proceed to the question of government, we must nicely discriminate the boundaries of sense, understanding, and reason. Sense is a receptivity—

MR. CROTCHET, JUN.

We are proceeding too fast. Money being all that is wanted to regenerate society, I

will put into the hands of this company a Now let us see

large sum for the

purpose.

how to dispose of it.

MR. MAC QUEDY.

We will begin by taking a committeeroom in London, where we will dine together once a week, to deliberate.

THE REV. DR. FOLLIOTT.

If the money is to go in deliberative dinners, you may set me down for a committee man and honorary caterer.

MR. MAC QUEDY.

Next, you must all learn political economy, which I will teach you, very compendiously,

in lectures over the bottle.

THE REV. DR. FOLLIOTT.

I hate lectures over the bottle. But pray, sir, what is political economy?

MR. MAC QUEDY.

Political economy is to the state what domestic economy is to the family.

THE REV. DR. FOLLIOTT.

No such thing, sir. In the family there is a paterfamilias, who regulates the distribution, and takes care that there shall be no such thing in the household as one dying of hunger, while another dies of surfeit. In the state it is all hunger at one end, and all surfeit at the other. Matchless Claret, Mr. Crotchet.

MR. CROTCHET.

Vintage of fifteen, Doctor.

MR. MAC QUEDY.

The family consumes, and so does the

state.

THE REV. DR. FOLLIOTT.

Consumes, sir! Yes: but the mode, the proportions: there is the essential difference between the state and the family. Sir, I hate false analogies.

MR. MAC QUEDY.

Well, sir, the analogy is not essential. Distribution will come under its proper head.

THE REV. DR. FOLLIOTT.

Come where it will, the distribution of the state is in no respect analogous to the distribution of the family. The paterfamilias, sir: the paterfamilias.