Again and again the penitent in his ‘novitiate’ succumbs to obscurely-indicated ‘temptations’:
Works were the snares of pride and the best works were mingled with the dross of sin;
It is evident that there was, in 1800, casuistry enough in the theology of all the available English churches to reinforce the manufacturer’s own sense of moral self-esteem.
For the children, the discipline of the overlooker and of the machinery might suffice; but for those ‘past the age of puberty’ inner compulsions were required. Hence it followed that Ure devoted a section of his book to the ‘Moral Economy of the Factory System’, and a special chapter to religion. T…
‘It required, in fact, a man of a Napoleonic nerve and ambition, to subdue the refractory tempers of work-people accustomed to irregular paroxysms of diligence…. Such was Arkwright.’ Moreover, the more skilled a workman, the more intractable to discipline he became, ‘the more self-willed and… the l…
