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The Chief Features of the Industrial Revolution

In the present text I’m going to analyse the text "The Chief Features of the Industrial Revolution" written by the historian Arnold Toynbee and published in 1884.
It is an essay organized in 10 paragraphs and it deals with the historical process known as the Industrial Revolution, underlining that it changed from the roots some important aspects of the nineteenth-century England. Indeed the title shows the reader immediately the content of the text: it is the analysis of the causes and the consequences of the Industrial Revolution.
The first paragraph is introductory. It goes from line 1 to line 3 and it explains the purpose of the text: the historian tries to give a point of view of what Industrial Revolution implies. He starts his argumentation with the essence of the Industrial Revolution: it is the substitution of competition for the medieval regulations which had controlled the production and distribution of wealth. It follows that there was the growth of two system of thought: Economic Science and Socialism. In particular, the Economic Science has four chief: Adam Smith, who investigated the causes of wealth and he aimed at the substitution of industrial freedom for a system of restriction; Malthus, who focused his attention on the causes of poverty; Ricardo, who showed how wealth is distributed under a system of industrial freedom; and John Stuart Mill, who tried to solve the problem of how wealth ought to be distributed.
In the second paragraph, the historian explain the facts of the Industrial Revolution: the far greater rapidity which marks the growth of population and the relative and positive decline in the agricultural population. Indeed, at the end of 18th century, there was an Agrarian Revolution.
He goes on, with the next paragraph, giving his personal opinion about the Agrarian Revolution. He poses a question to introduce the topic, in particular to explain the causes that led to the decrease in rural population. He individuates three effective causes: the distruction of the common-field system of cultivation, the enclosure of common and waste lands and the consolidation of small farms into large.
He also gives quotations of three important figures (Laurence, Eden and Cobbett) to confirm and show this topic.
The next paragraph reports the consequences and the advancements of the Agricultural changes: the improvement of breed of cattle, the introduction of the rotation of crops, the inventation of the steam-plough and the institution of the agricultural societies.
In the following paragraph the historian lists some mechanical inventions and tolls that make work easier and increase the texile industry, in particular the cotton one: the spinning-jenny, the water frame, Crompton's mule and the self-acting mule.
After that, the historian focuses his attention on another industry, the iron one, which had a relevant increase thanks to the new inventions: the invention of smelting by pit-coal and the application of the steam-engine to blast furnaces.
A further growth of the factory system was possible due to the great advance of the means of communication: the canal system was rapidly developed throughout the country, and in 1830 the first railroad was opened. These changes improved means of communications and caused an extraordinary increase in commerce, but this system meant a change from independence to dependence.
Later the historian gives quantitative data about the rise of rents which is due to the new system of production and distribution of wealth. The rise in rents is caused by: money invested in improvements, the effect of the enclosure system, the effect of the consolidation of farms and the high price of corn. These effects represented a great social revolution and a change in the balance of political power and in the relative position of classes.
Before reaching a conclusion the historian scans how the altered conditions in the production of wealth changed farmers' character and habits.
In the next paragraph he talks about the causes of working people's misery, often caused by the conditions of labour, the rise of prices and the fluctuation of trade.
The historian concludes the essay underlining that, how the Industrial Revolution effects show, wealth and well-being aren't strictly connected and often, something producing wealth may not produce well-being.