Industry and Idleness - The Industrious 'Prentice Alderman of London, the Idle one brought before him & Impeach'd by his Accomplice

Date1747

Designed and engraved by William Hogarth (1697 - 1764)

MediumEtching and line engraving

DimensionsOther: 10 1/2 × 13 3/4in. (26.7 × 34.9cm)

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number1947-487,A

DescriptionUpper margin reads: "The INDUSTRIOUS 'PRENTICE Alderman of London, the Idle one brought before him & Impeach'd by his Accomplice."
Caption on left reads: "Psalm IX. Ve: 16./ The Wicked is snar'd in the work of his own hands."
Caption on the right reads: "Leviticus CH: XIX. Ve: 15./ Thou shall dono unrighteous/ ness in Judgment:"
Lower margin reads: "Design'd & Engrav'd by W.m Hogarth. / Plate 10. / Publish'd according to Act of Parliament Sep.br 30, 1747."
Label TextThis print is from a set of prints known as "Industry and Idleness" by William Hogarth. The Industrious and Idle Apprentices are reunited in the 10th print in the series. Idle (the Idle Apprentice) is in a court of law and is about to be sent to Newgate prison for his criminal activities. He begs his old associate, The Industrious Apprentice, aka Goodchild, who has now risen to the rank of an Alderman of London, for forgiveness. Goodchild covers his eyes and looks away, an illusion to Blind Justice, signaling that he will not make exceptions or show favoritism to his old acquaintance. What Goodchild also misses by covering his eyes, the woman previously called "a common prostitute" bribes the clerk while the man with the eye-patch (Idle's accomplice who lured him to commit the crime) swears that his deposition against idle is accurate, thereby condemning him do death.

The series tells stories of the parallel and sometimes intersecting lives of the wayward Idle Apprentice and the successful Industrious Apprentice. The Idle Apprentice was designed to serve as a cautionary tale, while the Industrious Apprentice's life models exemplary behavior. It was issued in 12 prints, was very met with much acclaim and commercial success when they were published in 1747. Hogarth wrote that he designed the prints to educate the youth, particularly apprentices, and therefore series was "calculated for the use & Instruction of youth w[h]erein everything necessary to be known was to be made a intelligible as possible[.] and as fine engraving was not necessary to the main design...the purchase of them became within the reach of those for whom they [were] chiefly intended." They were given by masters to their apprentices as Christmas gifts and were published at Christmas after 1749 in Lillo's 'London Merchant' for the benefit of young apprentices.

See Ronald Paulson, Hogarth's Graphic Works, I, #168-179.