Chapter XVI: Introduction (5)

He must cut off all foreign competition, beyond a certain standard, for that quantity of subsistence which is necessary for home consumption; and, by premiums upon exportation, he must discharge the farmers of any superfluous load, which may remain upon their hands when prices fall too low. This important matter shall be explained at large in another place, when we come to treat of the policy of grain.

If natural causes should produce a rise in the price of subsistence, which cannot be brought down by extending agriculture, he must then lay the whole community under contribution, in order to indemnify those who work for strangers, for the advance upon the price of their food; or he must indemnify the strangers in another way, for the advance in the price of manufactures.

He must consider the manufactures of superfluity, as worked up for the use of strangers, and discourage all domestic competition for them, by every possible means.

He must do what he can, constantly to proportion the supply to the demand made for them; and when the first necessarily comes to exceed the latter, in spight of all his care, he must then consider what remains over the demand, as a superfluity of the strangers; and for the support of the equal balance between work and demand, he must promote the sale of them even within the country, under certain restrictions, until the hands employed in such branches where a redundancy is found, can be more usefully set to work in another way.

He must consider the advancement of the common good as a direct object of private interest to every individual, and by a disinterested administration of the public money, he must plainly make it appear that it is so.

From this principle flows the authority, vested in all governments, to load the community with taxes, in order to advance the prosperity of the state. And this object can be nowise better obtained than by applying the amount of them to the keeping an even balance between work and demand. Upon this the health of a trading state principally depends.

If the failure of foreign demand be found to proceed from the superior natural advantages of other countries, he must double his diligence to promote luxury among his neighbours; he must support simplicity at home; he must increase his bounties upon exportation; and his expence in relieving manufactures, when the price of their industry falls below the expence of their subsistence.

While these operations are conducted with coolness and perseverance, while the allurements of the wealth acquired do not frustrate the execution, the statesman may depend upon seeing foreigners return to his ports, so soon as their own dissipation, and want of frugality, come to compensate the advantages which nature had given them over their frugal and industrious neighbours.

If this plan be pursued, foreign trade will increase in proportion to the number of inhabitants; and domestic luxury will serve only as an instrument in the hands of the statesman to increase demand when the home supply becomes too great for foreign consumption. In other words, the rich citizens will be engaged to consume what is superfluous, in order to keep the balance even in favour of the industrious, and in favour of the nation.

The whole purport of this plan is to point out the operation of three very easy principles.

The first, That in a country entirely taken up with the object of promoting foreign trade, no competition should be allowed to come from abroad for articles of the first necessity, and principally for food, so as to raise prices beyond a certain standard.

The second, That no domestic competition should be allowed upon articles of superfluity, so as to raise prices beyond a certain standard.

The third, That when these standards cannot be preserved, and that from natural causes, prices get above them, public money must be thrown into the scale to bring prices to the level of those of exportation.

The greater the extent of foreign trade in any nation, the lower these standards _must_ be kept; the less the extent of it, the higher they _may_ be allowed to rise. Consequently,

Were no man in a nation employed in producing the necessaries of life, but every man in supplying articles of foreign consumption, the prices of necessaries might be allowed to fall as low as possible. There would be no occasion for a standard in favour of those who live by producing them.

Were no man in the state employed in supplying strangers, the prices of superfluities might be allowed to rise as high as possible, and a standard would also become useless, as the sole design of it is to favour exportation.

But as neither of these suppositions can ever take place, and as in every nation there is a part employed in producing, and a part in consuming, and that it is only the surplus of industry which can be exported; a standard is necessary for the support of the reciprocal interests of both parties at home; and the public money must be made to operate only upon the price of _the surplus_ of industry so as to make it exportable, even in cases where the national prices upon home consumption have got up beyond the standard. Let me set this matter in another light, the better to communicate an idea which I think a little obscure.

Were food and other necessaries the pure gift of nature in any country, I should have laid it down as a principle to discourage all foreign competition for them, either below or above any certain standard; because in this case the lower the price the better, since no inconveniency could result from thence to any industrious person. But when the production of these is in itself a manufacture, or an object of industry, a certain standard must be kept up in favour of those who live by producing them.

On the other hand, as to the manufactures of superfluity, domestic competition should be discouraged, beyond a certain standard, in order that prices may not rise above those offered by foreigners; but it might be encouraged below the standard, in order to promote consumption and give bread to manufacturers. But were there no foreign demand at all, there would be no occasion for any standard, and the nation’s wealth would thereby only circulate in greater or less rapidity in proportion as prices would rise or fall. The study of the balance between work and demand, would then become a principal object of attention in the statesman, not with a view to enrich the state, but in order to preserve every member of it in health and vigour. On the other hand, the object of a standard regards foreign trade, and the acquisition of new wealth, at the expence of other nations. The rich, therefore, at home must not be allowed to increase their consumption of superfluities beyond the proportion of the constant supply; because these being intended for strangers, the only way of preventing them from supplying themselves, is to prevent prices from getting up beyond the standard, at which strangers can produce them.

Farther, were every one of the society in the same pursuit of industry, there would be no occasion for the public to be laid under contribution for advancing the general welfare; but as there is a part employed in enriching the state, by the sale of their work to strangers, and a part employed in making these riches circulate at home, by the consumption of superfluities, I think it is a good expedient to throw a part of domestic circulation into the public coffers; that when the consequences of private wealth come necessarily to raise prices, a statesman may be enabled to defray the expence of bounties upon that part which can be exported, and thereby enable the nation to continue to supply foreigners at the same price as formerly.

The farther these principles can be carried into execution, the longer a state will flourish; and the longer she will support her superiority. When foreign demand begins to fail, so as not to be recalled, either industry must decline, or domestic luxury must begin. The consequences of both may be easily guessed at, and the principles which influence them shall be particularly examined in the following chapter.

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CHAP. XVI.
_Illustration of some Principles laid down in the former Chapter,
relative to the advancement and support of foreign Trade._

I am now to give an illustration of some things laid down, I think, in too general terms in the former chapter, relating to that species of trade which is carried on with other nations.

I have constantly in view to separate and distinguish the principles of foreign trade, from those which only influence the advancement of an inland commerce, and a brisk circulation: operations which produce very different effects, equally meriting the attention of a statesman.

The very existence of foreign trade, implies a separate interest between those nations who are found on the opposite side of the mercantile contract, as both endeavour to make the best bargain possible for themselves. These transactions imply a mutual dependence upon one another, which may either be necessary or contingent. It is necessary, when one of the nations cannot subsist without the assistance of the other, as is the case between the province of Holland, and those countries which supply it with grain; or contingent, when the wants of a particular nation cannot be supplied by their own inhabitants, from a want of skill and dexterity, only.

Wherever, therefore, one nation finds another necessarily depending upon her for particular branches of traffic, there is a certain foundation for foreign trade; where the dependence is contingent, there is occasion for management, and for the hand of an able statesman.

The best way to preserve every advantage, is, to examine in how far they are necessary, and in how far they are only contingent, to consider in what respect the nation may be most easily rivalled by her neighbours, and in what respect she has natural advantages which cannot be taken from her.

The natural advantages are chiefly to be depended on: France, for example, can never be rivalled in her wines. Other countries may enjoy great advantages from their situation, mines, rivers, sea ports, fishing, timber, and certain productions proper to the soil. If you abstract from these natural advantages, all nations are upon an equal footing as to trade. Industry and labour are no properties attached to place, any more than oeconomy and sobriety.

This proposition may be called in question, upon the principles of M. de Montesquieu, who deduces the origin of many laws, customs, and even religions, from the influence of the climate. That great man reasoned from fact and from experience, and from the power and tendency of natural causes, to produce certain effects when not checked by other circumstances; but in my method of treating this subject, I suppose these causes never to be allowed to produce their natural and immediate effects, when such effects would be followed by a political inconvenience: because I constantly suppose a statesman at the head of government, who makes every circumstance concur in promoting the execution of the plan he has laid down.

_1mo._ If a nation then has formed a scheme of being long great and powerful by trade, she must first apply closely to the manufacturing every natural produce of the country. For this purpose a sufficient number of hands must be employed: for if hands be found wanting, the natural produce will be exported without receiving any additional value from labour; and so the consequences of this natural advantage will be lost.

The price of food, and all necessaries for manufacturers, must be found at an easy rate.

And, in the last place, if oeconomy and sobriety in the workmen, and good regulations on the part of the statesman, are not kept up, the end will not be obtained: for if the manufacture, when brought to its perfection, does not retain the advantages which the manufacturer had in the beginning, by employing the natural produce of the country; it is the same thing as if the advantage had not existed. I shall illustrate this by an example.

I shall suppose wool to be better, more plentiful, and cheaper, in one country than in another, and two nations rivals in that trade. It is natural that the last should desire to buy wool of the first, and that the other should desire to keep it at home, in order to manufacture it. Here then is a natural advantage which the first country has over the latter, and which cannot be taken from her. I shall suppose that subsistence is as cheap in one country as in the other; that is to say, that bread and every other necessary of life is at the same price. If the workmen of the first country (by having been the founders of the cloth manufacture, and by having had, for a long tract of years, so great a superiority over other nations, as to make them, in a manner, absolutely dependent upon them for cloths) shall have raised their prices from time to time; and if, in consequence of large profits, long enjoyed without rivalship, these have been so consolidated with the real value, by an habitual greater expence in living, which implies an augmentation of wages; that country may thereby lose all the advantages it had from the low price and superior quality of its wool. But if, on the other hand, the workmen in the last country work less, be less dextrous, pay extravagant prices for wool at prime cost, and be at great expence in carriage; if manufactures cannot be carried on successfully, but by public authority, and if private workmen be crushed with excessive taxes upon their industry; all the accidental advantages which the last country had over the first, may come to be more than balanced, and the first may regain those which nature first had given her. But this should by no means make the first country rest secure. These accidental inconveniencies found in the last may come to cease; and therefore the only real security of the first for that branch, is the cheapness of the workmanship.

_2do._ In speaking of a standard, in the last chapter, I established a distinction between one regulated by the height of foreign demand, and another kept as low as the possibility of supplying the manufacture can admit. This requires a little explanation.

It must not here be supposed that a people will ever be brought from a principle of public spirit, not to profit of a rise in foreign demand; and as this may proceed from circumstances and events which are entirely hid from the manufacturers, such revolutions are unavoidable. We must therefore restrain the generality of our proposition, and observe, that the indispensible _vibrations_ of this foreign demand do no harm; but that the statesman should be constantly on his guard to prevent the _subversion of the balance, or the smallest consolidation of extraordinary profits with the real value_. This he will accomplish, as has been observed, by multiplying hands in those branches of exportation, upon which profits have risen. This will increase the supply, and even frustrate his own people of extraordinary gains, which would otherwise terminate in a prejudice to foreign trade.

A statesman may sometimes, out of a principle of benevolence, perhaps of natural equity towards the classes of the industrious, as well as from sound policy, permit larger profits, as an encouragement to some of the more elegant arts, which serve as an ornament to a country, establish a reputation for taste and refinement in favour of a people, and thereby make strangers prefer articles of their production, which have no other superior merit than the name of the country they come from: but even as to these, he ought to be upon his guard, never to allow them to rise so high, as to prove an encouragement to other nations, to establish a successful rivalship.

_3tio._ The encouragement recommended to be given to the domestic consumption of superfluities, when foreign demand for them happens to fall so low as to be followed with distress in the workmen, requires a little farther explanation.

If what I laid down in the last chapter be taken literally, I own it appears an absurd supposition, because it implies a degree of public spirit in those who are in a capacity to purchase the superfluities, no where to be met with, and at the same time a self-denial, in discontinuing the demand, so soon as another branch of foreign trade is opened for the employment of the industrious, which contradicts the principles upon which we have founded the whole scheme of our political oeconomy.

I have elsewhere observed, that were revolutions to happen as suddenly as I am obliged to represent them, all would go into confusion.

What, therefore, is meant in this operation comes to this, that when a statesman finds, that the natural taste of his people does not lead them to profit of the surplus of commodities which lie upon hand, and which were usually exported, he should interpose his authority and management in such a way as to prevent the distress of the workmen, and when, by a sudden fall in a foreign demand, this distress becomes unavoidable, without a more powerful interposition, he should then himself become the purchaser, if others will not; or, by premiums or bounties on the surplus which lies upon hand, promote the sale of it at any rate, until the supernumerary hands can be otherwise provided for. And although I allow that the rich people of a state are not naturally led, from a principle either of public spirit or self-denial, to render such political operations effectual to promote the end proposed, yet we cannot deny, that it is in the power of a good governor, by exposing the political state of certain classes of the people, to gain upon men of substance to concur in schemes for their relief; and this is all I intend to recommend in practice. My point of view is to lay down the principles, and I never recommend them farther than they are rendered possible in execution, by preparatory steps, and by properly working on the spirit of the people.

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CHAP. XVII.
_Symptoms of Decay in foreign Trade._

If manufacturers are found to be without employment, we are not immediately to accuse the statesman, or conclude this to proceed from a decay of trade, until the cause of it be inquired into. If upon examination it be found, that for some years past food has been at a higher rate than in neighbouring countries, the statesman may be to blame: for it is certain, that a trading nation, by turning part of her commerce into a proper channel, may always be able to establish a just balance in this particular. And though it be not expedient in years of scarcity to bring the price of grain very low, yet it is generally possible to raise the price of it in all rival nations, which, with regard to the present point, is the same thing.

If this want of employment for manufacturers do not proceed from the high prices of living, but for want of commissions from the merchants, the causes of this diminution of demand must be examined into. It may be accidental, and happen from causes which may cease in a little time, and trade return to flourish as before. It may also happen upon the establishment of new undertakings in different places of the country, from which, by reason of some natural advantage, or a more frugal disposition in the workmen, or from the proximity of place, markets may be supplied, which formerly were furnished by those industrious people who are found without employment. In these last suppositions, the distress of the manufacturers does not prove any decay of trade in general, but, on the contrary, may contribute to destroy the bad effects of consolidated profits, by obliging those who formerly shared them, to abandon the ease of their circumstances, and submit a-new to a painful industry, in order to procure subsistence. When such revolutions are sudden, they prove hard to bear, and throw people into great distress. It is partly to prevent such inconveniencies, that we have recommended the lowest standard possible, upon articles of exportation.

Two causes there are, which very commonly mark a decline of trade, to wit; 1. When foreign markets, usually supplied by a trading nation, begin to be furnished, let it be in the most trifling article, by others, not in use to supply them. Or, 2. When the country itself is furnished from abroad with such manufactures as were formerly made at home.

These circumstances prove one of two things, either that there are workmen in other countries, who, from advantages which they have acquired by nature, or by industry and frugality, finding a demand for their work, take the bread out of the mouths of those formerly employed, and deprive them of certain branches of their foreign trade: or, that these foreign workmen, having profited of the increased luxury and dissipation of the former traders, have begun to supply the markets with certain articles of consumption, the profits upon which being small, are, without much rivalship, insensibly yielded up to them by the workmen of the other trading nation, who find better bread in serving their own wealthy countrymen.

Against the first cause of decline, I see no better remedy than patience, as I have said already, and a perseverance in frugality and oeconomy, until the unwary beginners shall fall into the inconveniencies generally attending upon wealth and ease.

The second cause of decline is far more difficult to be removed. The root of it lies deep, and is ingrafted with the spirit and manners of the whole people, high and low. The lower classes have contracted a taste for superfluity and expence, which they are enabled to gratify, by working for their countrymen; while they despise the branches of foreign trade as low and unprofitable. The higher classes again depend upon the lower classes, for the gratification of a thousand little trifling desires, formed by the taste of dissipation, and supported by habit, fashion, and a love of expence.

Here then is a system set on foot, whereby the poor are made rich, and the rich are made happy, in the enjoyment of a perpetual variety of every thing which can remove the inconveniencies to which human nature is exposed. Thus both parties become interested to support it, and vie with one another in the ingenuity of contriving new wants; the one from the immediate satisfaction of removing them; the other from the profit of furnishing the means, and the hopes of one day sharing in them.

But even for this great evil, the very nature of man points out a remedy. It is the business of a statesman to lay hold of it. The remedy flows from the instability of every taste not founded upon rational desires.

In every country of luxury, we constantly find certain classes of workmen in distress, from the change of modes. Were a statesman upon his guard to employ such as are forced to be idle, before they betake themselves to new inventions, for the support of the old plan, or before they contract an abandoned and vitious life, he would get them cheap, and might turn their labour both to the advantage of the state and to the discouragement of luxury.

I confess, however, that while a luxurious taste in the rich subsists, industrious people will always be found to supply the instruments of it to the utmost extent; and I also allow, that such a taste has infinite allurements, especially while youth and health enable a rich man to indulge in it. Those, however, who are systematically luxurious, that is, from a formed taste and confirmed habit, are but few, in comparison of those who become so from levity, vanity, and the imitation of others. The last are those who principally support and extend the system; but they are not the most incorrigible. Were it not for imitation, every age would seek after, and be satisfied with the gratification of natural desires. Twenty-five might think of dress, horses, hunting, dogs, and generous wines: forty, of a plentiful table, and the pleasures of society: sixty, of coaches, elbow-chairs, soft carpets, and instruments of ease. But the taste for imitation blends all ages together. The old fellow delights in horses and fine clothes; the youth rides in his chariot on springs, and lolls in an easy chair, large enough to serve him for a bed. All this proceeds from the superfluity of riches and taste of imitation, not from the real allurements of ease and taste of luxury, as every one must feel, who has conversed at all with the great and rich. Fashion, which I understand here to be a synonimous term for imitation, leads most people into superfluous expence, which is so far from being an article of luxury, that it is frequently a load upon the person who incurs it. All such branches of expence, it is in the power of a statesman to cut off, by setting his own example, and that of his favourites and servants, above the caprice of fashion.

The levity and changeableness of mankind, as I have said, will even assist him. A generation of oeconomists is sometimes found to succeed a generation of spendthrifts; and we now see, almost over all Europe, a system of sobriety succeeding an habitual system of drunkenness. Drunkenness, and a multitude of useless servants, were the luxury of former times.

Every such revolution may be profited of by an able statesman, who must set a good example on one hand, while, on the other, he must profit of every change of taste, in order to re-establish the foreign trade of his subjects. An example of frugality, in the head of a luxurious people, would do infinite harm, were it only intended to reform the morals of the rich, without indemnifying the poor for the diminution upon their consumption.

At the same time, therefore, that luxury comes to lose ground at home, a door must be opened, to serve as an out-let for the work of those hands which must be thereby made idle; and which, consequently, must fall into distress.

This is no more than the principle before laid down, in the fifteenth chapter, reversed: there we said, that when foreign demand begins to decline, domestic luxury must be made to increase, in order to soften the shock of the sudden revolution in favour of the industrious. For the same reason here we say, that foreign trade must be opened upon every diminution of domestic luxury.

How few Princes do we find either frugal or magnificent from political considerations! And, this being the case, is it not necessary to lay before them the natural consequences of the one and the other? And it is still more necessary to point out the methods to be taken in order to avoid the inconveniencies which may proceed from either.

Under a prodigal administration, the number of people will increase. The statesman therefore should keep a watchful eye upon the supplying of subsistence. Under a frugal reign, numbers will diminish, if the statesman does not open every channel which may carry off the superfluous productions of industry. Here is the reason: a diminution of expence at home, is a diminution of employment; and this again implies a diminution of people; because it interrupts the circulation of the subsistence which made them live; but if employment is sent far from abroad, the nation will preserve its people, and the savings of the Prince may be compensated by the balance coming in from strangers.

These topics are delivered only as hints; and the amplification of them might not improperly have a place here; but I expect to bring them in elsewhere to greater advantage, after examining the principles of taxation, and pointing out those which direct the application of public money.

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CHAP. XVIII.
_Methods of lowering the Price of Manufactures, in order to make them
vendible in foreign Markets._

The multiplicity of relations between the several parts of political oeconomy, forces me to a frequent repetition of principles. I have no other rule to judge whether such relations be superfluous, or necessary, but by the tendency they have to give me a more distinct view of my subject. This is the case when the same principles are applied to different combinations of circumstances.

Almost every thing to be said on the head mentioned in the title of this chapter, has been taken notice of elsewhere; and my present intention is only to lay together ideas which appear scattered, because they have been occasionally brought in by their relations to other matters.

The methods of lowering the price of manufactures, so as to render them exportable, are of two kinds.

The first, such as proceed from a good administration, and which bring down prices within the country, in consequence of natural causes.

The second, such as operate only upon that part which comes to be exported, in consequence of a proper application of public money.

As I have not yet inquired into the methods of providing a public fund, it would, I think, be contrary to order to enter on the disposal of it, for bringing down the price of manufactures. This operation will come in more naturally afterwards, and the general distinction here mentioned, is only introduced by the by, that my readers may retain it and apply it as we go along.

The end proposed is to lower the price of manufactures, so that they may be exported. The first thing therefore to be known, is the cause from whence it happens, that certain manufactures cannot be furnished at home so cheap as in other countries; the second, how to apply the proper remedy for lowering the price of them.

The causes of high prices, that is, of prices relatively high to what they are found to be in other nations, are reducible to four heads; which I shall lay down in their order, and then point out the methods of removing them likewise, in their order.

_1mo._ The consolidation of high profits with the real value of the manufacture. This cause operates in countries where luxury has gained ground, and when domestic competition has called off too many of the hands, which were formerly content to serve at a low price, and for small gains.

_2do._ The rise in the price of articles of the first necessity. This cause operates when the progress of industry has been more rapid than that of agriculture. The progress of industry we have shewn necessarily implies an augmentation of _useful inhabitants_; and as these have commonly wherewithal to purchase subsistence, the moment their numbers swell above the proportion of the quantity of it produced by agriculture, or above what is found in the markets of the country, or brought from abroad, they enter into competition and raise the price of it. Here then let it be observed, by the by, that what raises the price of subsistence is the augmentation of the numbers of useful inhabitants, that is, of such as are easy in their circumstances. Let the wretched be ever so many, let the vicious procreation go on ever so far, such inhabitants will have little effect in raising price, but a very great one in increasing misery. A proof of this is to be met with in many provinces where the number of poor is very great, and where at the same time the price of necessaries is very low; whereas no instance can be found where a number of the industrious being got together, do not occasion an immediate rise on most of the articles of subsistence.

_3tio._ The natural advantages of other countries. This operates in spight of all the precautions of the most frugal and laborious people. Let them deprive themselves of every superfluity; let them be ever so diligent and ingenious; let every circumstance be improved by the statesman to the utmost for the establishment of foreign trade; the advantage of climate and situation may give such a superiority to the people of another country, as to render a direct competition with them impossible.

_4to._ The superior dexterity of other nations in working up their manufactures, their knowledge in the science of trade, the advantage they have in turning their money to account in the intervals of their own direct circulation, the superior abilities of their statesman, the application of their public money, in one word, the perfection of their political oeconomy.

Before I enter upon the method of removing these several inconveniencies, I must observe, that as we are at present treating of the _relative_ height of the price of manufactures, a competition between nations is constantly implied. It is this which obliges a statesman to be principally attentive to the rise of prices. The term _competition_ is relative to, and conveys the idea of emulation between two parties striving to compass the same end. I must therefore distinguish between the endeavours which a nation makes to _retain_ a superiority already got, and those of another which strives to get the better of it. The first I shall call a competition to _retain_; the second, a competition to _acquire_.

The first three heads represent the inconveniencies to which the competitors to _retain_ are liable; and the fourth comprehends those to which the competitors to _acquire_ are most commonly exposed.

Having digested our subject into order, I shall run through the principles which severally influence the removing of every inconvenience, whether incident to a nation whose foreign trade is already well established, or to another naturally calculated for entring into a competition for the acquisition of it.

In proposing a remedy for the particular causes of augmentation here set down, we must suppose every one entirely simple, and uncompounded with the others; a thing which in fact seldom happens. This I do for the sake of distinctness; and the principal difficulty in practice is to combine the remedies in proportion to the complication of the disease. I now come to the first of the four causes of high prices, to wit, consolidated profits.

The whole doctrine of these has been abundantly set forth in the 10th chapter. We there explained the nature of them, shewed how the subversion of the balance, by a long preponderancy of the scale of demand, had the effect of consolidating profits in a country of luxury; and observed, that the reducing them to the proper standard could never fail of bringing those who had long enjoyed them, into distress.

The question here is to reduce them, when foreign trade cannot otherwise be retained, let the consequences be ever so hurtful to certain individuals. When the well being of a nation comes in competition with a temporary inconvenience to some of the inhabitants, the general good must be preferred to particular considerations.

I have observed above, that domestic luxury, by offering high prices upon certain species of industry, calls off many hands employed to supply the articles of exportation, upon which profits are generally very moderate. The first natural and immediate effect of this, is, to diminish the hands employed in furnishing the foreign demand; consequently, to diminish the supply; consequently, to occasion a _simple competition_ on the side of the strangers, who are the purchasers; consequently, to augment profits, until by their rise and consolidation the market is deserted.

The very progress here laid down, points out the remedy. The number of hands employed in these particular branches must be multiplied; and if the luxurious taste and wealth of the country prevent any one who can do better, from betaking himself to a species of industry lucrative to the nation, but ungrateful to those who exercise it, the statesman must collect the children of the wretched into workhouses, and breed them to this employment, under the best regulations possible for saving every article of unnecessary expence; here likewise may be employed occasionally those above mentioned, whom the change of modes may have cast out of employment, until they can be better provided for. This is also an outlet for foundlings, since many of those who work for foreign exportation, are justly to be ranked in the lowest classes of the people; and in the first book we proposed, that every one brought up at the expence of public charity, should be thrown in for recruiting these classes, which can with greatest difficulty support their own propagation.

Here let me observe, that although it be true in general, that the greatest part of exportable manufactures do yield but very middling profits, from the extension of industry in different countries, yet sundry exceptions may be found; especially in nations renowned for their elegance of taste. But how quickly do we see these lucrative branches of foreign trade cut off, from the very inconvenience we here seek a remedy for. The reason is plain. When strangers demand such manufactures, they only share in the instruments of foreign luxury, which bring every where considerable profits to the manufacturer. These high profits easily establish a rivalship in favour of the nation to whom they are supplied; because a hint is sufficient to enable such as exercise a similar profession in that country, to supply their own inhabitants. This being the case, an able statesman should be constantly attentive to every growing taste in foreign nations for the inventions of his people; and so soon as his luxurious workmen have set any one on foot, he may throw that branch into the hands of the most frugal, in order to support it, and give them such encouragement as to prevent, at least, the rivalship of those strangers who are accustomed to work for large profits. This is one method of turning a branch of luxury into an article of foreign trade. Let me illustrate this by an example.

What great advantages do not the French reap from the exportation of their modes? But we quickly find their varnishes, gauzes, ribbands, and colifichets, imitated by other nations, for no other reason but because of the large, or at least consolidated profits enjoyed by the French workmen themselves, who, fertile in new inventions, and supported by their reputation for elegance of dress, have got into possession of the right of prescribing to all Europe the standard of taste in articles of mere superfluity. This however is no permanent prerogative; and that elegant people, by long setting the example, and determining the standard of refinement in some luxurious arts, will at last inspire a similar taste into their scholars, who will thereby be enabled to supplant them. Whereas were they careful to supply all their inventions at the lowest prices possible, they would ever continue to be the only furnishers.

The method therefore of reducing consolidated profits, whether upon articles of exportation, or home consumption, is to increase the number of hands employed in supplying them; and the more gradually this revolution is made to take place, the fewer inconveniencies will result to those who will thereby be forced to renounce them.

A country which has an extensive territory, and great opportunities of extending her agriculture (such as I supposed the present situation of France to be) may, under a good administration, find the progress of luxury very compatible with the prosperity of her foreign trade; because inhabitants may be multiplied at discretion. But so soon as subsistence becomes hard to be obtained, this expedient is cut off. A statesman must then make the best of the inhabitants he has, luxury must suffer a check; and those who are employed in supplying home consumption at high prices, must be made to reduce their consolidated profits, in order to bring the total amount of their manufactures within such bounds as to make them vendible in foreign markets.

If manufacturers become luxurious in their way of living, it must proceed from their extraordinary profits. These they may still continue to have, as long as the produce of their work is consumed at home. But no merchant will pretend to sell it out of the country; because, in this case, he will find the labour of other people who are less luxurious, and consequently work cheaper, in competition with him.

To re-establish then the foreign trade, these consolidated profits must be put an end to, by attacking luxury when circumstances render an augmentation of people inconvenient, and prices will fall of course.

This will occasion great complaints among all sorts of tradesmen. The cry will be, that trade is ruined, manufacturers are starving, and the state is undone: but the truth will be, that manufacturers will, by their labour, begin to enrich their own nation, at the expence of all those who trade with her, instead of being enriched at the expence of their own countrymen; and only by a revolution in the balance of wealth at home.

It will prove very discouraging to any statesman to attempt a sudden reform of this abuse of consolidated profits, when he is obliged to attack the luxury of his own people. The best way therefore is to prevent matters from coming to such a pass, as to demand so dangerous and difficult a remedy.

There is hardly a possibility of changing the manners of a people, but by a proper attention to the education of the youth. All methods, therefore, should be fallen upon to supply manufactures with new hands; and lest the corruption of example should get the better of all precautions, the seat of manufactures might be changed; especially when they are found in great and populous cities, where living is dear: in this case, others should be erected in the provinces where living is cheap. The state must encourage these new undertakings, numbers of children must be taken in, in order to be bred early to industry and frugality; this again will encourage people to marry and propagate, as it will contribute towards discharging them of the load of a numerous family. If such a plan as this be followed, how inconsiderable will the number of poor people become in a little time; and as it will insensibly multiply the useful inhabitants, out of that youth which recruited and supported the numbers of the poor, so the taxes appropriated for the relief of poverty may be wholly applied, in order to prevent it.

Laws of naturalization have been often proposed in a nation where consolidated profits have occasioned the inconveniencies for which we have here been proposing a remedy. By this expedient many flatter themselves to draw industrious strangers into the country, who being accustomed to live more frugally, and upon less profits, may, by their example and competition, beat down the price of work among the inhabitants.

Several circumstances concur to defeat the success of this scheme. The first is, that consolidated profits are not the only inconvenience to be removed: there is also a complication of high prices upon many necessaries. The second, as no real change is supposed to be made within the country, either as to the increase of subsistence, or the regulation of its price, or manner of living, these strangers, who, as such, must be exposed to extraordinary expence, are not able to subsist, nor consequently to work so cheap as they did at home. Besides, what can be supposed to be their motive of coming, if it be not to have higher wages, and to live better?

Here then is a nation sending for strangers, in order that they may work cheaper; and strangers flocking into the country in hopes of selling their work dearer. This is just the case with two friends who are about making a bargain; the seller imagines that _his friend_ will not grudge a good price. The buyer, on the other hand, flatters himself that _his friend_ will sell to him cheaper than to another. This seldom fails to produce discontent on both sides.

Besides, unless the quantity of food be increased, if strangers are imported to eat part of it, natives must in some degree starve; and if you augment the quantity of food, and keep it at a little lower price than in neighbouring nations, your own inhabitants will multiply; the state may take great numbers of them into their service when young; they soon come to be able to do something in the manufacturing way; they may be bound for a number of years, sufficient to indemnify the public for the first expence; and the encouragement alone of having bread cheaper than elsewhere, will bring you as many strangers as you incline to receive, provided a continual supply of food can be procured in proportion to the increase of the people.

But I imagine that it is always better for a state to multiply by means of its own inhabitants, than by that of strangers; for many reasons which to me appear obvious.

We come now to the second cause of high prices, to wit, a rise in the value of the articles of the first necessity, which we have said proceeds from the progress of industry having outstripped the progress of agriculture. Let me set this idea in a clearer light; for here it is shut up in too general terms to be rightly viewed on all sides.

The idea of inhabitants being multiplied beyond the proportion of subsistence, seems to imply that there are too many already; and the demand for their industry having been the cause of their multiplication, proves that formerly there were too few. Add to this, that if, notwithstanding the rise upon the price of work proceeding from the scarcity of subsistence, the scale of home demand is found to preponderate, at the expence of foreign trade, this circumstance proves farther, that however the inhabitants may be already multiplied above the proportion of subsistence, their numbers are still too few for what is demanded of them at home; and for what is required of them towards promoting the prosperity of their country, in supporting their trade abroad.

From this exposition of the matter, the remedy appears evident: both inhabitants and subsistence must be augmented. The question comes to be, in what manner, and with what precautions, must these operations be performed?

Inhabitants are multiplied by reducing the price of subsistence, to the value which demand has fixed upon the work of those who are to consume it. This is only to be accomplished by augmenting the quantity, by importation from foreign parts, when the country cannot be made to produce more of itself.

Here the interposition of a statesman is absolutely necessary; since great loss may often be incurred by bringing down the price of grain in a year of scarcity. Premiums, therefore, must be given upon importation, until a plan can be executed for the extending of agriculture; of which in another place. This must be gone about with the greatest circumspection; for if grain be thereby made to fall too low, you ruin the landed interest, and although (as we have said above) all things soon become balanced in a trading nation, yet sudden and violent revolutions, such as this must be, are always to be apprehended. They are ever dangerous; and the spirit of every class of inhabitants must be kept up.

By a discredit call upon any branch of industry, the hands employed in it may be made to abandon it, to the great detriment of the whole. This will infallibly happen, when violent transitions do not proceed from natural causes, as in the example here before us, when the price of grain is supposed to be brought down, from the increase of its quantity by importation, and not by plenty. Because, upon the falling of the market by importation, the poor farmer has nothing to make up for the low price he gets for his grain; whereas, when it proceeds from plenty, he has an additional quantity.

In years, therefore, of general scarcity, a statesman should not, by premiums given, reduce the price of grain, but in a reciprocal proportion to the quantity wanted: that is to say, the more grain is wanted, the less the price should be diminished.

It may appear a very extensive project for any government to undertake to keep down the prices of grain, in years of general scarcity. I allow it to be politically impossible to keep prices low; because if all Europe be taken together, the produce of the whole is consumed one year with another, by the inhabitants; and in a year when there is a general scarcity, it would be very hard, if not impossible, (without having previously established a plan for this purpose) to make any nation live in plenty while others are starving. All therefore that is proposed, is to keep the prices of grain in as just a proportion as possible to the plenty of the year.

Now if a government does not interpose, this never is the case. I shall suppose the inhabitants of a country to consume, in a year of moderate plenty, six millions of quarters of grain; if in a year of scarcity it shall be found, that one million of quarters, or indeed a far less quantity, be wanting, the five millions of quarters produced, will rise in their price to perhaps double the ordinary value, instead of being increased only by one fifth. But if you examine the case in countries where trade is not well established, as in some inland provinces on the continent, it is no extraordinary thing to see grain bearing three times the price it is worth in ordinary years of plenty, and yet if in such a year there were wanting six months provisions for the inhabitants of a great kingdom, all the rest of Europe would perhaps hardly be able to keep them from starving.

It is the fear of want, and not real want, which makes grain rise to immoderate prices. Now as this extraordinary revolution in the rise of it, does not proceed from a natural cause, to wit, the degree of scarcity, but to the avarice and evil designs of men who hoard it up, it produces as bad consequences to that part of the inhabitants of a country employed in manufactures, as the fall of grain would produce to the farmers, in case the prices should be, by importation, brought below the just proportion of the quantity produced in the nation.

Besides the importation of grain, there is another way of increasing the quantity of it very considerably, in some countries of Europe. In a year of scarcity, could not the quantity of food be considerably augmented by a prohibition to make malt liquors, allowing the importation of wines and brandies; or indeed without laying any restraint upon the liberty of the inhabitants as to malt liquors, I am persuaded that the liberty of importing wines duty free, would, in years of scarcity, considerably augment the quantity of subsistence.

This is not a proper place to examine the inconvenience which might result to the revenue by such a scheme; because we are here only talking of those expedients which might be fallen upon to preserve a balance on foreign trade. An exchequer which is filled at the expence of this, will not continue long in a flourishing condition.

These appear to be the most rational temporary expedients to diminish the price of grain in years of scarcity; we shall afterwards examine the principles upon which a plan may be laid down to destroy all precariousness in the price of subsistence.

Precautions of another kind must be taken in years of plenty; for high prices occasioned by exportation are as hurtful to the poor tradesman as if they were occasioned by scarcity. And low prices occasioned by superfluity are as hurtful to the poor husbandman as if his crop had failed him.

A statesman therefore, should be very attentive to put the inland trade in grain upon the best footing possible, to prevent the frauds of merchants, and to promote an equal distribution of food in all corners of the country: and by the means of importation and exportation, according to plenty and scarcity, to regulate a just proportion between the general plenty of the year in Europe, and the price of subsistence; always observing to keep it somewhat lower at home, than it can be found in any rival nation in trade. If this method be well observed, inhabitants will multiply; and this is a principal step towards reducing the expence of manufactures; because you increase the number of hands, and consequently diminish the price of labour.