and Jutland, and corn from almost all
the different countries of Europe. A small
quantity of manufactured produce, purchases
a great quantity of rude produce. A trading
and manufacturing country, therefore, naturally
purchases, with a small part of its manufactured
produce, a great part of the rude
produce of other countries; while, on the
contrary, a country without trade and manufactures
is generally obliged to purchase, at
the expense of a great part of its rude produce,
a very small part of the manufactured
produce of other countries. The one exports
what can subsist and accommodate but a very
few, and imports the subsistence and accommodation
of a great number. The other exports
the accommodation and subsistence of a
great number, and imports that of a very
few only. The inhabitants of the one must
always enjoy a much greater quantity of subsistence
than what their own lands, in the
actual state of their cultivation, could afford.
The inhabitants of the other most always enjoy
a much smaller quantity.
This system, however, with all its imperfections,
is perhaps the nearest approximation
to the truth that has yet been published upon
the subject of political economy; and is upon
that account, well worth the consideration of
every man who wishes to examine with attention
the principles of that very important
science. Though in representing the labour
which is employed upon land as the only productive
labour, the notions which it inculcates
are, perhaps, too narrow and confined;
yet in representing the wealth of nations as
consisting, not in the unconsumable riches of
money, but in the consumable goods annually
reproduced by the labour of the society,
and in representing perfect liberty as the only
effectual expedient for rendering this annual
reproduction the greatest possible, its doctrine
seems to be in every respect as just as it
is generous and liberal. Its followers are
very numerous; and as men are fond of paradoxes,
and of appearing to understand what
surpasses the comprehensions of ordinary people,
the paradox which it maintains, concerning
the unproductive nature of manufacturing
labour, has not, perhaps, contributed a little
to increase the number of its admirers. They
have for some years past made a pretty considerable
sect, distinguished in the French
republic of letters by the name of the Economists.
Their works have certainly been of
some service to their country; not only by
bringing into general discussion, many subjects
which had never been well examined
before, but by influencing, in some measure,
the public administration in favour
of agriculture. It has been in consequence
of their representations, accordingly, that the
agriculture of France has been delivered from
several of the oppressions which it before laboured
under. The term, during which such
a lease can be granted, as will be valid against
every future purchaser or proprietor of the
land, has been prolonged from nine to twenty-seven
years. The ancient provincial restraints
upon the transportation of corn from one province
of the kingdom to another, have been
entirely taken away; and the liberty of exporting
it to all foreign countries, has been
established as the common law of the kingdom
in all ordinary cases. This sect, in their
works, which are very numerous, and which
treat not only of what is properly called Political
Economy, or of the nature and causes of
the wealth of nations, but of every other
branch of the system of civil government, all
follow implicitly, and without any sensible
variation, the doctrine of Mr. Quesnai.
There is, upon this account, little variety in
the greater part of their works. The most
distinct and best connected account of this
doctrine is to be found in a little book written
by Mr. Mercier de la Riviere, some time intendant
of Martinico, entitled, The natural and
essential Order of Political Societies. The
admiration of this whole sect for their master,
who was himself a man of the greatest modesty
and simplicity, is not inferior to that of
any of the ancient philosophers for the founders
of their respective systems. 'There have
been since the world began,' says a very diligent
and respectable author, the Marquis de
Mirabeau, 'three great inventions which have
principally given stability to political societies,
independent of many other inventions which
have enriched and adorned them. The first
is the invention of writing, which alone gives
human nature the power of transmitting,
without alteration, its laws, its contracts, its
annals, and its discoveries. The second is
the invention of money, which binds together
all the relations between civilized societies.
The third is the economical table, the result
of the other two, which completes them both
by perfecting their object; the great discovery
of our age, but of which our posterity will
reap the benefit.'
As the political economy of the nations of
modern Europe has been more favourable to
manufactures and foreign trade, the industry
of the towns, than to agriculture, the industry
of the country; so that of other nations
has followed a different plan, and has been
more favourable to agriculture than to manufactures
and foreign trade.
The policy of China favours agriculture
more than all other employments. In China,
the condition of a labourer is said to be as
much superior to that of an artificer, as in
most parts of Europe that of an artificer is to
that of a labourer. In China, the great ambition
of every man is to get possession of a
little bit of land, either in property or in
lease; and leases are there said to be granted
upon very moderate terms, and to be sufficiently
secured to the lessees. The Chinese have