of labour is as necessary for the improvement
of this, as of every other art. Into other
arts, the division of labour is naturally introduced
by the prudence of individuals, who
find that they promote their private interest
better by confining themselves to a particular
trade, than by exercising a great number.
But it is the wisdom of the state only, which
can render the trade of a soldier a particular
trade, separate and distinct from all others.
A private citizen, who, in time of profound
peace, and without any particular encouragement
from the public, should spend the greater
part of his time in military exercises, might,
no doubt, both improve himself very much in
them, and amuse himself very well; but he
certainly would not promote his own interest.
It is the wisdom of the state only, which can
render it for his interest to give up the greater
part of his time to this peculiar occupation;
and states have not always had this wisdom,
even when their circumstances had become
such, that the preservation of their existence
required that they should have it.
A shepherd has a great deal of leisure; a
husbandman, in the rude state of husbandry,
has some; an artificer or manufacturer has
none at all. The first may, without any loss,
employ a great deal of his time in martial exercises;
the second may employ some part of
it; but the last cannot employ a single hour
in them without some loss, and his attention
to his own interest naturally leads him to neglect
them altogether. Those improvements in
husbandry, too, which the progress of arts
and manufacturers necessarily introduces, leave
the husbandman as little leisure as the artificer.
Military exercises come to be as much
neglected by the inhabitants of the country as
by those of the town, and the great body of the
people becomes altogether unwarlike. That
wealth, at the same time, which always follows
the improvements of agriculture and manufactures,
and which, in reality, is no more than
the accumulated produce of those improvements,
provokes the invasion of all their
neighbours. An industrious, and, upon that
account, a wealthy nation, is of all nations
the most likely to be attacked; and unless the
states takes some new measure for the public
defence, the natural habits of the people render
them altogether incapable of defending
themselves.
In these circumstances, there seem to be
but two methods by which the state can
make any tolerable provision for the public
defence.
If may either, first, by means of a very rigorous
police, and in spite of the whole bent
of the interest, genius, and inclinations of the
people, enforce the practice of military exercises,
and oblige either all the citizens of the
military age, or a certain number of them, to
join in some measure the trade of a soldier to
whatever other trade or profession they may
happen to carry on.
Or, secondly, by maintaining and employing
a certain number of citizens in the constant
practice of military exercises, it may
render the trade of a soldier a particular trade,
separate and distinct from all others.
If the state has recourse to the first of those
two expedients, its military force is said to
consist in a militia; if to the second, it is
said to consist in a standing army. The practice
of military exercises is the sole or principal
occupation of the soldiers of a standing
army, and the maintenance or pay which the
state affords them is the principal and ordinary
fund of their subsistence. The practice
of military exercises is only the occasional occupation
of the soldiers of a militia, and they
derive the principal and ordinary fund of their
subsistence from some other occupation. In
a militia, the character of the labourer, artificer,
or tradesman, predominates over that of
the soldier; in a standing army, that of the
soldier predominates over every other character;
and in this distinction seems to consist the
essential difference between those two different
species of military force.
Militias have been of several different kinds.
In some countries, the citizens destined for
defending the state seem to have been exercised
only, without being, if I may say so, regimented;
that is, without being divided into
separate and distinct bodies of troops, each
of which performed its exercises under its
own proper and permanent officers. In the
republics of ancient Greece and Rome, each
citizen, as long as he remained at home, seems
to have practiced his exercises, either separately
and independently, or with such of his
equals as he liked best; and not to have been
attached to any particular body of troops, till
he was actually called upon to take the field.
In other countries, the militia has not only
been exercised, but regimented. In England,
in Switzerland, and, I believe, in every other
country of modern Europe, where any imperfect
military force of this kind has been
established, every militiaman is, even in time
of peace, attached to a particular body of
troops, which performs its exercises under its
own proper and permanent officers.
Before the invention of fire-arms, that army
was superior in which the soldiers had, each
individually, the greatest skill and dexterity
in the use of their arms. Strength and agility
of body were of the highest consequence,
and commonly determined the fate of battles.
But this skill and dexterity in the use of their
arms could be acquired only, in the same
manner as fencing is at present, by practising,
not in great bodies, but each man separately,
in a particular school, under a particular
master, or with his own particular equals and
companions. Since the invention of fire-arms,