grow into more general ufe, or an improvement will take place in the quality and fabric which will de mand a proportionable addition of hands. The number of perfons employed in the manufactory of stockings has not, I apprehend, decreased, fince the invention of flocking looms. The amount of what is expended upon the article after fubftracting from it the price of the raw material, and confequently what is paid for work in this branch of our manufactories, is not lefs than it was before. Goods of a finer texture are worn in the place of coarfer. This is the change which the invention has produced; and which compenfates to the manufactory for every other inconveniency. Add to which, that in the above, and in almost every inflance, an improvement which conduces to the recommendation of a manufactory, either by the cheapness or the quality of the goods, draws up after it many dependent employments, in which no abbreviation has taken place.

From the reafoning that has been purfued, and the various confiderations fuggefted in this chapter, a judgment may, in fome fort, be formed, how far regulations of law are in their nature capable of contributing to the fupport and advancement of population. I fay how far: for, as in many fubje&s, fo efpecially in thofe which relate to commerce, to plenty, to riches, and to the number of people, more is wont to be expected from laws, than laws can do. Laws can only imperfectly restrain that diffoluteness of manners, which, by diminishing the frequency of marriages, impairs the very fource of population. Laws cannot regulate the wants of mankind, their mode of living, or their defire of thofe fuperfluities, which fafhion, more irrefiftable than laws, has once introduced into general ufage, or, in other words, has erected into neceffaries of life.

life. Laws cannot induce men to enter into marriages, when the expences of a family muft deprive them of that fyftem of accommodation, to which they have habituated their expectations. Laws, by their protection, by affuring to the labourer the fruit and profit of his labour, may help to make a people induftrious; but without induftry, the laws cannot provide either fubfiftence, or employment: laws cannot make corn grow without toil and care; or trade flourish without art and diligence. In fpite of all laws, the expert, laborious, honeft workman will be employed, in preference to the lazy, the unfkilful, the fraudulent, and evafive: and this is not more true of two inhabitants of the fame village, than it is of the people of two different countries, which communicate cither with each other, or with the reft of the world. The natural bafis of trade is rivalfhip of quality and price; or, which is the fame thing, of fkill and induftry. Every attempt to force trade by operation of law, that is, by compelling perfons to buy goods at one market, which they can obtain cheaper and better from another, is fure to be either eluded by the quick-fightednefs and inceffant activity of private intereft, or to be frustrated by retaliation. One half of the commercial laws of many ftates are calculated merely to counteract the restrictions which have been impofed by other ftates. Perhaps the only way, in which the interpofition of law is falutary in trade, is in the prevention of frauds.

Next to the indifpenfable requifites of internal peace and fecurity, the chief advantage, which can be derived to population from the interference of law, appears to me to confift in the encouragement of agriculture. This, at leaft, is the direct way of increafing the number of the people; every other mode being effectual only by its influence upon this. Now the principal expedient by which fuch a pur pofe can be promoted, is to adjust the laws of property, as nearly as poffible, to the following rules :

firftly, "to give to the occupier all the power over the "foil which is neceffary for its perfect cultivation;" -fecondly, "to affign the whole profit of every

improvement to the perfons by whose activity it is "carried on." What we call property in land, as hath been obferved above, is power over it. Now it is indifferent to the public in whofe hands this power refides, if it be rightly ufed: it matters not to whom the land belongs, if it be well cultivated. When we lament that great eftates are often united in the fame hand, or complain that one inan poffeffes what would be fufficient for a thoufand, we fuffer ourfelves to be mifled by words. The owner of ten thousand pounds a year confumes little more of the produce of the foil than the owner of the ten pounds a year. If the cultivation be equal, the estate, in the hands of one great lord, affords fubfiftence and employment to the fame number of perfons, as it would do, if it were divided amongst a hundred propri etors. In like manner, we ought to judge of the effect upon the public intereft, which may arise from lands being holden by the king, or by the fubject; by private perfons, or by corporations; by laymen, or ecclefiaftics; in fee, or for life; by virtue of office, or in right of inheritance. mean that thefe varieties make no difference, but I mean, that all the difference they do make refpects the cultivation of the lands which are fo holden.

I do not

There exift in this country conditions of tenure, which condemn the land itself to perpetual fterility. Of this kind is the right of common, which precludes each proprietor from the improvement, or even the convenient occupation of his eftate, without, what feldom can be obtained, the confent of many others. This tenure is alfo ufually embarraffed by the interference of manerial claims, under which it often happens that the furface belongs to one owner and the foil to another; fo that neither owner can stir a clod without the concurrence of his partner in the property. In many manors, the

tenant

tenant is reftrained from granting leafes beyond a Thort term of years; which renders every plan of folid improvement impracticable. In thefe cafes the owner wants, what the firft rule of rational policy requires, "fufficient power over the foil for its per"fect cultivation." This power ought to be extended to him by fome eafy and general law of enfranchisement, partition, and inclofure; which, though compulfory upon the lord, or the reft of the tenants, whilft it has in view the melioration of the foil, and tenders an equitable compenfation for every right that it takes away, is neither more arbitrary, nor more dangerous to the ftability of property, than that which is done in the conftruction of roads, bridges, embankments, navigable canals, and indeed, in almost every public work, in which private owners of land are obliged to accept that price for their property which an indifferent jury may award. It may here however be proper to obferve, that although the inclofure of wafles and paftures be generally beneficial to population, yet the inclosure of lands in tillage, in order to convert them into paftures, is as generally hurtful.

But fecondly, agriculture is difcouraged by every conftitution of landed property, which lets in thofe, who have no concern in the improvement, to a participation of the profit. This objection is applicable to all fuch cuftoms of manors as fubject the proprietor, upon the death of the lord or tenant, or the alienation of the eftate, to a fine apportioned to the improved value of the land. But of all inftitutions, which are, in this way, adverfe to cultivation and improvement, none is fo noxious as that of tithes, A claimant here enters into the produce who contributed no affiftance whatever to the production. When years, perhaps, of care and toil have matured an improvement; when the hufbandman fees new crops ripening to his fkill and induftry, the moment he is ready to put his fickle to the grain, he finds himfelf compelled to divide his harveft with a ftranger

ftranger. Tithes are a tax not only upon induftry, but upon that induftry which feeds mankind; upon that fpecies of exertion, which it is the aim of all wife laws to cherish and promote; and to uphold and excite which, compofes, as we have feen, the main benefit that the community receives from the whole fyftem of trade, and the fuccefs of commerce. And together with the more general inconveniency that attends the exaction of tithes, there is this addition al evil, in the mode at leaft according to which they are collected at prefent, that they operate as a bounty upon pafturage. The burthen of the tax falls with its chief, if not with its whole weight, upon tillage; that is to fay, upon that precife mode of cultivation, which, as hath been shown above, it is the bufinets of the ftate to relieve and remunerate, in preference to every other. No measure of fuch extenfive concern appears to me fo practicable, nor any fingle alteration fo benfiecial, as the converfion of tithes into corn This commutation, I am convinced, might be fo adjufted, as to fecure to the title-holder a complete and perpetual equivalent for his interest, and to leave to induftry its full operation and entire reward.

CHA P. XII.

OF WAR, AND OF MILITARY

ESTABLISHMENTS

ECAUSE the Chriftian fcriptures defcribe wars, as what they are, as crimes or judgments; fome have been led to believe that it is unlawful for a Chriftian to bear arms. But it fhould be remembered, that it may be neceffary for individuals to

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