from which it is raised being given, will depena greatly upon the kind. For instance: a piece of ground capable of supplying animal food sufficient for the subsistence of ten persons, would sustain, at least, the double of that number with grain, roots, and milk. The first resource of savage life is in the flesh of wild animals; hence the numbers amongst savage nations, compared with the tract of country which they occupy, are univer

and to maintain that appearance which the custom of society requires. This obligation creates such a demand upon his income, and adds so much to the cost and burden of a family, as to put it out of his power to marry, with the prospect of continuing his habits, or of maintaining his place and situation in the world. We see, in this description, the cause which induces men to waste their lives in a barren celibacy; and this cause, which impairs the very source of popula-sally small; because this species of provision is, tion, is justly placed to the account of luxury.

It appears, then, that luxury, considered with a view to population, acts by two opposite effects; and it seems probable that there exists a point in the scale, to which luxury may ascend, or to which the wants of mankind may be multiplied with advantage to the community, and beyond which the prejudicial consequences begin to preponderate. The determination of this point, though it assume the form of an arithmetical problem, depends upon circumstances too numerous, intricate, and undefined; to admit of a precise solution. However, from what has been observed concerning the tendency of luxury to diminish marriages, in which tendency the evil of it resides, the following general conclusions may be established :— 1st, That, of different kinds of luxury, those are the most innocent which afford employment to the greatest number of artists and manufacturers; or those, in other words, in which the price of the work bears the greatest proportion to that of the raw material. Thus, luxury in dress or furniture, is universally preferable to luxury in eating, because the articles which constitute the one, are more the production of human art and industry, than those which supply the other.

of all others, supplied in the slenderest proportion. The next step was the invention of pasturage, or the rearing of flocks and herds of tame animals: this alteration added to the stock of provision much. But the last and principal improvement was to follow; namely, tillage, or the artificial production of corn, esculent plants, and roots. This discovery, whilst it changed the quality of human food, augmented the quantity in a vast proportion. So far as the state of population is governed and limited by the quantity of provision, perhaps there is no single cause that affects it so powerfully, as the kind and quality of food which chance or usage hath introduced into a country. In England, notwithstanding the produce of the soil has been, of late, considerably increased, by the enclosure of wastes, and the adoption, in many places, of a more successful husbandry, yet we do not observe a corresponding addition to the number of inhabitants; the reason of which appears to me to be, the more general consumption of animal food amongst us. Many ranks of people whose ordinary diet was, in the last century, prepared almost entirely from milk, roots, and vegetables, now require every day a considerable portion of the flesh of animals. Hence a great part of the richest lands of the country are conna-verted to pasturage. Much also of the bread-corn, which went directly to the nourishment of human bodies, now only contributes to it by fattening the flesh of sheep and oxen. The mass and volume of provisions are hereby diminished; and what is gained in the melioration of the soil, is lost in the quality of the produce. This consideration teaches us, that tillage, as an object of national care and encouragement, is universally preferable to pasturage, because the kind of provision which it yields, goes much farther in the sustentation of human life. Tillage is also recommended by this additional advantage, that it affords employment to a much more numerous peasantry. Indeed, pasturage seems to be the art of a nation, either imperfectly civilized, as are many of the tribes which cultivate it in the internal parts of Asia; or of a nation, like Spain, declining from its summit by luxury and inactivity.

2dly, That it is the diffusion, rather than the degree of luxury, which is to be dreaded as a tional evil. The mischief of luxury consists, as we have seen, in the obstruction which it forms to marriage. Now it is only a small part of the people that the higher ranks in any country compose; for which reason, the facility or the difficulty of supporting the expense of their station, and the consequent increase or diminution of marriages among them, will influence the state of population but little. So long as the prevalency of luxury is confined to a few of elevated rank, much of the benefit is felt, and little of the inconveniency. But when the imitation of the same manner descends, as it always will do, into the mass of the people; when it advances the requisites of living, beyond what it adds to men's abilities to purchase them; then it is that luxury checks the formation of families, in a degree that ought to alarm the public fears.

3dly, That the condition most favourable to population is that of a laborious, frugal people, ministering to the demands of an opulent, luxurious nation; because this situation, whilst it leaves them every advantage of luxury, exempts them from the evils which naturally accompany its admission into any country.

II. Next to the mode of living, we are to consider "the quantity of provision suited to that mode, which is either raised in the country, or imported into it:" for this is the order in which we assigned the causes of population, and undertook to treat of them. Now, if we measure the quantity of provision by the number of human bodies it will support in due health and vigour, this quantity, the extent and quality of the soil

The kind and quality of provision, together with the extent and capacity of the soil from which it is raised, being the same; the quantity procured will principally depend upon two circumstances,-the ability of the occupier, and the encouragement which he receives. The greatest misfortune of a country is an indigent tenantry. Whatever be the native advantages of the soil, or even the skill and industry of the occupier, the want of a sufficient capital confines every plan, as well as cripples and weakens every operation of husbandry. This evil is felt, where agriculture is accounted a servile or mean employment; where farms are extremely subdivided and badly furnished with habitations; where leases are unknown, or are of short or precarious duration.

With respect to the encouragement of husbandry; however it may come in aid of another principle, in this, as in every other employment, the true re- however it may occasionally qualify the rigour, or ward of industry is in the price and sale of the supply the imperfection, of an established rule of produce. The exclusive right to the produce, is distribution, can never itself become that rule or the only incitement which acts constantly and principle; because men will not work to give the universally; the only spring which keeps hu- produce of their labour away-Moreover, the man labour in motion. All therefore that the only equivalents that can be offered in exchange laws can do, is to secure this right to the occupier for provision are power and labour. All property of the ground; that is, to constitute such a system is power. What we call property in land, is the of tenure, that the full and entire advantage of power to use it, and to exclude others from the every improvement go to the benefit of the im- use. Money is the representative of power, beprover; that every man work for himself, and not cause it is convertible into power: the value of for another; and that no one share in the profit it consists in its faculty of procuring power over who does not assist in the production. By the things and persons. But power which results occupier I here mean, not so much the person from civil conventions (and of this kind is what who performs the work, as him who procures the we call a man's fortune or estate,) is necessarily labour and directs the management: and I con- confined to a few, and is withal soon exhausted: sider the whole profit as received by the occupier, whereas the capacity of labour is every man's when the occupier is benefited by the whole natural possession, and composes a constant and value of what is produced, which is the case with renewing fund. The hire, therefore, or produce the tenant who pays a fixed rent for the use of of personal industry, is that which the bulk of land, no less than with the proprietor who holds every community must bring to market, in exit as his own. The one has the same interest in change for the means of subsistence; in other the produce, and in the advantage of every im- words, employment must, in every country, be the provement, as the other. Likewise the proprietor, medium of distribution, and the source of supply though he grant out his estate to farm, may be to individuals. But when we consider the proconsidered as the occupier, insomuch as he regu-duction and distribution of provision, as distinct lates the occupation by the choice, superintend- from, and independent of, each other; when, supency, and encouragement, of his tenants, by the posing the same quantity to be produced, we disposition of his lands, by erecting buildings, pro- inquire in what way, or according to what rule. viding accommodations, by prescribing conditions, it may be distributed; we are led to a conception or supplying implements and materials of improve- of the subject not at all agreeable to truth and ment; and is entitled, by the rule of public expe- reality; for, in truth and reality, though provision diency above mentioned, to receive, in the advance must be produced before it be distributed, yet the of his rent, a share of the benefit which arises production depends, in a great measure, upon the from the increased produce of his estate. The distribution. The quantity of provision raised violation of this fundamental maxim of agrarian out of the ground, so far as the raising of it policy constitutes the chief objection to the holding requires human art or labour, will evidently be of lands by the state, by the king, by corporate regulated by the demand: the demand, or, in other bodies, by private persons in right of their offices words, the price and sale, being that which alone or benefices. The inconveniency to the public rewards the care, or excites the diligence, of the arises not so much from the unalienable quality of husbandman. But the sale of provision depends lands thus holden in perpetuity, as from hence; upon the number, not of those who want, but of that proprietors of this description seldom con- those who have something to offer in return for tribute much either of attention or expense to the what they want; not of those who would consume, cultivation of their estates, yet claim, by the rent, but of those who can buy; that is, upon the num a share in the profit of every improvement that is ber of those who have the fruits of some other made upon them. This complaint can only be kind of industry to tender in exchange for what obviated by "long leases at a fixed rent," which they stand in need of from the production of the convey a large portion of the interest to those who soil. actually conduct the cultivation. The same objection is applicable to the holding of lands by foreign proprietors, and in some degree to estates of too great extent being placed in the same

hands.

We see, therefore, the connection between population and employment. Employment affects population "directly," as it affords the only medium of distribution by which individuals can obtain from the common stock a supply for the III. Beside the production of provision, there wants of their families: it affects population, "inremains to be considered the DISTRIBUTION.-It is directly," as it augments the stock itself of proviin vain that provisions abound in the country, sion, in the only way by which the production of unless I be able to obtain a share of them. This it can be effectually encouraged,-by furnishing reflection belongs to every individual. The plenty purchasers. No man can purchase without an of provision produced, the quantity of the public equivalent; and that equivalent, by the generality stock affords subsistence to individuals, and en- of the people, must in every country be derived couragement to the formation of families, only in from employment. And upon this basis is foundproportion as it is distributed, that is, in propor-ed the public benefit of trade, that is to say, its tion as these individuals are allowed to draw from it a supply of their own wants. The distribution, therefore, becomes of equal consequence to population with the production.-Now there is but one principle of distribution that can ever become universal, namely, the principle of "exchange;" or, in other words, that every man have something to give in return for what he wants. Bounty, U

subserviency to population, in which its only real utility consists. Of that industry, and of those arts ar.d branches of trade, which are employed in the production, conveyance, and preparation, of any principal species of human food, as of the business of the husbandman, the butcher, baker, brewer, corn merchant, &c. we acknowledge the necessity: likewise of those manufactures which

soil, nor any concern in its cultivation, is regularly supplied with the produce, because he gives, in exchange for what he stands in need of, something upon which the receiver places an equal value: and the community is kept quiet, while both sides are engaged in their respective occupations.

furnish us with warm clothing, convenient habi- | remaining unemployed. The idleness of one half tations, domestic utensils, as of the weaver, tailor, of the community would overwhelm the whole smith, carpenter, &c. we perceive (in climates, with confusion and disorder. One only way prehowever, like ours, removed at a distance from the sents itself of removing the difficulty which this sun,) the conduciveness to population, by their question states, and which is simply this: that rendering human life more healthy, vigorous, and they, whose work is not wanted, nor can be emcomfortable. But not one half the occupations ployed, in the raising of provision out of the which compose the trade of Europe, fall within ground, convert their hands and ingenuity to the either of these descriptions. Perhaps two-thirds fabrication of articles which may gratify and reof the manufacturers in England are employed quite those who are so employed, or who by the upon articles of confessed luxury, ornament, or division of lands in the country, are entitled to splendour; in the superfluous embellishment of the exclusive possession of certain parts of them. some articles which are useful in their kind, or By this contrivance, all things proceed well. The upon others which have no conceivable use or occupier of the ground raises from it the utmost value but what is founded in caprice or fashion. that he can procure, because he is repaid for what What can be less necessary or less connected with he can spare by something else which he wants, the sustentation of human life, than the whole or with which he is pleased: the artist or manufacproduce of the silk, lace, and plate manufacturer, though he have neither any property in the tory? yet what multitudes labour in the different branches of these arts! What can be imagined more capricious than the fondness for tobacco and snuff? yet how many various occupations, and how many thousands in each, are set at work in administering to this frivolous gratification! Concerning trades of this kind, (and this kind comprehends more than half the trades that are exercised,) it may fairly be asked, "How, since they add nothing to the stock of provision, do they tend to increase the number of the people?" We are taught to say of trade, "that it maintains multitudes;" but by what means does it maintain them, when it produces nothing upon which the support of human life depends ?-In like manner with respect to foreign commerce; of that mer-productive; the rest is instrumental;-both equalchandise which brings the necessaries of life into a country, which imports, for example, corn, or cattle, or cloth, or fuel, we allow the tendency to advance population, because it increases the stock of provision by which the people are subsisted. But this effect of foreign commerce is so little seen in our own country, that I believe, it may be affirmed of Great Britain, what Bishop Berkley said of a neighbouring island, that, if it were encompassed with a wall of brass fifty cubits high, the country might maintain the same number of inhabitants that find subsistence in it at present; and that every necessary, and even every real comfort and accommodation of human life, might be supplied in as great abundance as they now are. Here, therefore, as before, we may fairly ask, by what operation it is, that foreign commerce, which brings into the country no one article of human subsistence, promotes the multiplication of human

life?

The answer of this inquiry, will be contained in the discussion of another, viz:

Since the soil will maintain many more than it can employ, what must be done, supposing the country to be full, with the remainder of the inhabitants? They who, by the rules of partition, (and some such must be established in every country,) are entitled to the land; and they who, by their labour upon the soil, acquire a right in its produce, will not part with their property for nothing; or, rather, they will no longer raise from the soil what they can neither use themselves, nor exchange for what they want. Or, lastly, if these were willing to distribute what they could spare of the provision which the ground yielded, to others who had no share or concern in the property or cultivation of it, yet still the most enormous mischiefs would ensue, from great numbers

It appears, then, that the business of one half of mankind is, to set the other half at work; that is, to provide articles which, by tempting the desires, may stimulate the industry, and call forth the activity, of those upon the exertion of whose industry, and the application of whose faculties, the production of human provision depends. A certain portion only of human labour is, or can be

ly necessary, though the one have no other object than to excite the other. It appears also, that it signifies nothing, as to the main purpose of trade, how superfluous the articles which it furnishes are; whether the want of them be real or imaginary; whether it be founded in nature, or in opinion, in fashion, habit, or emulation: it is enough that they be actually desired and sought after. Flourishing cities are raised and supported by trading in tobacco; populous towns subsist by the manufactory of ribands. A watch may be a very unnecessary appendage to the dress of a peasant; yet if the peasant will till the ground in order to ob tain a watch, the true design of trade is answered: and the watchmaker, while he polishes the case, or files the wheels of his machine, is contributing to the production of corn as effectually, though not so directly, as if he handled the spade or held the plough. The use of tobacco has been mentioned already, not only as an acknowledged superfluity, but as affording a remarkable example of the caprice of human appetite: yet if the fisherman will ply his nets, or the mariner fetch rice from foreign countries, in order to procure to himself this indulgence, the market is supplied with two important articles of provision, by the instrumentality of a merchandise which has no other apparent use than the gratification of a vitiated palate.

But it may come to pass that the husbandman, land-owner, or whoever he be that is entiled to the produce of the soil, will no longer exchange it for what the manufacturer has to offer. He is already supplied to the extent of his desires. For instance, he wants no more cloth; he will no longer therefore give the weaver corn in return for the produce of his looms: but he would readily give it for tea, or for wine. When the weaver

finds this to be the case, he has nothing to do but | ed with one kind of manufacture, it renews the to send his cloth abroad, in exchange for tea or demand by converting it into another: but it is infor wine, which he may barter for that provision ferior to the former, as it promotes this end by one which the offer of his cloth will no longer procure. side only of the bargain,-by what it carries out. The circulation is thus revived: and the benefit -The last, the lowest, and most disadvantageous of the discovery is, that, whereas the number of species of commerce, is the exportation of raw weavers, who could find subsistence from their materials in return for wrought goods: as when employment, was before limited by the consump- wool is sent abroad to purchase velvets; hides or tion of cloth in the country, that number is now peltry, to procure shoes, hats, or linen cloth. This augmented, in proportion to the demand for tea trade is unfavourable to population, because it and wine. This is the principle of foreign com- leaves no room or demand for employment, either merce. In the magnitude and complexity of the in what it takes out of the country, or in what it machine, the principle of motion is sometimes lost brings into it. Its operation on both sides is or unobserved; but it is always simple and the noxious. By its exports, it diminishes the very same, to whatever extent it may be diversified subject upon which the industry of the inhabitand enlarged in its operation. ants ought to be exercised; by its imports, it lesThe effect of trade upon agriculture, the process sens the encouragement of that industry, in the of which we have been endeavouring to describe, same proportion that it supplies the consumption is visible in the neighbourhood of trading towns, of the country with the produce of foreign labour. and in those districts which carry on a communi- Of different branches of manufactory, those are, cation with the markets of trading towns. The in their nature, the most beneficial, in which the husbandmen are busy and skilful; the peasantry price of the wrought article exceeds in the highest laborious; the land is managed to the best advan- proportion that of the raw material: for this excess tage; and double the quantity of corn or herbage measures the quantity of employment, or, in other (articles which are ultimately converted into hu- words, the number of manufacturers, which each man provision) raised from it, of what the same branch sustains. The produce of the ground is soil yields in remoter and more neglected parts of never the most advantageous article of foreign the country. Wherever a thriving manufactory commerce. Under a perfect state of public econfinds means to establish itself, a new vegetation omy, the soil of the country should be applied springs up around it. I believe it is true that agri- solely to the raising of provisions for the inhabitculture never arrives at any considerable, much ants, and its trade be supplied by their industry. less at its highest, degree of perfection, where it is A nation will never reach its proper extent of not connected with trade; that is, where the de- population, so long as its principal commerce conmand for the produce is not increased by the con- sists in the exportation of corn or cattle, or even sumption of trading cities. of wine, oil, tobacco, madder, indigo, timber; because these last articles take up that surface which ought to be covered with the materials of human subsistence.

Let it be remembered then, that agriculture is the immediate source of human provision; that trade conduces to the production of provision only as it promotes agriculture; that the whole system of commerce, vast and various as it is, hath no other public importance than its subserviency to this end.

It must be here however noticed, that we have all along considered the inhabitants of a country as maintained by the produce of the country; and that what we have said is applicable with strictness to this supposition alone. The reasoning, nevertheless, may easily be adapted to a different case: for when provision is not produced, but imported, what has been affirmed concerning provision, will be, in a great measure, true of that article, whe ther it be money, produce, or labour, which is exchanged for provision. Thus, when the Dutch raise madder, and exchange it for corn; or when the people of America plant tobacco, and send it to Europe for cloth; the cultivation of madder and tobacco becomes as necessary to the subsistence of the inhabitants, and by consequence will affect the state of population in these countries as sensibly, as the actual production of food, or the manufactory of raiment. In like manner, when the same inhabitants of Holland earn money by the carriage of the produce of one country to another, and with that money purchase the provision from abroad, which their own land is not extensive enough to supply, the increase or decline of this carrying trade will influence the numbers of the people no less than similar changes would do in the cultivation of the soil.

We return to the proposition we laid down, that " employment universally promotes population." From this proposition it follows, that the comparative utility of different branches of national commerce is measured by the number which each branch employs. Upon which principle a scale may easily be constructed, which shall assign to the several kinds and divisions of foreign trade, their respective degrees of public importance. In this scale, the first place belongs to the exchange of wrought goods for raw materials, as of broad cloth for raw silk; cutlery for wool; clocks or watches for iron, flax, or furs; because this traffic provides a market for the labour that has already been expended, at the same time that it supplies materials for new industry. Population always flourishes where this species of commerce obtains to any considerable degree. It is the cause of employment, or the certain indication. As it takes off the manufactures of the country, it promotes employment; as it brings in raw materials, it supposes the existence of manufactories in the country, and a demand for the article when manufactured. The second place is due to that commerce, which barters one species of wrought goods for another, as stuffs for calicoes, fustians for cambrics, leather for paper, or wrought goods for articles which require no farther preparation, as 1. EMIGRATION.-Emigration may be either for wine, oil, tea, sugar, &c. This also assists the overflowing of a country, or the desertion. employment; because, when the country is stock-As the increase of the species is indefinite; and

The few principles already established, will enable us to describe the effects upon population which may be expected from the following important articles of national conduct and economy:

the number of inhabitants which any given tract | than that of a country which works up goods for or surface can support, finite; it is evident that great numbers may be constantly leaving a country, and yet the country remain constantly full. Or whatever be the cause which invincibly limits the population of a country; when the number of the people has arrived at that limit, the progress of generation, beside continuing the succession, will supply multitudes for foreign emigration. In these two cases, emigration neither indicates any political decay, nor in truth diminishes the number of the people; nor ought to be prohibited or discouraged. But emigrants may relinquish their country, from a sense of insecurity, oppression, annoyance, and inconveniency. Neither, again, here is it emigration which wastes the people, but the evils that occasion it. It would be in vain, if it were practicable, to confine the inhabitants at home; for the same causes which drive them out of the country, would prevent their multiplication if they remained in it. Lastly; men may be tempted to change their situation by the allurement of a better climate, of a more refined or luxurious manner of living; by the prospect of wealth; or, sometimes, by the mere nominal advantage of higher wages and prices. This class of emigrants, with whom alone the laws can interfere with effect, will never, I think, be numerous. With the generality of a people, the attachment of mankind to their homes and country, the irksomeness of seeing new habitations, and of living amongst strangers, will outweigh, so long as men possess the necessaries of life in safety, or at least so long as they can obtain a provision for that mode of subsistence which the class of citizens to which they belong are accustomed to enjoy, all the inducements that the advantages of a foreign land can offer. There appear, therefore, to be few cases in which emigration can be prohibited, with advantage to the state; it appears also that emigration is an equivocal symptom, which will probably accompany the decline of the political body, but which may likewise attend a condition of perfect health and vigour.

others, whilst these others are cultivating new tracts of land for them: for as, in a genial climate, and from a fresh soil, the labour of one mar will raise provision enough for ten, it is manifest that, where all are employed in agriculture, much the greater part of the produce will be spared from the consumption; and that three out of four, at least to those who are maintained by it, will reside in the country which receives the redundancy. When the new country does not remit provision to the old one, the advantage is less; but still the exportation of wrought goods, by whatever return they are paid for, advances population in that secondary way, in which those trades promote it that are not employed in the produc-. tion of provision. Whatever prejudice, therefore, some late events have excited against schemes of colonization, the system itself is founded in apparent national utility; and what is more, upon principles favourable to the common interest of human nature; for it does not appear by what other method newly-discovered and unfrequented countries can be peopled, or during the infancy of their establishment be protected or supplied. The error which we of this nation at present lament, seems to have consisted not so much in the original formation of colonies, as in the subsequent management; in imposing restrictions too rigorous, or in continuing them too long; in not perceiving the point of time when the irresistible order and progress of human affairs demand a change of laws and policy.

III. MONEY.-Where money abounds, the people are generally numerous: yet gold and silver neither feed nor clothe mankind; nor are they in all countries converted into provision by purchasing the necessaries of life at foreign markets; nor do they, in any country, compose those articles of personal or domestic ornament which certain orders of the community have learnt to regard as necessaries of life, and without the means of procuring which, they will not enter into family-establishments:-at least, this property of the precious metals obtains in a very small degree. II. COLONIZATION.-The only view under The effect of money upon the number of the peowhich our subject will permit us to consider ple, though visible to observation, is not explained colonization, is in its tendency to augment the without some difficulty. To understand this conpopulation of the parent state. Suppose a fertile, nexion properly, we must return to the proposibut empty island, to lie within the reach of a tion with which we concluded our reasoning upon country in which arts and manufactures are al- the subject; "that population is chiefly promoted ready established; suppose a colony sent out from by employment." Now of employment, money is such a country, to take possession of the island, partly the indication, and partly the cause. The and to live there under the protection and au- only way in which money regularly and sponthority of their native government: the new set-taneously flows into a country, is in return for the tlers will naturally convert their labour to the cul- goods that are sent out of it, or the work that is tivation of the vacant soil, and with the produce performed by it; and the only way in which moof that soil will draw a supply of manufactures ney is retained in a country, is by the country's from their countrymen at home. Whilst the in- supplying, in a great measure, its own consump habitants continue few, and lands cheap and fresh, tion of manufactures. Consequently, the quanthe colonists will find it easier and more profitable tity of money found in a country, denotes the to raise corn, or rear cattle, and with corn and cat- amount of labour and employment; but still, tle to purchase woollen cloth, for instance, or linen, employment, not money, is the cause of popula than to spin or weave these articles for themselves. tion; the accumulation of money being merely a The mother-country, meanwhile, derives from this collateral effect of the same cause, or a circumconnexion an increase both of provision and em- stance which accompanies the existence, and ployment. It promotes at once the two great re- measures the operation, of that cause. And this quisites upon which the facility of subsistence, and is true of money, only whilst it is acquired by the by consequence the state of population, depend, industry of the inhabitants. The treasures which production and distribution; and this in a man-belong to a country by the possession of mines, or ner the most direct and beneficial. No situation by the exaction of tribute from foreign dependencan be imagined more favourable to population, cies, afford no conclusion concerning the state of