Part 21 (1/2)
{99} In Brabant and Flanders the people were very jealous of their liberties. They were, however, most terribly oppressed by the churchmen and lawyers.
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The repairs of highways, bridges, streets, and expenses of police in general; whatever falls on parishes, towns, or counties, in the form of a tax or rate, is generally ill-administered, and the wastefulness increases with wealth. The difficulty of controling or redressing those evils proceeds from the same spirit pervading all the separate administrations. Government alone can remedy this; and it is both the interest and duty of the government to keep a strict watch over every body of men that has an interest separate from that of the public at large. Similar to the human body, which becomes stiff and rigid with age, so, as states get older, regulation upon regulation, and encroachment on encroachment, add friction and difficulty to the machine, till its force is overcome, and the motion stops. In the human body, if no violent disease intervenes, age occasions death. In the body politic, if no accidental event comes to accelerate the effect, it brings on a revolution; hence, as a nation never dies, it throws off the old grievances, and begins a new career.
The tendency that all laws and regulations have to become more complicated, and that all bodies, united by one common interest, have to encroach on the general weal, are known from the earliest periods; but we have no occasion to go back to early periods for a proof of that in this country. As wealth increases, the temptation augments, and the resistance decreases. The wealthy part of society are scarcely pressed upon by the evils, and they love ease too well to trouble themselves with fighting the battles of the public. Those who are engaged in trade are too much occupied to spare time; and, if they were not, they neither in general know how to proceed, nor have they any fund at their disposal, from which to draw the necessary money for expenditure.
It sometimes happens, that an individual, from a real public spirit, or from a particular humour or disposition, or, perhaps, because he has been severely oppressed, musters sufficient courage to undertake the redress of some particular grievance; but, unless he is very fortunate, and possesses both money and abilities, it is generally the ruin of his peace, if not of his fortune. He finds himself at once beset with a host of enemies, who throw every embarra.s.sment in his way: his friends [end of page #123] may admire and pity, but they very seldom lend him any a.s.sistance. If some progress is made in redressing the grievance, it is generally attended with such consequences to the individual, as to deter others from undertaking a similar cause. Thus the incorporated body becomes safe, and goes on with its encroachments with impunity.
Much more may be said upon this subject; but, as it is rather one of which the operation is regulated by particular circ.u.mstances, than by general rules, the object being to apply the result of the inquiry to England, we shall leave it till we come to the application of it to that country, only observing, that the church, the army, and the law, are the three bodies universally and princ.i.p.ally to be looked to as dangerous; and each of them according to the situation and the form of government of the respective countries, though, in England, the church has less means than in any country in Europe of extending its revenues or power, the law and corporate bodies the most; and, under arbitrary governments, the church and the military have the most, and the law and corporate bodies little or none. [end of page #124]
CHAP. V.
_Of the internal Causes of Decline, arising from the unequal Division of Property, and its Acc.u.mulation in the Hands of particular Persons.-- Its Effects on the Employment of Capital_.
In every country, the wealth that is in it has a natural tendency to acc.u.mulate in the hands of certain individuals, whether the laws of the society do or do not favour that acc.u.mulation. Although it has been observed in a former chapter that wealth follows industry, and flies from the son of the affluent citizen to the poor country boy, yet that is only the case with wealth, the possessor of which requires industry to keep it; for, where wealth has been obtained, so as to be in the form of land or money at interest, this is no longer the case. {100}
In America, and in countries that are new, or in those of which the inhabitants have been sufficiently hardy, and rash to overturn every ancient inst.i.tution, precautions have been taken against the acc.u.mulation of too much wealth in the hands of one person, or at least to discourage and counteract it; but, in old nations, where we do not chuse =sic= to run such risks, the case is different. The natural vanity of raising a family, the means that a rich man has to acc.u.mulate, the natural chance of wealth acc.u.mulating by marriages, and many other circ.u.mstances, operate in favour of all those rich men, who are freed from risk, and independent of industry. In some cases, extravagance dissipates wealth, but the laws favour acc.u.mulation of landed property, and counteract extravagance; the advantages are in favour of all the wealthy in general, and the consequence is, that from the first origin of any particular order of things, till some convulsion takes place, the division of property becomes more and more unequal.
Far from counteracting this by the laws of the land, in all those
{100} Amongst the Romans, in early times, property in land was by law to be equally divided; but that absurd law was never strictly attended to, and when the country became wealthy was totally set aside.
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countries, the governments of which took strength during this feudal system, there are regulations leading greatly to accelerate the progress.
The law of primogeniture has this effect; and the law of entails, both immoral and impolitic in its operation, has a still greater tendency.
These laws only extend to agricultural property; but commerce, which at first tends to disseminate wealth, in the end, has the same effect of acc.u.mulating it in private hands.
Industry, art, and intelligence, are, in the early ages, the spring of commerce; but, as machinery and capital become necessary, a set of persons rise up who engross all the great profits, and ama.s.s immense fortunes. {101}
The consequence of great fortunes, and the unequal division of property, are, that the lower ranks, though expensively maintained, become degraded, disorderly, and uncomfortable, while the middling cla.s.ses disappear by degrees. Discontent pervades the great ma.s.s of the people, and the supporters of the government, though powerful, are too few in number, and too inefficient in character to preserve it from ruin.
The proprietors of land or money should never be so far raised above the ordinary cla.s.s of the people as to be totally ignorant of their manner of feeling and existing, or to lose sight of the connection between industry and prosperity; for, whenever they do, the industrious are oppressed, and wealth vanishes. {102}
It requires not much knowledge, and little love of justice, to see that there must be gradations in society, which, instead of diminis.h.i.+ng, increase the general happiness of mankind; but when we
{101} Invention has nearly the same effect in commerce that the introduction of gunpowder and artillery have on the art of war. Wealth is rendered more necessary to carry them on. Every new improvement that is made, in either the personal strength and energy of man becomes of less importance.
{102} Some of the greatest proprietors in this kingdom, much to their honour, are the most exemplary men in it, with respect to their conduct to their tenantry; but though the instances are honourable and splendid, they are not general; nor is it in the nature of things that they can be general. In France, matters were in general different; and the inattention of the n.o.bility to their duty was one cause of the revolution; they had forgot, that, if they neglected or oppressed the industrious, they must ruin themselves.
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