Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

That this reasoning is not chimerical, but founded on history and experience, our author fhews from the Spartan, Roman, and other ftates, which owed their great power to the want of commerce and luxury; and as it is natural to afk, whether fovereigns may not return to the maxims of ancient policy, and confult their own intereft, in this respect, more than the happiness of their fubjects; he anfwers, that to him it appears almost impoffible, because ancient policy was violent, and contrary to the more natural and ufual courfe of things. In the fubfequent part. of this difcourfe, he proceeds to fhew that, though the want of trade and manufactures, among a free and very martial people, may fometimes have no other effect, than to render the public more powerful, yet according to the moft natural course of things, induftry, and arts, and trade increase the power of the fovereign, as well as the happiness of the fubjects. Towards the clofe of it, he endeavours to make it appear, that the poverty of the common people in France, Italy and Spain, is, in fome measure, oweing to the fuperior riches of the foil and happiness of the climate. • In fuch a fine mold or foil, fays he, as that of those more fouthern regions, agriculture is an easy art, and one man, with a couple of forry horfes, will be able, in a season, to cultivate as much land as will pay a pretty confiderable rent to the proprietor. All the art, which the farmer knows, is to leave his ground fallow for a year, as foon as it is exhaufted; and the warmth of the fun alone, and temperature of the climate enrich it, and restore its fertility. Such poor peafants, therefore, require only a fimple maintenance for their labour. They have no stock nor riches, which claim more; and at the fame time, they are for ever dependant on their landlord, who gives no leafes, nor fears that his land will be spoiled, by the ill methods of cultivation. In England, the land is rich, but coarse, must be cultivated at a great expence, and produces but flender crops, when not carefully managed, and by a method, which gives not the full profit, but in a course of feveral years. A farmer, therefore, in England, must have a confiderable ftock and a long leafe; which beget proportionable profits. The fine vineyards of Champagne and Burgundy, that oft yield to the landlord above five pounds per acre, are cultivated by peafants, who have fcarce bread; and the reafon is, that fuch peafants need no ftock but their own limbs, and a few inftruments of husbandry, which they can buy for twenty fhillings. The

C 3

farmers

[ocr errors]

farmers are commonly in fome better circumftances in thofe countries. But the graziers are most at their ease of all thofe, who cultivate the land. The reafon is ftill the fanie. Men muft have profits proportionable to their expence and hazard. Where fo confiderable a number of the labouring poor as the peasants and farmers, are in very low circumftances, all the reft muft partake of their poverty, whether the government of that nation be monarchical or republican.

We may form a fimilar remark with regard to the general hiftory of mankind. What is the reafon why no people living betwixt the tropics could ever yet attain to any art or civility, or reach even any police in their government and any military difcipline; while few nations in the temperate climates have been altogether deprived of thefe advantages? It is probable, that one caufe of this phænomenon, is the warmth and equality of weather in the torrid zone, that render cloaths and houfes lefs requifite for the inhabitants, and thereby remove, in part, that neceffity, which is the great fpur to induftry and invention. Curis acuens mortalia corda. Not to mention, that the fewer goods or poffeffions of this kind any people enjoy, the fewer quarrels are likely to arife amongst them, and the lefs neceffity will there be for a fettled police or regular authority to protect and defend them from foreign enemies or from each other.'

Our author introduces his difcourfe on Luxury, which follows that on Commerce, with obferving, that it is a word of a very uncertain fignification, and may be taken in a good as well as in a bad fenfe; that in general, it means great refinement in the gratification of the fenfes, and that any degree of it may be innocent or blameable, according to the age or country or condition of the perfon. The bounds, fays he, betwixt the virtue and the vice cannot here be fixed exactly, more than in other moral fubjects. To imagine that the gratifying any of the fenfes, or the indulging any delicacy in meats, drinks, or apparel, is, of itfelf a vice, can never enter into any head, that is not difordered by the frenzies of a fanatical enthusiasm. I have, indeed, heard of a monk abroad, who, because the windows of his cell opened upon a very noble profpect, made a covenant with his eyes never to turn that way, or receive fo fenfual a gratification. And fuch is the crime of drinking Champagne or Burgundy, preferably to fmall beer or porter, Thefe indulgencies are only vices, when they are pursued at the expence of fome virtue, as liberality or charity in like manner, as they are follies, when for them a man ruins

his fortune, and reduces himfelf to want and beggary. Where they entrench upon no virtue, but leave ample subject, whence to provide for friends, family, and every proper object of generofity or compaffion, they are entirely innocent, and have in every age been acknowledged fuch by almost all moralifts. To be entirely occupied with the luxury of the table, for inftance, without any relifh for the pleafures of ambition, study or converfation, is a mark of grofs ftupidity, and is incompatible with any vigour of temper or genius. To confine one's expence entirely to fuch a gratification, without regard to friends or family, is an indication of a heart entirely devoid of humanity or be nevolence. But if a man referve time fufficient for all laudible purfuits, and money fufficient for all generous pur→ pofes, he is free from every fhadow of blame or reproach.

Since luxury may be confidered either as innocent of blameable, one may be furprized at thofe prepofterous opis nions, which have been entertained concerning it; while men of libertine principles beftow praifes even on vicious luxury, and reprefent it as highly advantageous to fociety; and on the other hand, men of fevere morals blame even the most innocent luxury, and reprefent it as the fource of all the corruptions, diforders, and factions incident to civil government.'

Our author endeavours in this difcourfe to correct both thefe extremes, by proving, first, that the ages of refine ment and luxury are both the happieft and moft virtuous; and, fecondly, that wherever luxury ceafes to be innocent, it alfo ceases to be beneficial, and when carried a degree too far, is a quality pernicious, tho' perhaps not the most pernicious, to political fociety. In order to prove his firft point, he confiders the effects of luxury both in private and public life; and fhews that industry, knowledge and humanity, are linked together by an indiffoluble chain, and are found, from experience as well as reafon, to be peculiar to the more polished and luxurious ages.

• What has chiefly induced fevere moralifts, fays he, to declaim against luxury and refinement in pleasure, is the example of ancient Rome, which, joining to its poverty and rufticity, virtue and public fpirit, rofe to fuch a furprising height of grandeur and liberty; but having learned from its conquered provinces the Grecian and Afiatic luxury, fell into every kind of corruption; whence arofe fedition and civil wars, attended at laft with the total lofs of liberty. All the Latin claffics, whom we perufe in our infancy, are full of these sentiments, and univerfally afcribe the ruin of their

CA
4

their ftate to the arts and riches imported from the caft.But it would be easy to prove, that thefe writers mistook the caufe of the diforders in the Roman ftate, and ascribed to luxury and the arts what really proceeded from an illmodelled government, and the unlimited extent of conquests. Luxury or refinement on pleasure has no natural tendency to beget venality and corruption. The value which all men put upon any particular pleasure depends on comparifon and experience; nor is a porter lefs greedy of money, which he spends on bacon and brandy, than a courtier who purchases champagne and ortolans. Riches are valuable at all times, and to all men, because they always purchase pleasures, fuch as men are accustomed to and defire; nor can any thing reftrain or regulate the love of money but a fense of honour and virtue; which if it be not nearly equal at all times, will naturally abound most in ages of luxury and knowledge.

The liberties of England, so far from decaying fince the origin of luxury and the arts, have never flourished fa much as during that period. And tho' corruption may feem to encrease of late years, this is chiefly to be afcribed to our established liberty, when our princes have found the impoffibility of governing without parliaments, or of terrifying parliaments by the phantom of prerogative. Not ta mention, that this corruption or venality prevails infinitely more among the electors than the elected; and therefore cannot justly be ascribed to any refinements in luxury.

If we confider the matter in a proper light, we shall find, that luxury and the arts are rather favourable to liberty, and have a natural tendency to preserve, if not produce a free government. In rude unpolifhed nations, where the arts are neglected, all the labour is bestowed on vaffals or tenants. The latter are neceffarily dependent and fitted for flavery and fubjection; efpecially where they poffefs no riches, and are not valued for their knowledge in agriculture; as must always be the cafe where the arts are neglected. The former naturally erect themselves into petty tyrants; and muft either fubmit to an abfolute mafter for the fake of peace and order; or if they will preserve their independency, like the Gothic barons, they muft fall into feuds and contefts among themselves, and throw the whole fociety into fuch confufion as is perhaps worse than the moft defpotic government. But where luxury nourishes. commerce and industry, the peafants, by a proper cultivation of the land, become rich and independent; while the tradef

men

men and merchants acquire a share of the property, and draw authority and confideration to that middling rank of men, who are the best and firmest basis of public liberty. These fubmit not to flavery, like the poor peasants, from poverty and meannefs of spirit; and having no hopes of tyrannizing over others, like the barons, they are not tempted, for the fake of that gratification, to submit to the tyranny of their fovereign. They covet equal laws, which may fecure their property, and preserve them from monarchical, as well as ariftocratical tyranny..

The houfe of commons is the fupport of our popular. government; and all the world acknowledge, that it owed its chief influence and confideration to the increase of commerce, which threw fuch a balance of property into the hands of the commons. How inconfiftent, then, is it to blame fo violently luxury, or a refinement in the arts, and to present it as the bane of liberty and public spirit!'

[ocr errors]

In the three laft pages of this discourse, our author endeavours to prove his fecond point, and begins with confidering what vicious luxury is. No gratification, says he, however fenfual, can of itself, be esteemed vicious. A gratification is only vicious, when it ingroffes all a man's expence, and leaves no ability for fuch acts of duty and generofity as are required by his fituation and fortune. Suppofe, that he correct the vice, and employ part of his expence in the education of his children, in the fupport of his friends, and in relieving the poor; would any prejudice refult to fociety? On the contrary, the fame confumption would arife; and that labour, which, at prefent, is employed only in producing a slender gratification to one man, would relieve the neceffitous, and beftow fatisfaction on hundreds. The fame care and toil, which raife a difh of pease at Christmas, would give bread to a family during fix months. To fay, that, without a vicious luxury, the labour would not have been employed at all, is only to fay, that there is fome other defect in human nature, fuch as indolence, felfishness, inattention to others, for which luxury, in fome measure, provides a remedy; as one poifon may be an antidote to another. But virtue, like wholesome food, is better than poisons, however corrected.

of

• Suppose the fame number of men, that are, at present, in Britain, with the fame foil and climate; I ask, is it not poffible for them to be happier, by the most perfect way life, that can be imagined, and by the greatest reformation, which omnipotence itself could work in their temper and

difpofition?

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »