Part 16

In effect, do but observe how easily a creditable merchant buys from the manufacturer, payable at twelve months, an enormous stock of goods, which he is himself obliged to sell, either to the consumer or to the retailer, at twelve, eighteen, or twenty-four months credit, and which often are not totally paid for at the end of three years. What difference in the prices must be the consequence of that series of _facilities_! Are high prices an evil? Put an end to credit, nothing more easy; nothing more is required, than to suffer to lie dormant all those laws, which secure to the creditor, the payment of his advances at the precise time when they become demandable: it is that certitude of being repaid, at the needful hour, that often induces the creditor himself to borrow, in order to extricate a debtor, whom he knows to be indiscreet, but from whose custom he derives a considerable yearly profit, upon a prodigious consumption; a profit he would lose, by being less indulgent: take away from the creditor the certainty of extorting his repayment, if it should be refused at a moment when a critical event should render such rigour indispensable, credit is destroyed, _as well as_ the consumption which followed it, _as well as_ the production of the earth which could not be paid, but by those manufactories annihilated by the want of consumption: cross the Straits of _Calais_, and (in order to console the _worshippers of the balance_) add, _as well as_ thousands of acres of vineyards in _France_, the produce of which _strips England_ annually of so vast a sum! _as well as_ thousands of acres in _Italy_, set apart for the rearing of silk-worms, and the culture of olive-trees, which swallow up a prodigious sum of _English_ money; _as well as_ thousands of acres in _Silesia_, where they cultivate the hemp which _English_ money buys in that country; _as well as_ thousands of acres in _Russia_ and in _Sweden_, whence we are obliged to import, at the expence of so much _English_ money, that immense quantity of timber, iron, canvass—articles which would become useless by the extinction of credit, and the destruction of that trade, of which credit was the very soul;—the chain would lead us too far. It is sufficiently evident, that then all the goods remaining unsold could not be purchased but with ready money, and _then_ indeed every thing would be excessively cheap. Would all that be for the best?—In a word, give up all thoughts of riches, or submit to the highest prices; but let those high prices come to you from the profusion of wealth universally diffused, and not from the tyranny of your own monopoly.

_The happy Issue of a desperate Combat between Monopoly and some private Interests._

The scene of this combat does not lie in _England_; we have seen that there they think of nothing more than to keep the balance even, and make up, as fast as possible, each in his own department, for the injustice granted to the importunity and cupidity of others, without any other inconvenience arising therefrom, than that of having a very large surplus, excessively dear, and that of not being able to procure what is wanted at the lowest rate, nor of the best quality. Even Smuggling, which follows certain regulations, with bludgeons and pistols in hand, cannot produce any great effect on the sum of national labour, though it may perhaps considerably influence the revenue of the Exchequer; it is probable that the smuggler exports as much _English_ work into _France_ as he imports of _French_ work into _England_; and that, in this respect, the gain of the most fortunate individual comes to very little: my intention is, to speak here of a combat, which has lasted a hundred years between the _French_ FAIR trader and the _American_ smuggler.

The system of administration adopted under Mons. _Sartine_, for the _French_ colonies, a system, for which they are indebted to ten years labour of Mr. _Malouit_, the present Intendant of _Toulon_, permits us to speak now of that combat, and to descry the dawn of a more serene day, opening upon those colonies; till then, I should not have hesitated to call them unfortunate, _in regard to their means_, if the private interest of the inhabitants, as well as that of the general-officers, Intendants and Directors of the Domain, (interests never combined but amongst the latter) had not moderated the effects of that dreadful punishment the galleys, denounced at the request of the _French_ merchants, against any one who should presume to import a negro or a cheese from the _English_ islands into the _French_ colonies, however good the one, however industrious the other might be; and whatever advantage might be gained by paying for both in molasses which the planter was obliged to throw away, _because the French merchants would not buy it_.

It is true, that the humanity of the _great_ smugglers has often suffered the _little_ ones to escape, before or after sentence, (the negro and the cheese being duly seised); and that a dozen of the little smugglers whom the policy of the great ones sacrificed _by installments_ to the clamours of the merchant, were nearly the only victims of that barbarous law, the strict execution of which would have deprived _France_,

First, Of the fifth part, at least, of the present revenue arising to her from her colonies;

Secondly, Of all those branches of industry to which such an addition of revenue gives constant life;

Thirdly, Of all the profit which the _fair_ trader, the instigator of that barbarous law, gets annually on the importations and exportations which that additional income requires;

Fourthly, Of the duties which the King’s treasury receives directly, or indirectly, from the one and the other; (it is impossible to estimate this article.)

Fifthly, and in fine, of the assistance which the State derives for the Royal navy, from that increase in its trading one, which became necessary after the increase of a revenue, due to people who should have been sent to the galleys, had they been caught in the flagrancy of such a crime. One half of the cotton and coffee which is gathered at _St. Domingo_, _Martinico_, _Guadaloupe_, and _Grand Terre_ above all, owes its existence to negroes, constantly furnished to the _French_ smuggler, both great and small, by the _English_ merchant, the natural, _and as it plainly appears_, the necessary enemy to _France_ and her trade; the quantity of sugar and indigo which in the said colonies owes its existence to the same means, is much more than necessary to make up that fifth of the revenue, the glory of which may be claimed by the smuggler, though the _fair_ trader comes in for a share in the profits.

Any one desirous to have this fact confirmed, may be informed of it by nine tenths of the _French_ planters, provided they be taught that the time is now come, when every useful truth may be spoken, even with energy, when accompanied by decency. This once ascertained, he is no native of _America_ who will refuse his evidence; an _American_ believes in every thing that is just and reasonable, the very instant that it is pronounced.

I sincerely wish that smuggling might produce in _England_ the same good it has done to the _French_ colonies; this would appear to me very just, and the more so, since it will not be the fault of the _British_ commerce, if that blessed contraband, after having given life to _America_, does not spread the same animation every where, _Great Britain excepted_. I have heard an _English_ manufacturer prove at the bar of the House of Lords, that his manufactory was in want of a special patronage, by so much the more, as the size and brittleness of his ware made it a difficult point for him to smuggle it over to the continent, and as a duty of 30 _per cent._ had been lately laid upon it, in the two countries where it concerned him most to have it exported. Amongst other questions that were put to him, I remarked four, which would have stunned me, had I been in his place. One of these questions was as follows: “Have you not heard that that 30 _per cent._ of which you complain, was laid in consequence of some prohibitions, or extra duties imposed in _England_ on some articles imported from those very countries which you allude to?” I could make nothing of the manufacturer’s answers; they were so long-winded, they had been so carefully studied, they were so very full of a policy which I do not understand, that it became impossible for me to class them under any heads in my memory.

_Reflexions on a very strange Revolution in ~France~._

A General maxim, almost universally adopted beyond contradiction, and the foundation of an hundred regulations, enforced from pole to pole, is, that it is essential for all national commodities to be at the lowest price, in order that foreign trade may turn out to the best advantage; that is to say, for the native traders to be able to dispose abroad of the products of national industry, at a cheaper rate than any other nation can sell those of her own. Certain it is, that the less price national commodities will bring, the less of the products of national industry will be necessary to pay them off, the more of course will there remain of those products to stock the foreign markets, and the more also will the foreign purchaser be gratified by the reduced price at which they may be given, to the detriment of the land proprietor of the nation; this is so self-evident that it cannot be withstood. This, methinks, is carrying to an excess the principles of Christian charity, if the Legislators are land proprietors; it is a shameful abuse of power, if the Legislators are at the head of manufactures; and in either case one must be blind to the necessity of keeping up an even balance between agriculture and industry.—_Had not Nature militated under hand, and with some advantage against the dreams of speculators in this respect, and against the much more dangerous surreptions of cupidity, to what state of abjection and misery would not agriculture be now reduced in all countries!_

I have said, that the price of every thing would perhaps be now in _France_, very little different from what it was 40 years ago, had it not been for an eventual circumstance, (I might have said a regulation,) which a few years ago tertiated, at least, the fortune of every subject in that kingdom;—nominally at first, it is true; but afterwards in reality, owing to the prodigious encouragement that ensued; I mean the regulation which permitted the exportation of wheat, and authorised each of the _French_ Provinces not to consider herself as a stranger to all the others. I shall only make a few reflexions on a matter which might furnish enough to fill a volume.

First, The adopted maxim of the pretended advantage of enjoying the national commodities at the lowest prices, _for the better encouragement of industry_, was not held less sacred at the time the regulation took place, than when that maxim was considered as the basis of the system of exportation _the most advantageous to the kingdom_, and the condition (_sine quâ non_) of the many wonders that might be expected therefrom, towards an increase of wealth.⸺Yet if there exist a regulation calculated to operate in diametrical opposition to the _sacred maxim_, it is clearly the freedom of the corn trade; to be convinced of this truth, one need but attend to its effect in _France_. The little success I have met with in my endeavours to come, in this respect, at some particulars which might perhaps have given me a few ideas, confines me to what I can gather from recollection; but with truth I can say that my memory seldom deceives me on the abstracts it presents to my mind. The reader may perceive, that the summary I now stand in need of, has no manner of connexion with the little springs that were put in play to ruin the author of the scheme; the chief and true point, is, that all secret intrigues, all public combinations, ended only in occasioning a reform in what was deemed abusive, in a regulation the advantages of which were fully demonstrated; and that the price of wheat, after having tertiated, doubled, trebled perhaps by the help of the forestallers, from whose abilities were expected the repeal of the law and the fall of its devisers, was fixed at last between one half and three fourths above the price, as it was upon the medium of ten years preceding the regulation. It is easily conceived that the price of wheat dictated that of all other commodities; in effect, previous to the last war, the only decisive period in the present point, the nominal revenue of the lands in _France_, increased by one half at least of what it was 15 years before;—then, commodities were, upon the whole, dearer by one half; yet the maxim was held _sacred_ still, and is not less so at the present time—in _England_ as well as in _France_;—nevertheless I can see no medium; either the maxim is absurd in itself, or _French_ industry has lost one third of its benefits by a regulation which tertiated, almost suddenly, the price of all productions in _France_.

Secondly, In order that industry may be said to have lost that third, the increase of revenue, yielded by the land to its proprietor, must have been cast into some national _vortex_, or sent into some foreign one, or concealed in the earth by the suspicious proprietor; for if the surplus of the landed revenue has occasioned a greater demand for and consumption of the products of industry, and more culture of the land, industry, by raising the price of her goods on the very first increase of the demand, has obtained in the first year, her first share in that accession of wealth; and she could not miss the second, so soon as a larger sum of savings bestowed upon the lands, had brought about what they never fail to produce, I mean, more productions, and soon after a greater demand for goods, and _soon after_ again more goods to answer the additional demands.

Thirdly, If that sudden advance in the price of provisions, ended only in an increase almost equally sudden in the price of the products of industry, there could not be then any inconvenience, either to industry or agriculture, in a sudden and proportionate rise which preserved the former equilibrium, and presented the same correspondence between the two revenues; (the only thing that can materially affect the two _capitalists_, though neither of them think about it.)

Fourthly, If there has been no inconvenience in so considerable but proportionable increase in the prices, _coming from agriculture_, where could be the inconvenience in a proportioned increase, equally sudden and general if _it should come_ from industry?

Fifthly, What difference can there be between a regulation which raises the landed revenue in a kingdom, from 6 to 9, followed by a re-action in industry, which raises equally to 9 what usually went for 6; and another regulation which would begin the same operation in industry, and should be equally followed by a proportionable re-action in agriculture?

Sixthly, When, by a regulation respecting the corn, industry is at liberty to enhance the price of her goods, in the same proportion as the effects of the regulation have raised the products of agriculture, cannot a regulation that concerns or imposes taxes, and by which industry is forced to increase her prices by the full amount of the taxes,—cannot such a regulation, I say, permit the cultivator, without inconvenience, to advance the price of the productions of the earth, in the same proportion as the taxes, or the regulation concerning them, have increased that of the products of industry?

Seventhly, Let us suppose that the operation is effected, and followed by the sum of money which a nominal revenue, grown more considerable, requires for the circulation; can there exist then the most trifling difference between the present state of any individuals in the nation, and the state they were in previous to their being loaded with that enormous burden, called taxes?

Eighthly, If after enquiry, the only answer that could be given should be a negative, would it not be profitable to let the public into the secret, in order that after having observed a very singular analogy between a young nymph loaded with a column of several thousand pounds weight of air, each of them as heavy as if it were of lead, and the _French_ as well as the _English_ loaded annually, constantly, in the same manner, the one with 600 millions of _livres Tournois_, the other with 14 or 15 millions of pounds sterling, they should be led further to observe, with what agility, what graces, what sprightliness, the young dancer plays with her load—“trips it along on the fantastic toe,” and with what grimaces, what groans, what lamentations, the two vigorous nations shrink under a burden which is not more sensible than air, from the instant that it is as perfectly divided?

I must here go some steps back:

Ninthly, If the nullity of the burden depended on the equality with which it should be divided, and if this equality should depend on an addition to the supposed burden, might it not be expected (not from the tricks of customary seduction, or from the shorter method of authority, but from all the means calculated to enforce conviction) that the nation would find herself less aggrieved by an additional tax, which would tend to equalise the weight, than she could be by an increase of taxes laid for the purpose of effecting a reimbursement, which, upon a second thought, no one can wish for?

Tenthly, Before the regulation alluded to, wheat was, in _France_, one third or one half cheaper than it is at this day; the rest of the other productions of the earth stood in the same proportion: in _England_, at that very time, the price of wheat differed very little from what it now is. How could _England then_ maintain a competition—a combat, as it were, of exportation, against her _natural_ enemy (the _French_ industry), so lightly, so advantageously armed by the low price of the commodities in _France_?—If the maxim is as just as it is held _sacred_, surely _France_ must have derived a prodigious benefit from the barricadoes by which the exportation of wheat was prevented, even from one Province to another, in order that it should be in all at the lowest possible price:—it follows also that _England_, already compelled by her taxes, her internal monopoly, and her riches, to raise the price of her wheat at home, must have undergone dreadful inconveniences, by availing herself, as she has ever done, of the least dearth abroad, to make that very wheat dearer in _England_, whilst she was going to diminish its price wherever scarcity had made it excessive.

Eleventhly, If _France_ has obtained such wonderful advantages from her internal as well as external barriers, it is not in respect to her agriculture; her agriculture has clearly lost, not only that part of the value in her productions, of which she was daily deprived by this barrier, but also the encouragement which a gradual increase in the price of the productions would have occasioned, to increase their quantity: it is therefore by the exportation of the products of her industry, which, being sold at a price below that of all other nations, have procured her in money that prodigious balance of exported goods, _which the wretched state of the national cultivator did not permit him to pay for_:—but observe, that the _French_ exportation, carried on with that advantage (pretended to be so very considerable) of the low price of national commodities, brought no more money to _France_, than that which she wanted for the five articles I have mentioned before, when treating of the balance of _England_. This matter I hope I shall set in the fullest blaze of evidence.—But, on the other hand, observe also that _England_, by an exportation carried on with the utmost regularity, under the supposed disadvantage of her commodities being rated much higher than those of her competitors, a rate which she even increased herself, by the exportation of wheat, which she encouraged by premiums—_by premiums, destructive of the sacred maxim_; observe, I say, that under that disadvantage, in spite of those inconsistencies, as fortunate as they are real and palpable, _England_, nevertheless, has not failed to procure the money wanted for the five articles, the only ones that can give any value to money.—Shall it be said that _France_ would have obtained a balance in money much less considerable, if she had not kept her prices so low, if she had acted with less respect to the maxim?—Shall it be said, that the balance in money would have been far more favourable to _England_, had not the price of her commodities been so high at home; if she had more consistently acted upon the maxim; if, above all, she had prohibited the exportation of wheat, which is so often lamented, and even sometimes so loudly complained of by her manufacturers?—This indeed would be to appropriate great merit to the resource of hiding money under ground, when we cannot flatter ourselves with the thoughts of having too much of it, but at the expence of agriculture: but no matter; let us see whether the inference be just.

Twelfthly, Had _France_ been indebted to the disparagement in the prices of her commodities, for the advantage of procuring the money wanted for the five articles before mentioned, she would have found herself in the impossibility of answering that want, as soon as, by the new regulation, those commodities were restored to their natural value, as soon as the liberty of exporting wheat had raised its price almost to the level of that which it bore in _England_.—Now will it be said, that ever since the landed revenue in _France_ has risen from 40 to 50 _per cent._ by an advance in the price of commodities, less bullion has been spent by the _French_ in plate, in gilding, and other articles of luxury?—Will it be said that _France_ stood in need of the money necessary to settle in cash with her foreign correspondents, when this resource from circumstances became preferable to the mode of paying in bills of exchange?—Will it be said that she fell short of it for all those Jewish and miserable operations, or for that reciprocally beneficial smuggling with her neighbours?—Will it be said, that her circulation, which, beyond any doubt, required a more considerable mass of money, as soon as her revenue had tertiated, has suffered by that necessity of a higher balance, become impossible (according to the maxim) as soon as it grew indispensable?—Will it be said, that her industry has lingered away as soon as her agriculture has been more able to enliven it?—Yet all these absurdities must be admitted, or it must be acknowledged that the price of commodities may be tertiated, or doubled in a nation, not only without injuring industry, whose business it is to keep within the kingdom all the money wanted for circulation, but even with securing to the nation a more considerable balance in money, since it must become so whenever the price of every thing is raised one third, and perhaps more than one half.—The _sacred maxim_ therefore has not even common sense, _when applied to the internal trade of the State_.