Indeed, under such extreme straitness and distrac tion labors the whole body of their finances, so far does their charge outrun their supply in every par
ticular, that no man, I believe, whohas considered their affairs with any degree of attention or informa tion, but must hourly look for some extraordinary convulsion in that whole system: the effect of which on France, and even on all Europe, it is difficult to
conjecture.
ticular, that no man, I believe, whohas considered their affairs with any degree of attention or informa tion, but must hourly look for some extraordinary convulsion in that whole system: the effect of which on France, and even on all Europe, it is difficult to
conjecture.
Edmund Burke
ON THE PRESENT STATE OF THE NATION.
Nothing less. Examine our imports from thence ; it seems upon this vulgar idea of exports and imports, to turn the balance against you. But your exports to Newfoundland are your own goods. Your import is your own food; as much your own, as that you raise with your plonghs out of your own soil; and not your loss, but your gain; your riches, not your poverty. But so fallacious is this way of judging, that neither the export nor import, nor both together, supply any idea approaching to adequate of that branch of business. The vessels in that trade go straight from Newfoundland to the foreign market;
and the sale there, not the import here, is the meas ure of its value. That trade, which is one of your greatest and best, is hardly so much as seen in the custom-house entries; and it is not of less annual value to this nation than 400,000l. 6thly. The qual ity of your imports must be considered as well as the quantity. To state the whole of the foreign im
as loss, is exceedingly absurd. All the iron, hemp, flax, cotton, Spanish wool, raw silk, woollen and linen-yarn, which we import, are by no means to be considered as the matter of a merely luxurious consumption; which is the idea too generally and loosely annexed to our import article. These above
mentioned are materials of industry, not of luxury, which are wrought up here, in many instances, to ten times, and more, of their original value. Even where they are not subservient to our exports, they
still add to our internal wealth, which consists in the stock of useful commodities, as much as in gold and
In looking over the specific articles of our ex
silver.
vot. 1. 2|
port and import, I have often been astonished to see
for how small a part of the supply of our consump
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tion, either luxurious or convenient, we are indebted to nations properly foreign to us.
These considerations are entirely passed over by
the author; they have been but too much neglected
by most who have speculated on this subject. But they ought never to be omitted by those who mean to come to anything like the true state of the British trade. They compensate, and they more than com pensate, everything which the author can cut off with any appearance of reason for the over-entry of 'British goods; and they restore to us that balance of four millions, which the author has thought proper on such a very poor and limited comprehension of the object to reduce to 2,500,000l.
In general this author is so circumstanced, that to support his theory he is obliged to assume his facts: and then, if you allow his facts, they will not support his conclusions. What if all he says of the state of this balance were true ? did not the same objections always lie to custom-house entries? do they defalcate more from the entries of 1766 than from those of 1754? Ifthey prove us ruined, we were always ruined. Some ravens have always indeed croaked out this kind of song. They have a malignant delight in presaging mischief, when they are not employed in doing it: they are miserable and disappointed at
every instance of the public prosperity. They over look us like the malevolent being of the poet : --
Tritonida conspicit arcem
Ingeniis, opibusque, et festa pace virentem; Vixque tenet lacrymas quia nil lacrymabile cernit.
It is in this spirit that some have looked upon
those accidents that cast an occasional trade. Their imaginations entail these
? damp upon accidents
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upon us in perpetuity. We have had some bad har vests. This must very disadvantageously affect the balance of trade, and the navigation of a people, so large a part of whose commerce is in grain. But, in knowing the cause, we are morally certain, that,
according to the course of events, it cannot long sub sist. In the three last years, we have exported scarce ly any grain; in good years, that export hath been worth twelve hundred thousand pounds and more; in the two last years, far from exporting, we have been obliged to import to the amount perhaps of our former exportation. So that in this article the bal ance must be 2,000,000l. against us; that one million in the ceasing of gain, the other in the in crease of expenditure. But none of the author's promises or projects could have prevented this mis
fortune; and, thank God, we do not want him or them to relieve us from it; although, his friends should now come into power, doubt not but they will be ready to take credit for any increase of trade or excise, that may arise from the happy circum
stance of good harvest.
This connects with his loud laments and melan
choly prognostications concerning the high price of the necessaries of life and the products of labor. With all his others, deny this fact; and again call upon him to prove it. Take average and not
accident, the grand and first necessary of life cheap in this country; and that too as weighed, not against labor, which its true counterpoise, but against money. Does he call the price of wheat at this day, between 32 and 40 shillings per quarter in London dear He must know that fuel (an object
* It dearer in some places, and rather cheaper in others but must soon all come to level.
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of the highest order in the necessaries of life, and of
the first necessity in almost every kind of manufac
ture) is in many of our provinces cheaper than in any part of the globe. Meat is on the whole not exces
sively dear, whatever its price may be at particular times and from particular accidents. If it has had anything like an uniform rise, this enhancement may easily be proved not to be owing to the increase of taxes, but to uniform increase of consumption and of money. Diminish the latter, and meat in your markets will be sufficiently cheap in account, but much dearer in effect: because fewer will be in a condition to buy. Thus your apparent plenty will be real indigence. At present, even under tempo rary disadvantages, the use of flesh is greater here than anywhere else; it is continued without any in terruption of Lents or meagre days; it is sustained and growing even with the increase of our taxes.
But some have the art of converting even the signs of national prosperity into symptoms of decay and ruin. And our author, who so loudly disclaims pop ularity, never fails to_lay hold of the most vulgar popular prejudices and humors, in hopes to capti vate the crowd. Even those peevish dispositions which grow out of some transitory suffering, those passing clouds which float in our changeable atmos phere, are by him industriously figured into fright
ful shapes, in order first to terrify, and then to govern the populace.
It was not enough for the author's purpose to give this false and discouraging picture of the state of his own country. It did not fully answer his end, to ex aggerate her burdens, to depreciate her successes, and to vilify her character. Nothing had been done, 1111
. . . ,,,_",
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less the situation of France were exalted in propor tion as that of England had been abased. The reader will excuse the citation I make at length from his book; he outdoes himself upon this occasion. His confidence is indeed unparalleled, and altogether of the heroic cast: --
"If our rival nations were in the same circum stances with ourselves, the augmentation of our taxes would produce no ill consequences : if we were obliged to raise our prices, they must, from the same causes, do the like, and could take n0 advantage by under selling and under-working us. But the alarming consideration to Great Britain that France not in the same condition. Her distresses, during the war, were great, but they were immediate; her want of credit, as has been said, compelled her to impover
? ish her people, by raising the greatest part of her sup plies within the year; but the burdens she imposed on them were, in a great measure, temporary, and must be greatly diminished afew years peace. She could procure no considerable loans, therefore she has mort gaged no such oppressive taxes as those Great Britain has imposed in perpetuity for payment interest. Peace must, therefore, soon re-establish' her commerce and
manufactures, especially as the comparative lightness of taxes, and the cheapness of living, in that country, must make France an asylum for British manufac turers and artificers. " On this the author rests the merit of his whole system. And on this point will join issue with him. If France not at least in the same condition, even in that very condition which the author falsely represents to be ours,--if the very re verse of his proposition be not true, then will admit
his state of the nation to be just; and all his inferen
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cos from that state to be logical and conclusive. It is not surprising, that the author should hazard our opinion of his veracity. That is a virtue on which great statesmen do not perhaps pique themselves so much; but it is somewhat extraordinary, that he should stake on a very poor calculation of chances, all credit for care, for accuracy, and for knowledge of the subject of which he treats. He is rash and inaccurate, because he thinks he writes to a public 1gnorant and inattentive. But he may find himself in that respect, as in many others, greatly mistaken.
In order to contrast the light and vigorous condi tion of France with that of England, weak, and sink ing under her burdens, he states, in his tenth page, that France had raised 50,314,378l. sterling by taxes within the several years from the year 1756 to 1762 both inclusive. An Englishman must stand aghast at such a representation: To find France able to raise within the year sums little inferior to all that we were able even to borrow on interest with all the resources of the greatest and most established credit in the world! Europe was filled with astonishment when they saw England borrow in one year twelve millions. It was th'ought, and 'very justly, no small proof of na tional strength and financial skill, to find a fund for the payment of the interest upon this sum. The in terest of _this, computed with the one per cent annu ities, amounted only to 600,000l. a year. This, I say, was thought a surprising effbrt even of credit. But this author talks, as of a thing not worth proving, and but just worth observing, that France in one yea1 raised sixteen times that sum without borrowing, and continued to raise sums not far from equal to it for
several years together. Suppose some Jacob Hen
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r1ques had proposed, in the year 1762, to prevent a perpetual charge on the nation by raising ten mil lions within the year: he would have been consid ered, not as a harsh financier, who laid a heavy hand on the public; but as a poor visionary, who had run mad on supplies and taxes. They who know that the whole land-tax of England, at 4s. in the pound, raises but two millions, will not easily apprehend that any such sums as the author has conjured up can be raised even in the most opulent nations. France owed a large debt, and was encumbered with heavy
establishments, before that war. The author does not formally deny that she borrowed something in every year of its continuance; let him produce the funds for this astonishing annual addition to all her vast preceding taxes ; an addition equal to the whole excise, customs, land and malt-taxes of England taken together.
But what must be the reader's astonishment, per haps his indignation, if he should find that this great financier has fallen into the most unaccountable of all errors, no less an error than that of mistaking the identical sums borrowed by France upon interest, for supplies raised within the year! Can it be conceived that any man, only entered into the first rudiments of finance, should make so egregious a blunder; should write should print it; should carry to second edition; should take not collaterally and incidentally, but layit down as the corner-stone of his whole system, in such an important point as the comparative states of France and England? But will be said, that was his misfortune to be ill-in formed. Not at all. A man of any loose general knowledge, and of the most ordinary sagacity, never
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could have been misinformed in so gross a manner; because he would have immediately rejected so wild and extravagant an account.
The fact is this: the credit of France, bad as it might have been, did enable her (not to raise within the year) but to borrow the very sums the author mentions; that is to say, 1,106,916,261 livres, mak ing, in the author's computation, 50,314,378l. The credit of France was low; but it was not annihilated. ' She did not derive, as our author chooses to assert,' any advantages from the debility of her credit. Its consequence was the natural one: she borrowed; but she borrowed upon bad terms, indeed on the
most exorbitant usury.
In speaking of a foreign revenue, the very pretence
to accuracy would be the most inaccurate thing in' the world. Neither the author nor I can with oer-_ tainty authenticate the information we comm1micate to the public, nor in an affair of eternal fluctuation arrive at perfect exactness. All we can do, and this we may be expected to do, is to avoid gross errors and blunders of a capital nature. We cannot order the proper officer to lay the accounts before the House. But the reader must judge on the probability of the accounts we lay before him. The author speaks of
France as raising her supplies for war by taxes with in the year; and of her debt, as a thing scarcely worthy of notice. I affirm that she borrowed large sums in every year ; and has thereby accumulated an immense debt. This debt continued after the war infinitely to embarrass her affairs; and to find some means for its reduction was then and has ever since been the first object of her policy. But she has so little succeeded in all her efforts, that the per
? ? ? ? ON THE PRESENT STATE OF THE NATION.
329
petual debt of France is at this hour little short of 100,000,000l. sterling; and she stands charged with at least 40,000,000 of English pounds on life-rents and tontines. The annuities paid at this day at the Hotel de Ville of Paris, which are by no means her sole payments of that nature, amount to 139,000,000 of livres, that is to 6,3-18,000l. ; besides billets au porteur, and various detached and unfunded debts, to a great
amount, and which bear an interest.
At the end of the war, the interest payable on her
debt amounted to upwards of seven millions sterling. M. de la Verdy, the last hope of the French finances, was called in, to aid in the reduction of an interest, so light to our author, so intolerably heavy
? upon those who are to pay it. After many unsuccessful efforts towards reconciling arbitrary reduction with public credit, he was obliged to go the plain high road of power, and to impose a tax of 10 per cent upon a very great part of the capital debt of that kingdom; and this measure of present ease, to the
destruction of future credit, produced about 500,000l. a year, which was carried to their Caisse d'amortisse ment or sinking fund. _But so unfaithfully and un steadily has this and all the other articles which compose that fund been applied to their purposes, that they have given the state but very little even of present relief, since it is known to the whole world that she is behind-hand on every one of her establish ments. Since the year 1763,there has been no oper ation of any consequence on the French finances; and in this enviable condition is France at present with regard to her debt.
Everybody knows that the principal of the debt is but a name ; the interest is the only thing which can distress a nation. Take this idea, which will not be
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disputed, and compare the interest paid by England with that paid by France:
Interest paid by France, funded and
unfunded, for perpetuity or on lives,
after the" tax of 10 per cent . . . ? 6,500,000
330
Interest paid by England, as stated by the author, p. 27 . . . . . . .
4,600,000
Interest paid by France exceeds that
paid by England . . . . . . . ? 1,900,000
The author cannot complain, that I state the inter est paid by England as too low. He takes it himself as the extremest term. Nobody who knows anything of the French finances will affirm that I state the in terest paid by that kingdom too high. It might be easily proved to amount to a great deal more: even this is near two millions above what is England.
There are three standards to judge of the good con dition of a nation with regard to its finances. 1st, The relief of the people. 2nd, The equality of sup plies to establishments. 3rd, The state of public credit. Try France on all these standards.
Although oiir author very liberally administers relief to the people of France, its government has not been altogether so gracious. Since the peace, she has taken off' but a single oingtie? me, or shilling in the pound, and some small matter in the capitation. But, if the government has relieved them in one point, it has only burdened them the more heavily ill another. The Taillef' that grievous and destructive imposition, which all their financiers lament, without being able to remove or to replace, has been aug
* A tax rated by the intendant in each generality, on the presumed fortune of every person below the degree of a gentleman.
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mented no less than six millions of livres, or 270,000 pounds English. A further augmentation of this or other duties is now talked of; and it is certainly ne
cessary to their affairs: so exceedingly remote from either truth or verisimilitude is the author's amazing assertion, that the burdens of France in the war were in a great measure temporary, and must be greatly diminished by a few years ofpeaoe.
In the next place, if the people of France are not lightened of taxes, so neither is the state disburdened of charges. I speak from very good information, that the annual income of that state is at this day thirty millions of livres, or 1,350,000l. sterling, short
? of a provision for their ordinary peace establishment ; so far are they from the attempt or even hope to dis charge any part of the capital of their enormous debt.
Indeed, under such extreme straitness and distrac tion labors the whole body of their finances, so far does their charge outrun their supply in every par
ticular, that no man, I believe, whohas considered their affairs with any degree of attention or informa tion, but must hourly look for some extraordinary convulsion in that whole system: the effect of which on France, and even on all Europe, it is difficult to
conjecture.
In the third point of view, their credit. Let the
reader cast his eye on a table of the price of French
fiLI1dS, as they stood a few weeks ago, compared with the state of some of our English stocks, even in their present low condition : --
French. British.
5 per cents . . . . 63 Bank stock, 5? . 159 4 per cent (not taxed) 57 4 per cent cons. 100 3 per cent " " 49 3 per cent cons. 88
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This state of the funds of France and England is sufficient to convince even prejudice and obstinacy, that if France and England are not in the same con dition (as the author afiirms they are not) the dif ference is infinitely to the disadvantage of France.
This depreciation of their funds has not much the air of a nation lightening burdens and discharging debts.
Such is the true comparative state of the two king doms in those capital points of view. Now as to the nature of the taxes which provide for this debt, as well as for their ordinary establishments, the author has thought proper to affirm that " they are compara tively light "'; that " she has mortgaged no such op pressive taxes as ours " ; his effrontery on this head is intolerable. Does the author recollect a single tax
in England to which something parallel in nature, and as heavy in burden, does not exist in France; does he not know that the lands of the noblesse are still under the load of the greater part of the old feudal charges, from which the gentry of England have been relieved for upwards of a hundred years, and which were in kind, as well as burden, much worse than our modern land-tax? Besides that all the gentry of France serve in the army on very slender pay, and to the utter ruin of their fortunes, all those who are not noble have their lands heavily taxed. Does he not know that wine," brandy, soap, candles, leather, salt
petre, gunpowder, are taxed in France? Has he not heard that government in France has made a monop oly of that great article of salt? that they compel the people to take a certain quantity of and at certain rate, both rate and quantity fixed at the ar bitrary pleasure of the imposer? "' that they pay in
* Before the war was sold to, or rather forced on, the consumer
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France the Taille, an arbitrary imposition on pre sumed property? that a tax is laid in fact and name, on the same arbitrary standard, upon the acquisitions of their industry ? and that in France a heavy capita tion-taa: is also paid, from the highest to the very poorest sort of people? Have we taxes of such weight, or anything at all of the compulsion, in the
article of salt? do we pay any taillaye, any faculty taz, any industry-tax? do we pay any capitation-tax whatsoever? Ibelieve the people of London would fall into an agony to hear of such taxes proposed upon them as are paid at Paris. There is not a sin gle article of provision for man or beast which enters that great city, and is not excised ; corn, hay, meal,
? butcher's-meat, fish, fowls, everything. I do not here mean to censure the policy of taxes laid on the con sumption of great luxurious cities. I only state the fact. We should be with difficulty brought to hear of a tax of 50s. upon every ox sold in Smithfield. Yet this tax is paid in Paris. Wine, the lower sort of wine, little better than English small beer, pays 2d. a bottle.
We, indeed, tax our beer; but the imposition on small beer is very far from heavy. In no part of England are eatables of any kind the object of tax ation. In almost every other country in Europe they are excised, more or less. I have by me the state of the revenues of many of the principal nations on the Continent; and, on comparing them with ours, I think I am fairly warranted to assert, that England is the most lightly taxed of any of the great states
at 11 sous, or about 5d. the pound. What it is at present, I am not informed. Even this will appear no trivial imposition. In London, salt may be had at a penny farthing per pound from the last retailer.
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of Europe. They, whose unnatural and sullen arises from contemplation of the distresses of their country, will revolt at this position. But am
called upon, will prove beyond all possibility dispute even though this proof should deprive these gentlemen of the singular satisfaction of considering their country as undone; and though the best civil government, the best constituted, and the best man aged revenue that ever the world beheld, should thoroughly vindicated from their perpetual claxnors and complaints. As to our neighbor and rival France, in addition to what have here suggested, say, and when the author chooses formally to deny, shall formally prove that her subjects pay more than England, on computation of the wealth 'of both countries; that her taxes are more injudiciously and more oppressively imposed more vexatiously col
lected come in smaller proportion to the royal cof fers, and are less applied by far to the public service. am not one of those who choose to take the author's
word for this happy and flourishing condition of the French finances, rather than attend to the changes, the violent pushes and the despair of all her own nanciers. Does he choose to be referred for the easy and happy condition of the subject in France to the remonstrances of their own parliaments, written with such an eloquence, feeling, and energy, as have not seen exceeded in any other writings? The author may say, their complaints are exaggerated, and the effects of faction. answer, that they are the repre sentations of numerous, grave, and most respectable bodies of men, upon the affairs of their own country. But, allowing that discontent and faction may per vert the judgment of such venerable bodies in France,
334
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we have as good a right to suppose that the same causes may full as probably have produced from a private, however respectable person, that frightful, and, I trust I have shown, groundless representation of our own affairs in England.
The author is so conscious of the dangerous effects of that representation, that he thinks it necessary, and very necessary it to guard against them. He assures us, " that he has not made that display of the difficulties of his country, to expose her counsels to the ridicule of other states, or to provoke vanquished enemy to insult her; nor to excite the people's rage against their governors, or sink them into despond
ency of the public welfare. " readily admit this apology for his intentions. . God forbid should think any man capable of entertaining so execrable and senseless design. The true cause of his drawing so shocking picture no more than this and ought rather to claim our pity than excite our indignation he finds himself out of power; and this condition intolerable to him. The same sun which gilds all nature, and exhilarates the whole creation, does not shine upon disappointed ambition. It something that rays out of darkness, and inspires nothing but gloom and melancholy. Men in this deplorable state of mind find comfort in spreading the contagion of
their spleen. They find an advantage too; for general, popular error, to imagine the loudest com
for the public to be the most anxious for its welfare. If such persons can answer the ends of relief and profit to themselves, they are apt to be careless enough about either the means or the conse
quences.
Whatever this complainant's motives may be, the
plainers
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effects can by no possibility be other than those which he so strongly, and I hope truly, disclaims all inten tion of producing. To verify this, the reader has only to consider how dreadful a picture he has drawn in his 32nd page, of the state of this kingdom; such a picture as, I believe, has hardly been applicable, without some exaggeration, to the most degenerate and undone commonwealth that ever existed. Let this view of things be compared with the prospect of a remedy which he proposes in the page directly oppo site, and the subsequent. I believe no man living
could have imagined it possible, except for the sake of burlesquing a subject, to propose remedies so ridic ulously disproportionate to the evil, so full of uncer tainty in their operation, and depending for their success in every step upon the happy event of so many new, dangerous, and visionary projects. It is not amiss, that he has thought proper to give the public some little notice of what they may expect from his friends, when oi1r affairs shall be committed to their management. Let us see how the accoimts of disease and remedy are balanced in his " State of the Nation. " In the first place, on the side of evils, he states, "an impoverished and heavily-burdened
A declining trade and decreasing specie. The power of the crown never so much extended over the great; but the great without influence over the lower sort. Parliament losing its reverence with the people. The voice of the multitude set up against the sense of the legislature; a people luxurious and licentious, impatient of rule, and despising all author ity. Government relaxed in every sinew, and a cor rupt selfish spirit. pervading the whole. An opinion of many, that the form of government is not worth
? public.
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contending for. No attachment in the bulk of the people towards the constitution. No reverence for the customs of our ancestors. No attachment but to private interest, nor any zeal but for selfish gratifi cations. Trade and manufactures going to ruin. Great Britain in danger of becoming tributary to France, and the descent of the crown dependent on
her pleasure. Ireland, in case of a war, to become a prey to France; and Great Britain, unable to re cover Ireland, cede it by treaty," (the author never can think of a treaty without making cessions,) "in order to purchase peace for herself. The colonies
left exposed to the ravages of a domestic, or the con quest of a foreign enemy. "--Gloomy enough, God knows. The author well observes,* that a mind not totally devoid of feeling cannot look upon such a pros
pect without horror; and an heart capable of humanity must be unable to bear its description. He ought to have added, that no man of common discretion ought to have exhibited it to the public, if it were true ; or of common honesty, if it were false.
But now for the comfort; the day-star which is to arise in our hearts; the author's grand scheme for totally reversing this dismal state of things, and mak ing us1' "happy at home and respected abroad, for midable in war and flourishing in peace. "
In this great work he proceeds with a facility equally astonishing and pleasing. Never was finan cier less embarrassed by the burden of establishments,
or with the difficulty of finding ways and means. If an establishment is troublesome to him, he lops off at a stroke just as much of it as he chooses. He mows down, without giving quarter, or assigning reason,
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army, navy, ordnance, ordinary, extraordinaries; noth ing can stand before him. Then, when he comes to provide, Amalthea's horn is in his hands; and he pours out with an inexhaustible bounty, taxes, duties, loans, and revenues, without uneasiness to himself, or burden to the public. Insomuch that, when we consider the abundance of his resources, we cannot avoid being surprised at his extraordinary attention to savings. But it is all the exuberance of his good ness.
This book has so much of a certain tone of power, that one would be almost tempted to think it written by some person who had been high in office. A man is generally rendered somewhat a worse reasoner for having been a minister. In private, the assent of lis tening and obsequious friends; in public, the venal cry and prepared vote of a passive senate, confirm him in habits of begging the question with impu nity, and asserting without thinking himself obliged to prove. Had it not been for some such habits, the author could never have expected that we should take his estimate for a peace establishment solely on his word.
This estimate which he gives,*_' is the great ground work of his plan for the national redemption ; and it ought to be'well and firmly laid, or what must be come of the superstructure ? One would have thought the natural method in a plan of reformation would be, to take the present existing estimates as they stand; and then to show what may be practicably and safely defalcated from them. This would, I say, be the natural course; and what would be expected from a man of business. But this author takes a
* Page 33.
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very different method. For the ground of his specu lation of a present peace establishment, he resorts to a former speculation of the same kind, which was in the mind of the minister of the year 1764. Indeed it never existed anywhere else. " The plan," * says he,
with his usual ease, " has been already formed, and the outline drawn, by the administrationof 1764. I shall attempt to fill up the void and obliterated parts,
and trace operation. The standing expense of the present (his projected) peace establislnnent, improved
the experience the two last years, may be thus esti mated"; and he estimates at 3,468,161l.
Here too would be natural to expect some rea sons for condemning the subsequent actual establish ments, which have so much transgressed the limits of his plan of 1764, as well as some arguments in fa vor of his' new project; which has in some articles exceeded, in others fallen short, but 0n the whole much below his old one. Hardly word on any of
these points, the only points however that are in the least essential; for unless you assign reasons for the increase or diminution of the several articles of pub lic charge, the playing at establishments and esti mates an amusement of no higher order, and of much less ingenuity, than Questions and commands,
or What my thought like? To bring more distinctly under the reader's view this author's strange method of
will lay before him the three schemes; viz. the idea of the ministers in 1764, the actual esti mates o-f the two last years as given by the author him
? proceeding,
self, and lastly the new project of his political millen nium
Page 33.
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Plan of establishment for 1764, as by
" Considerations," p. 43 . . . . "' ? 3,609,700
Medium of 1767 and 1768, as by " State
of the Nation," p. 29 and 30 . . . 3,919,375
Present peace establishment, as by the
project in " State of the Nation," p. 33 3,468,161
It is not from anything our author has anywhere said, that you are enabled to find the ground, much less the justification, of the immense difference be tween these several systems ; you must compare them yourself, article by article; no very pleasing employ ment, by the way, to compare the agreement or disa greement of two chimeras. I now only speak of the comparison of his own two projects. As to the latter of them, it differs from the former, by having some of the articles diminished, and others increasedj I find the chief article of reduction arises from the smaller deficiency of land and malt, and of the annu ity funds, which he brings down to 295,561l. in his new estimate, from 502,400l. which he had allowed
for those articles in the " Considerations. " With this reduction, owing, as it must be, merely to a small er deficiency of funds, he has nothing at all to do. It can be no work and no merit of his. But with re gard to the increase, the matter is very different. It is all his own ; the public is loaded (for anything we can see to the contrary) entirely gratis. The chief articles of the increase are on the navy,i and on the army and ordnance extraordinaries; the navy being
* The figures in the "Considerations" are wrongly cast up; i| should be 3,608,700l.
1' " Considerations," p. 43. " State of the Nation," p. 33.
'
? 1 Ibid.
? ? ? ON THE PRESENT STATE OF THE NATION. 341
estimated in his "State of the Nation" 50,000l. a year more, and the army and ordnance extraordina ries 40,000l. more, than he had thought proper to al low for them in that estimate in his " Considerations," which he makes the foundation of his present project. He has given no sort of reason, stated no sort of ne cessity, for this additional allowance, either in the one article or the other. What is still stronger, he admits that his allowance for the army and ordnance extras is too great, and expressly refers you to the " Considerations "; "' where, far from giving 75,000l. a year to that service, as the " State of the Nation "
has done, the author apprehends his own scanty pro vision of 35,000l. to be by far too considerable, and
? thinks it may well admit of further
reductions. 1'
* Page 34.
T The author of the " State of the Nation," p. 34, informs us, that
the sum of 75,000l. allowed by him for the extras of the army and ordnance, is far less than was allowed for the same service in the years 1767 and 1768. It is so undoubtedly, and by at least 200,000l.
Nothing less. Examine our imports from thence ; it seems upon this vulgar idea of exports and imports, to turn the balance against you. But your exports to Newfoundland are your own goods. Your import is your own food; as much your own, as that you raise with your plonghs out of your own soil; and not your loss, but your gain; your riches, not your poverty. But so fallacious is this way of judging, that neither the export nor import, nor both together, supply any idea approaching to adequate of that branch of business. The vessels in that trade go straight from Newfoundland to the foreign market;
and the sale there, not the import here, is the meas ure of its value. That trade, which is one of your greatest and best, is hardly so much as seen in the custom-house entries; and it is not of less annual value to this nation than 400,000l. 6thly. The qual ity of your imports must be considered as well as the quantity. To state the whole of the foreign im
as loss, is exceedingly absurd. All the iron, hemp, flax, cotton, Spanish wool, raw silk, woollen and linen-yarn, which we import, are by no means to be considered as the matter of a merely luxurious consumption; which is the idea too generally and loosely annexed to our import article. These above
mentioned are materials of industry, not of luxury, which are wrought up here, in many instances, to ten times, and more, of their original value. Even where they are not subservient to our exports, they
still add to our internal wealth, which consists in the stock of useful commodities, as much as in gold and
In looking over the specific articles of our ex
silver.
vot. 1. 2|
port and import, I have often been astonished to see
for how small a part of the supply of our consump
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tion, either luxurious or convenient, we are indebted to nations properly foreign to us.
These considerations are entirely passed over by
the author; they have been but too much neglected
by most who have speculated on this subject. But they ought never to be omitted by those who mean to come to anything like the true state of the British trade. They compensate, and they more than com pensate, everything which the author can cut off with any appearance of reason for the over-entry of 'British goods; and they restore to us that balance of four millions, which the author has thought proper on such a very poor and limited comprehension of the object to reduce to 2,500,000l.
In general this author is so circumstanced, that to support his theory he is obliged to assume his facts: and then, if you allow his facts, they will not support his conclusions. What if all he says of the state of this balance were true ? did not the same objections always lie to custom-house entries? do they defalcate more from the entries of 1766 than from those of 1754? Ifthey prove us ruined, we were always ruined. Some ravens have always indeed croaked out this kind of song. They have a malignant delight in presaging mischief, when they are not employed in doing it: they are miserable and disappointed at
every instance of the public prosperity. They over look us like the malevolent being of the poet : --
Tritonida conspicit arcem
Ingeniis, opibusque, et festa pace virentem; Vixque tenet lacrymas quia nil lacrymabile cernit.
It is in this spirit that some have looked upon
those accidents that cast an occasional trade. Their imaginations entail these
? damp upon accidents
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upon us in perpetuity. We have had some bad har vests. This must very disadvantageously affect the balance of trade, and the navigation of a people, so large a part of whose commerce is in grain. But, in knowing the cause, we are morally certain, that,
according to the course of events, it cannot long sub sist. In the three last years, we have exported scarce ly any grain; in good years, that export hath been worth twelve hundred thousand pounds and more; in the two last years, far from exporting, we have been obliged to import to the amount perhaps of our former exportation. So that in this article the bal ance must be 2,000,000l. against us; that one million in the ceasing of gain, the other in the in crease of expenditure. But none of the author's promises or projects could have prevented this mis
fortune; and, thank God, we do not want him or them to relieve us from it; although, his friends should now come into power, doubt not but they will be ready to take credit for any increase of trade or excise, that may arise from the happy circum
stance of good harvest.
This connects with his loud laments and melan
choly prognostications concerning the high price of the necessaries of life and the products of labor. With all his others, deny this fact; and again call upon him to prove it. Take average and not
accident, the grand and first necessary of life cheap in this country; and that too as weighed, not against labor, which its true counterpoise, but against money. Does he call the price of wheat at this day, between 32 and 40 shillings per quarter in London dear He must know that fuel (an object
* It dearer in some places, and rather cheaper in others but must soon all come to level.
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of the highest order in the necessaries of life, and of
the first necessity in almost every kind of manufac
ture) is in many of our provinces cheaper than in any part of the globe. Meat is on the whole not exces
sively dear, whatever its price may be at particular times and from particular accidents. If it has had anything like an uniform rise, this enhancement may easily be proved not to be owing to the increase of taxes, but to uniform increase of consumption and of money. Diminish the latter, and meat in your markets will be sufficiently cheap in account, but much dearer in effect: because fewer will be in a condition to buy. Thus your apparent plenty will be real indigence. At present, even under tempo rary disadvantages, the use of flesh is greater here than anywhere else; it is continued without any in terruption of Lents or meagre days; it is sustained and growing even with the increase of our taxes.
But some have the art of converting even the signs of national prosperity into symptoms of decay and ruin. And our author, who so loudly disclaims pop ularity, never fails to_lay hold of the most vulgar popular prejudices and humors, in hopes to capti vate the crowd. Even those peevish dispositions which grow out of some transitory suffering, those passing clouds which float in our changeable atmos phere, are by him industriously figured into fright
ful shapes, in order first to terrify, and then to govern the populace.
It was not enough for the author's purpose to give this false and discouraging picture of the state of his own country. It did not fully answer his end, to ex aggerate her burdens, to depreciate her successes, and to vilify her character. Nothing had been done, 1111
. . . ,,,_",
? ? ? ? ON THE PRESENT STATE OF THE NATION. 325
less the situation of France were exalted in propor tion as that of England had been abased. The reader will excuse the citation I make at length from his book; he outdoes himself upon this occasion. His confidence is indeed unparalleled, and altogether of the heroic cast: --
"If our rival nations were in the same circum stances with ourselves, the augmentation of our taxes would produce no ill consequences : if we were obliged to raise our prices, they must, from the same causes, do the like, and could take n0 advantage by under selling and under-working us. But the alarming consideration to Great Britain that France not in the same condition. Her distresses, during the war, were great, but they were immediate; her want of credit, as has been said, compelled her to impover
? ish her people, by raising the greatest part of her sup plies within the year; but the burdens she imposed on them were, in a great measure, temporary, and must be greatly diminished afew years peace. She could procure no considerable loans, therefore she has mort gaged no such oppressive taxes as those Great Britain has imposed in perpetuity for payment interest. Peace must, therefore, soon re-establish' her commerce and
manufactures, especially as the comparative lightness of taxes, and the cheapness of living, in that country, must make France an asylum for British manufac turers and artificers. " On this the author rests the merit of his whole system. And on this point will join issue with him. If France not at least in the same condition, even in that very condition which the author falsely represents to be ours,--if the very re verse of his proposition be not true, then will admit
his state of the nation to be just; and all his inferen
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cos from that state to be logical and conclusive. It is not surprising, that the author should hazard our opinion of his veracity. That is a virtue on which great statesmen do not perhaps pique themselves so much; but it is somewhat extraordinary, that he should stake on a very poor calculation of chances, all credit for care, for accuracy, and for knowledge of the subject of which he treats. He is rash and inaccurate, because he thinks he writes to a public 1gnorant and inattentive. But he may find himself in that respect, as in many others, greatly mistaken.
In order to contrast the light and vigorous condi tion of France with that of England, weak, and sink ing under her burdens, he states, in his tenth page, that France had raised 50,314,378l. sterling by taxes within the several years from the year 1756 to 1762 both inclusive. An Englishman must stand aghast at such a representation: To find France able to raise within the year sums little inferior to all that we were able even to borrow on interest with all the resources of the greatest and most established credit in the world! Europe was filled with astonishment when they saw England borrow in one year twelve millions. It was th'ought, and 'very justly, no small proof of na tional strength and financial skill, to find a fund for the payment of the interest upon this sum. The in terest of _this, computed with the one per cent annu ities, amounted only to 600,000l. a year. This, I say, was thought a surprising effbrt even of credit. But this author talks, as of a thing not worth proving, and but just worth observing, that France in one yea1 raised sixteen times that sum without borrowing, and continued to raise sums not far from equal to it for
several years together. Suppose some Jacob Hen
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r1ques had proposed, in the year 1762, to prevent a perpetual charge on the nation by raising ten mil lions within the year: he would have been consid ered, not as a harsh financier, who laid a heavy hand on the public; but as a poor visionary, who had run mad on supplies and taxes. They who know that the whole land-tax of England, at 4s. in the pound, raises but two millions, will not easily apprehend that any such sums as the author has conjured up can be raised even in the most opulent nations. France owed a large debt, and was encumbered with heavy
establishments, before that war. The author does not formally deny that she borrowed something in every year of its continuance; let him produce the funds for this astonishing annual addition to all her vast preceding taxes ; an addition equal to the whole excise, customs, land and malt-taxes of England taken together.
But what must be the reader's astonishment, per haps his indignation, if he should find that this great financier has fallen into the most unaccountable of all errors, no less an error than that of mistaking the identical sums borrowed by France upon interest, for supplies raised within the year! Can it be conceived that any man, only entered into the first rudiments of finance, should make so egregious a blunder; should write should print it; should carry to second edition; should take not collaterally and incidentally, but layit down as the corner-stone of his whole system, in such an important point as the comparative states of France and England? But will be said, that was his misfortune to be ill-in formed. Not at all. A man of any loose general knowledge, and of the most ordinary sagacity, never
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could have been misinformed in so gross a manner; because he would have immediately rejected so wild and extravagant an account.
The fact is this: the credit of France, bad as it might have been, did enable her (not to raise within the year) but to borrow the very sums the author mentions; that is to say, 1,106,916,261 livres, mak ing, in the author's computation, 50,314,378l. The credit of France was low; but it was not annihilated. ' She did not derive, as our author chooses to assert,' any advantages from the debility of her credit. Its consequence was the natural one: she borrowed; but she borrowed upon bad terms, indeed on the
most exorbitant usury.
In speaking of a foreign revenue, the very pretence
to accuracy would be the most inaccurate thing in' the world. Neither the author nor I can with oer-_ tainty authenticate the information we comm1micate to the public, nor in an affair of eternal fluctuation arrive at perfect exactness. All we can do, and this we may be expected to do, is to avoid gross errors and blunders of a capital nature. We cannot order the proper officer to lay the accounts before the House. But the reader must judge on the probability of the accounts we lay before him. The author speaks of
France as raising her supplies for war by taxes with in the year; and of her debt, as a thing scarcely worthy of notice. I affirm that she borrowed large sums in every year ; and has thereby accumulated an immense debt. This debt continued after the war infinitely to embarrass her affairs; and to find some means for its reduction was then and has ever since been the first object of her policy. But she has so little succeeded in all her efforts, that the per
? ? ? ? ON THE PRESENT STATE OF THE NATION.
329
petual debt of France is at this hour little short of 100,000,000l. sterling; and she stands charged with at least 40,000,000 of English pounds on life-rents and tontines. The annuities paid at this day at the Hotel de Ville of Paris, which are by no means her sole payments of that nature, amount to 139,000,000 of livres, that is to 6,3-18,000l. ; besides billets au porteur, and various detached and unfunded debts, to a great
amount, and which bear an interest.
At the end of the war, the interest payable on her
debt amounted to upwards of seven millions sterling. M. de la Verdy, the last hope of the French finances, was called in, to aid in the reduction of an interest, so light to our author, so intolerably heavy
? upon those who are to pay it. After many unsuccessful efforts towards reconciling arbitrary reduction with public credit, he was obliged to go the plain high road of power, and to impose a tax of 10 per cent upon a very great part of the capital debt of that kingdom; and this measure of present ease, to the
destruction of future credit, produced about 500,000l. a year, which was carried to their Caisse d'amortisse ment or sinking fund. _But so unfaithfully and un steadily has this and all the other articles which compose that fund been applied to their purposes, that they have given the state but very little even of present relief, since it is known to the whole world that she is behind-hand on every one of her establish ments. Since the year 1763,there has been no oper ation of any consequence on the French finances; and in this enviable condition is France at present with regard to her debt.
Everybody knows that the principal of the debt is but a name ; the interest is the only thing which can distress a nation. Take this idea, which will not be
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disputed, and compare the interest paid by England with that paid by France:
Interest paid by France, funded and
unfunded, for perpetuity or on lives,
after the" tax of 10 per cent . . . ? 6,500,000
330
Interest paid by England, as stated by the author, p. 27 . . . . . . .
4,600,000
Interest paid by France exceeds that
paid by England . . . . . . . ? 1,900,000
The author cannot complain, that I state the inter est paid by England as too low. He takes it himself as the extremest term. Nobody who knows anything of the French finances will affirm that I state the in terest paid by that kingdom too high. It might be easily proved to amount to a great deal more: even this is near two millions above what is England.
There are three standards to judge of the good con dition of a nation with regard to its finances. 1st, The relief of the people. 2nd, The equality of sup plies to establishments. 3rd, The state of public credit. Try France on all these standards.
Although oiir author very liberally administers relief to the people of France, its government has not been altogether so gracious. Since the peace, she has taken off' but a single oingtie? me, or shilling in the pound, and some small matter in the capitation. But, if the government has relieved them in one point, it has only burdened them the more heavily ill another. The Taillef' that grievous and destructive imposition, which all their financiers lament, without being able to remove or to replace, has been aug
* A tax rated by the intendant in each generality, on the presumed fortune of every person below the degree of a gentleman.
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mented no less than six millions of livres, or 270,000 pounds English. A further augmentation of this or other duties is now talked of; and it is certainly ne
cessary to their affairs: so exceedingly remote from either truth or verisimilitude is the author's amazing assertion, that the burdens of France in the war were in a great measure temporary, and must be greatly diminished by a few years ofpeaoe.
In the next place, if the people of France are not lightened of taxes, so neither is the state disburdened of charges. I speak from very good information, that the annual income of that state is at this day thirty millions of livres, or 1,350,000l. sterling, short
? of a provision for their ordinary peace establishment ; so far are they from the attempt or even hope to dis charge any part of the capital of their enormous debt.
Indeed, under such extreme straitness and distrac tion labors the whole body of their finances, so far does their charge outrun their supply in every par
ticular, that no man, I believe, whohas considered their affairs with any degree of attention or informa tion, but must hourly look for some extraordinary convulsion in that whole system: the effect of which on France, and even on all Europe, it is difficult to
conjecture.
In the third point of view, their credit. Let the
reader cast his eye on a table of the price of French
fiLI1dS, as they stood a few weeks ago, compared with the state of some of our English stocks, even in their present low condition : --
French. British.
5 per cents . . . . 63 Bank stock, 5? . 159 4 per cent (not taxed) 57 4 per cent cons. 100 3 per cent " " 49 3 per cent cons. 88
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This state of the funds of France and England is sufficient to convince even prejudice and obstinacy, that if France and England are not in the same con dition (as the author afiirms they are not) the dif ference is infinitely to the disadvantage of France.
This depreciation of their funds has not much the air of a nation lightening burdens and discharging debts.
Such is the true comparative state of the two king doms in those capital points of view. Now as to the nature of the taxes which provide for this debt, as well as for their ordinary establishments, the author has thought proper to affirm that " they are compara tively light "'; that " she has mortgaged no such op pressive taxes as ours " ; his effrontery on this head is intolerable. Does the author recollect a single tax
in England to which something parallel in nature, and as heavy in burden, does not exist in France; does he not know that the lands of the noblesse are still under the load of the greater part of the old feudal charges, from which the gentry of England have been relieved for upwards of a hundred years, and which were in kind, as well as burden, much worse than our modern land-tax? Besides that all the gentry of France serve in the army on very slender pay, and to the utter ruin of their fortunes, all those who are not noble have their lands heavily taxed. Does he not know that wine," brandy, soap, candles, leather, salt
petre, gunpowder, are taxed in France? Has he not heard that government in France has made a monop oly of that great article of salt? that they compel the people to take a certain quantity of and at certain rate, both rate and quantity fixed at the ar bitrary pleasure of the imposer? "' that they pay in
* Before the war was sold to, or rather forced on, the consumer
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France the Taille, an arbitrary imposition on pre sumed property? that a tax is laid in fact and name, on the same arbitrary standard, upon the acquisitions of their industry ? and that in France a heavy capita tion-taa: is also paid, from the highest to the very poorest sort of people? Have we taxes of such weight, or anything at all of the compulsion, in the
article of salt? do we pay any taillaye, any faculty taz, any industry-tax? do we pay any capitation-tax whatsoever? Ibelieve the people of London would fall into an agony to hear of such taxes proposed upon them as are paid at Paris. There is not a sin gle article of provision for man or beast which enters that great city, and is not excised ; corn, hay, meal,
? butcher's-meat, fish, fowls, everything. I do not here mean to censure the policy of taxes laid on the con sumption of great luxurious cities. I only state the fact. We should be with difficulty brought to hear of a tax of 50s. upon every ox sold in Smithfield. Yet this tax is paid in Paris. Wine, the lower sort of wine, little better than English small beer, pays 2d. a bottle.
We, indeed, tax our beer; but the imposition on small beer is very far from heavy. In no part of England are eatables of any kind the object of tax ation. In almost every other country in Europe they are excised, more or less. I have by me the state of the revenues of many of the principal nations on the Continent; and, on comparing them with ours, I think I am fairly warranted to assert, that England is the most lightly taxed of any of the great states
at 11 sous, or about 5d. the pound. What it is at present, I am not informed. Even this will appear no trivial imposition. In London, salt may be had at a penny farthing per pound from the last retailer.
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of Europe. They, whose unnatural and sullen arises from contemplation of the distresses of their country, will revolt at this position. But am
called upon, will prove beyond all possibility dispute even though this proof should deprive these gentlemen of the singular satisfaction of considering their country as undone; and though the best civil government, the best constituted, and the best man aged revenue that ever the world beheld, should thoroughly vindicated from their perpetual claxnors and complaints. As to our neighbor and rival France, in addition to what have here suggested, say, and when the author chooses formally to deny, shall formally prove that her subjects pay more than England, on computation of the wealth 'of both countries; that her taxes are more injudiciously and more oppressively imposed more vexatiously col
lected come in smaller proportion to the royal cof fers, and are less applied by far to the public service. am not one of those who choose to take the author's
word for this happy and flourishing condition of the French finances, rather than attend to the changes, the violent pushes and the despair of all her own nanciers. Does he choose to be referred for the easy and happy condition of the subject in France to the remonstrances of their own parliaments, written with such an eloquence, feeling, and energy, as have not seen exceeded in any other writings? The author may say, their complaints are exaggerated, and the effects of faction. answer, that they are the repre sentations of numerous, grave, and most respectable bodies of men, upon the affairs of their own country. But, allowing that discontent and faction may per vert the judgment of such venerable bodies in France,
334
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we have as good a right to suppose that the same causes may full as probably have produced from a private, however respectable person, that frightful, and, I trust I have shown, groundless representation of our own affairs in England.
The author is so conscious of the dangerous effects of that representation, that he thinks it necessary, and very necessary it to guard against them. He assures us, " that he has not made that display of the difficulties of his country, to expose her counsels to the ridicule of other states, or to provoke vanquished enemy to insult her; nor to excite the people's rage against their governors, or sink them into despond
ency of the public welfare. " readily admit this apology for his intentions. . God forbid should think any man capable of entertaining so execrable and senseless design. The true cause of his drawing so shocking picture no more than this and ought rather to claim our pity than excite our indignation he finds himself out of power; and this condition intolerable to him. The same sun which gilds all nature, and exhilarates the whole creation, does not shine upon disappointed ambition. It something that rays out of darkness, and inspires nothing but gloom and melancholy. Men in this deplorable state of mind find comfort in spreading the contagion of
their spleen. They find an advantage too; for general, popular error, to imagine the loudest com
for the public to be the most anxious for its welfare. If such persons can answer the ends of relief and profit to themselves, they are apt to be careless enough about either the means or the conse
quences.
Whatever this complainant's motives may be, the
plainers
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effects can by no possibility be other than those which he so strongly, and I hope truly, disclaims all inten tion of producing. To verify this, the reader has only to consider how dreadful a picture he has drawn in his 32nd page, of the state of this kingdom; such a picture as, I believe, has hardly been applicable, without some exaggeration, to the most degenerate and undone commonwealth that ever existed. Let this view of things be compared with the prospect of a remedy which he proposes in the page directly oppo site, and the subsequent. I believe no man living
could have imagined it possible, except for the sake of burlesquing a subject, to propose remedies so ridic ulously disproportionate to the evil, so full of uncer tainty in their operation, and depending for their success in every step upon the happy event of so many new, dangerous, and visionary projects. It is not amiss, that he has thought proper to give the public some little notice of what they may expect from his friends, when oi1r affairs shall be committed to their management. Let us see how the accoimts of disease and remedy are balanced in his " State of the Nation. " In the first place, on the side of evils, he states, "an impoverished and heavily-burdened
A declining trade and decreasing specie. The power of the crown never so much extended over the great; but the great without influence over the lower sort. Parliament losing its reverence with the people. The voice of the multitude set up against the sense of the legislature; a people luxurious and licentious, impatient of rule, and despising all author ity. Government relaxed in every sinew, and a cor rupt selfish spirit. pervading the whole. An opinion of many, that the form of government is not worth
? public.
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contending for. No attachment in the bulk of the people towards the constitution. No reverence for the customs of our ancestors. No attachment but to private interest, nor any zeal but for selfish gratifi cations. Trade and manufactures going to ruin. Great Britain in danger of becoming tributary to France, and the descent of the crown dependent on
her pleasure. Ireland, in case of a war, to become a prey to France; and Great Britain, unable to re cover Ireland, cede it by treaty," (the author never can think of a treaty without making cessions,) "in order to purchase peace for herself. The colonies
left exposed to the ravages of a domestic, or the con quest of a foreign enemy. "--Gloomy enough, God knows. The author well observes,* that a mind not totally devoid of feeling cannot look upon such a pros
pect without horror; and an heart capable of humanity must be unable to bear its description. He ought to have added, that no man of common discretion ought to have exhibited it to the public, if it were true ; or of common honesty, if it were false.
But now for the comfort; the day-star which is to arise in our hearts; the author's grand scheme for totally reversing this dismal state of things, and mak ing us1' "happy at home and respected abroad, for midable in war and flourishing in peace. "
In this great work he proceeds with a facility equally astonishing and pleasing. Never was finan cier less embarrassed by the burden of establishments,
or with the difficulty of finding ways and means. If an establishment is troublesome to him, he lops off at a stroke just as much of it as he chooses. He mows down, without giving quarter, or assigning reason,
? * Page 31. VOL. 1.
T Page 33.
22
? ? ? 338 OBSERVATIONS on A LATE PUBLICATION
army, navy, ordnance, ordinary, extraordinaries; noth ing can stand before him. Then, when he comes to provide, Amalthea's horn is in his hands; and he pours out with an inexhaustible bounty, taxes, duties, loans, and revenues, without uneasiness to himself, or burden to the public. Insomuch that, when we consider the abundance of his resources, we cannot avoid being surprised at his extraordinary attention to savings. But it is all the exuberance of his good ness.
This book has so much of a certain tone of power, that one would be almost tempted to think it written by some person who had been high in office. A man is generally rendered somewhat a worse reasoner for having been a minister. In private, the assent of lis tening and obsequious friends; in public, the venal cry and prepared vote of a passive senate, confirm him in habits of begging the question with impu nity, and asserting without thinking himself obliged to prove. Had it not been for some such habits, the author could never have expected that we should take his estimate for a peace establishment solely on his word.
This estimate which he gives,*_' is the great ground work of his plan for the national redemption ; and it ought to be'well and firmly laid, or what must be come of the superstructure ? One would have thought the natural method in a plan of reformation would be, to take the present existing estimates as they stand; and then to show what may be practicably and safely defalcated from them. This would, I say, be the natural course; and what would be expected from a man of business. But this author takes a
* Page 33.
? ? ? ? ON THE PRESENT STATE OF THE NATION.
very different method. For the ground of his specu lation of a present peace establishment, he resorts to a former speculation of the same kind, which was in the mind of the minister of the year 1764. Indeed it never existed anywhere else. " The plan," * says he,
with his usual ease, " has been already formed, and the outline drawn, by the administrationof 1764. I shall attempt to fill up the void and obliterated parts,
and trace operation. The standing expense of the present (his projected) peace establislnnent, improved
the experience the two last years, may be thus esti mated"; and he estimates at 3,468,161l.
Here too would be natural to expect some rea sons for condemning the subsequent actual establish ments, which have so much transgressed the limits of his plan of 1764, as well as some arguments in fa vor of his' new project; which has in some articles exceeded, in others fallen short, but 0n the whole much below his old one. Hardly word on any of
these points, the only points however that are in the least essential; for unless you assign reasons for the increase or diminution of the several articles of pub lic charge, the playing at establishments and esti mates an amusement of no higher order, and of much less ingenuity, than Questions and commands,
or What my thought like? To bring more distinctly under the reader's view this author's strange method of
will lay before him the three schemes; viz. the idea of the ministers in 1764, the actual esti mates o-f the two last years as given by the author him
? proceeding,
self, and lastly the new project of his political millen nium
Page 33.
? ? *
:
is
I it
is
its of
a
is
it
by
? 340 OBSERVATIONS on A LATE PUBLICATION
Plan of establishment for 1764, as by
" Considerations," p. 43 . . . . "' ? 3,609,700
Medium of 1767 and 1768, as by " State
of the Nation," p. 29 and 30 . . . 3,919,375
Present peace establishment, as by the
project in " State of the Nation," p. 33 3,468,161
It is not from anything our author has anywhere said, that you are enabled to find the ground, much less the justification, of the immense difference be tween these several systems ; you must compare them yourself, article by article; no very pleasing employ ment, by the way, to compare the agreement or disa greement of two chimeras. I now only speak of the comparison of his own two projects. As to the latter of them, it differs from the former, by having some of the articles diminished, and others increasedj I find the chief article of reduction arises from the smaller deficiency of land and malt, and of the annu ity funds, which he brings down to 295,561l. in his new estimate, from 502,400l. which he had allowed
for those articles in the " Considerations. " With this reduction, owing, as it must be, merely to a small er deficiency of funds, he has nothing at all to do. It can be no work and no merit of his. But with re gard to the increase, the matter is very different. It is all his own ; the public is loaded (for anything we can see to the contrary) entirely gratis. The chief articles of the increase are on the navy,i and on the army and ordnance extraordinaries; the navy being
* The figures in the "Considerations" are wrongly cast up; i| should be 3,608,700l.
1' " Considerations," p. 43. " State of the Nation," p. 33.
'
? 1 Ibid.
? ? ? ON THE PRESENT STATE OF THE NATION. 341
estimated in his "State of the Nation" 50,000l. a year more, and the army and ordnance extraordina ries 40,000l. more, than he had thought proper to al low for them in that estimate in his " Considerations," which he makes the foundation of his present project. He has given no sort of reason, stated no sort of ne cessity, for this additional allowance, either in the one article or the other. What is still stronger, he admits that his allowance for the army and ordnance extras is too great, and expressly refers you to the " Considerations "; "' where, far from giving 75,000l. a year to that service, as the " State of the Nation "
has done, the author apprehends his own scanty pro vision of 35,000l. to be by far too considerable, and
? thinks it may well admit of further
reductions. 1'
* Page 34.
T The author of the " State of the Nation," p. 34, informs us, that
the sum of 75,000l. allowed by him for the extras of the army and ordnance, is far less than was allowed for the same service in the years 1767 and 1768. It is so undoubtedly, and by at least 200,000l.
