The Athenians did not carry on that extenfive commerce, which might have been expected from the labour of their flaves, the great number of their feamen, the power which they had over the ftates of Greece, and, what exceeded all, the excellent regulations of Solon.

In many countries, where all the taxes are farmed, the collection of the royal revenues ruins commerce, not only by its inequality, oppreffion, and extreme exactions, but also by the difficulties it occafions, and the formalities it requires.

In other places, where the duties of customs are collected upon the good faith of the importers, there is a wide difference in respect of the conveniencies for traffick. One word in writing transacts the greatest business. The merchant is under no neceflity of lofing time in attendance; nor obliged to employ clerks, on purpose to remove the difficulties ftarted by the financiers, or be compelled to fubmit to them..

The liberty of trading does not confift in a permiffion to merchants of doing whatever they please; this would be rather the flavery of commerce: what cramps the trader, does not cramp the trade. In free countries the merchant meets with innumerable obftacles; but in defpotic governments he is not near fo much thwarted by the laws. England prohibits the exportation of its wool; the has ordained coals to be imported to the capital by fea; fhe has prohibited the exportation of horses fit for stallions; fhe obliges fhips, which trade from her plantations in America into Europe, to anchor firft in England. By these, and fuch like prohibitions, he cramps the merchant; but it is for the benefit of commerce.

Where-ever there is trade, there are cuftom-houfes alfo.

The object of trade, is the exportation and importation of goods, for the advantage of the ftate: the object of the custom-houses, is a certain duty, exacted from the fame exportation and importation of goods, for the advantage likewife of the state; for this reafon a ftate ought to preserve an exact impartiality between the custom-house and the trade, and to make such proper regulations, that these two might never clash with each other: then the people will enjoy their free liberty of

commerce.

* England has no tarif, or fixed books of rates with other nations: her tarif changes, as we may fay, at every selffion of parliament, by the particular duties which the lays on, or takes off.

Strongly jealous of the trade which is carried on in her country, the rarely engages herself in treaties with other ftates, and depends on no laws, but her own.'

We

We know not on what authority her imperial majefty has adopted the idea contained in the last article. We believe that England has entered into as many treaties with foreign powers as any nation in Europe; but we do not recollect any one inftance in which the interpretation of thofe treaties depended only upon her own laws. In admiralty cafes, her courts have always been determined by the civil law and that of nations, which are in common to all European ftates; and we will venture to say, that in commercial affairs tranfacted in other countries, an intelligent English judge and jury will always be determined by the laws, ufages, and cuftoms of the people among whom the affair in litigation was transacted.

Upon the whole, we fhall not hesitate to pronounce, that this publication contains many excellent hints for the improvement even of our own laws, especially in cafes of distributive juftice; and that the imperial authorefs, by the wife and falutary inftitutions fhe lays down, bids fair to atone for the ravages which the forefathers of her people formerly carried into the feats of politenefs, literature, commerce, and industry.

IV. Thoughts on different Subjects. By J. J. Rouffeau, Citizen of Geneva. In two Vols. 12mo. Pr. 55. Crowder.

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HOUGH we are far from entertaining any predilection either for the genius, morals, or perfon of this citizen of Geneva; yet we cannot refuse the highest approbation of many fentiments contained in the mifcellany before us. The author, in fpeaking of optimifin, condemns equally devotees and philofophers; the former, because they are always interpofing divine juftice in events merely natural, and the latter, because they are making problems always in the wrong. I think (fays

he) things fhould be confidered relatively in the phyfical order, and abfolutely in the moral order: fo that the greatest idea I can form of Providence is, that every material being is difpofed the best that is poffible with refpect to the whole; and every intelligent and fenfible being, the beft that is poffible with refpect to itself; or, in other terms, that for every fenfible being

it is better to exist than not to exist. But this rule fhould be applied to the whole duration of every fenfible being, and not to fome particular moments of its existence, such as human life; which fhews how intimately the queftion of Providence is connected with that of the immortality of the foul, which I have the happiness to believe. If I refer thefe arguments to their common principle, they, in my opinion, may be all traced back to that of the exiftence of God. If God exifts, which it is not poffible to doubt, he must be perfect; if he is perfect, he is all

wife, all powerful and juft; if he is all wife and juft, all is for the beft; if he is just and all powerful, my foul is immortal; if my foul is immortal, thirty or forty years of life are nothing to me, and may, perhaps, be neceffary for the maintenance of the univerfe.'

Mr. Rouffeau fpeaking of the Perfians, is in many places a little paradoxical. Read a love-letter (fays he) composed by an author in his closet, or a genius who is defirous of fhining from the little fire in his brain; the letter, o ufe the expreffion, feems as if it would burn the paper, but its heat extends no farther. You may be inchanted, perhaps affected by it, but fo flightly as to leave the words only to remember it by. On the contrary, a letter which love has really dictated, a letter of a true and paffionate lover, will be dull, diffufed, long, full of diforder and repetitions: his heart, filled with the paffion with which it overflows, returns always to the fame thing, and has never done speaking; like a brisk spring which runs without ceafing, and is never exhaufted. No fallies of wit, nothing remarkable: we retain neither words, phrases, nor turns of periods; we admire nothing, we are ftruck with nothing. Nevertheless the foul is melted, and we feel ourselves affected without knowing why. If ftrength of fentiment does not strike us, its truth affects us, and it is thus the heart speaks to the heart. But those who feel nothing, those who poffefs only the jargon embellished with the paffions, know not these kind of beauties, and defpife them.'

We are afraid that in the above quotation our author talks rather from philofophy than experience. The expreffions of paffion are not always dull and diffuse, difordered and redundant. We could venture to produce many examples which prove the contrary, and that paffion, instead of hurting, often improves elegance. Was ever mortal in a more mournful fituation than Anne Bullen, when the night before her execution she wrote to her husband Henry VIII. that letter which must be for ever the standard of epiftolary compofition? She might not, perhaps, be a lover, but he was a wife and a mother, and under fentence of death; confequently all her paffions were interested in what he wrote. In fact, Rouffeau knows the properties of his own heart, and those of the friends with whom he is converfant; he is a judge of the little focial commerce in which he has been concerned; but he has no enlarged ideas of the mental faculties, which he bounds by his own experience and conceptions. Thefe, fo far as his knowledge reaches, are precife and accurate; but he is too confined in his notions of human nature.

VOL. XXVI. Oa, 1768.

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In

In treating on finances and taxes he writes like a citizen of Geneva, without the leaft knowledge of that national œconomy which is proper for a great ftate.

The most important maxim in the adminiftration of the finances, is to labour more carefully to prevent the wants of the state than to augment its revenues. The antient governments did more in effect, with their parfimony, than ours with all their treasures.

The books, and all the accounts of registers, ferve less to detect their infidelities than to conceal them; and prudence is never fo ready at inventing new precautions as roguery at eluding them. Leave then these regifters and papers, and place the finances in trufty hands: this is the only means to have them faithfully managed. Virtue is the only efficacious inftrument in this delicate part of the administration.

• Cæteris paribus. He who has ten times more effects than another, fhould pay ten times more. He who has barely what is neceffary, fhould pay nothing at all; and the tax upon him who poffeffes a fuperfluity may extend, in case of neceffity, as far as the whole that exceeds what is neceffary. Some will fay, that, in respect to their rank, what would be fuperfluous for a man of a meaner rank, is neceffary for them; but this is a falfhood; for a grandee has two legs as well as a clown, and but one belly, no more than him: besides, this pretended neceffity is fo little neceffary to his rank, that if he renounced it for a laudable purpofe, he would be the more refpected; the people would proftrate themselves at the foot of a minifter who went to the council on foot, from having fold his coach to contribute towards a preffing occafion of the state. In short, the laws prefcribe magnificence to no one; and neither conveniency, or decorum, are a fufficient reafon against them.

'Let heavy taxes be laid on livery fervants, equipages, rich furniture, palaces, and public entertainments of every kind, idle profeffions of every kind, as dancers, fingers, players; and. in a word, upon that croud of objects of luxury, amusement, and idleness, which strike all eyes; and which can be the lefs concealed, as their only ufe is to be exposed to view; and which would be intirely useless, if they were not seen. There is no fear that the produce of fuch taxes would be small, from being left to every man's choice, and being laid on things which are not abfolutely neceffary. To fuppose, that after they have once fuffered themselves to be feduced by luxury they can ever renounce it, is a proof of a very slender knowledge of mankind: they would an hundred times fooner deny themfelves neceffaries, and would rather chufe to die of hunger than fhame. The increase of expence would be a fresh reason for maintaining

maintaining it; when the vanity of fhewing themselves rich would be gratified from the price of the thing, and the expence of the tax; while there are rich people, they will distinguish themselves from the poor; and the state cannot procure itself a lefs burthenfome or a more certain revenue, than from this diftinction.

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For the fame reason, industry would not fuffer from an œconomy which enriched the finances, encouraged agriculture, by eafing the peafant, and would infenfibly bring all fortunes to that mediocrity which conftitutes the true ftrength of a state. I own, the taxes might contribute to make some fashions pass away more quickly; but then, in their room, others would be fubftituted, by which the tradefman would get money, without any loss to the Exchequer. In fhort, fuppofe the genius of the government is conftantly to place all taxes on fuperfluous riches, two things would happen: either the rich would retrench their fuperfluous expences, which would tend to the profit of the ftate; in which cafe the affeffment of taxes will have produced the effect of the best fumptuary laws. The expences of the state will, confequently, be leffened with thofe of individuals; and, the Exchequer will not receive the less for this; because, it will have much fewer difbursements; or, if the rich will not retrench their profufion, the Exchequer will have, from the produce of the taxes, the neceffary refources, for the real neceffities of the ftate. In the first case, the Exchequer is enriched by all that expence. which is faved; in the other, it enriches itfelf ftill more at the useless expence of individuals. I am of opinion, that whatever is not profcribed by the laws, nor contrary to the customs, and which the government has a right to forbid, it may certainly permit upon paying a duty; and, for example, the government has a right to forbid the ufe of coaches; it can, therefore, with the greatest propriety, lay a tax on coaches. A wife and useful method of blaming their ufe, without entirely putting a ftop to them. In this cafe the tax may be looked on as a kind of penalty, the produce of which makes amends for the abuse it punishes.

It has been afferted, that the peasant ought to be taxed. and that he would do nothing, had he nothing to pay; but experience contradicts this ridiculous maxim, in every nation. In Holland, in England, where the cultivator of land pays but very little; and, particularly, in China, where he pays nothing, the land is beft cultivated. On the contrary, wherever the labourer is taxed in proportion to the produce of his land, he leaves it untilled, or raises only enough for him to fubfift on: for he who lofes the fruit of his labour, gains by doing nothing; T 2

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