Part 27

I shall now inspect the question more minutely; for all I have said hitherto is not so much an apology for luxury, as an exposition of the inconveniences attending its being made the principal object of taxation: I beg to be excused, if I grow unwillingly more familiar in my style, when the dignity of the subject seems to require one of suitable dignity in the manner of treating it.

It is the quality of the land that determines the division of its products: however ungrateful the soil, the man who cultivates it, first deducts what is necessary for his subsistence, and a trifle more; the rest is divided amongst the landlord and some others, for one reason or another admitted to a share. This division, determined by the most general quality of the land, brings down the proprietor, who farms out his estate, to about one third of its productions, and reduces nearly to the like proportion, those who are employed in wresting them from the bottom of the earth.

In order therefore to consume as much as 80 men, the proprietor must have a landed estate capable of giving food to 240; and out of these 240, 160 must be provided for before the proprietor can think on his own consumption. Consequently, it would be unreasonable to call him to any other account than for that portion which he has received: but I readily subscribe to the necessity of having that account examined with the utmost rigour, since the object is to justify the dissipation of so considerable a surplus, and since the employment of that surplus, well ascertained, will give us sufficient light on the employment of the other parts of the revenue, which by that means it will be useless to examine.

The highest pitch of extravagance, in point of luxury, is, beyond contradiction, that which, in the smallest possible compass, contains the largest quantity, as well as the greatest perfection of labour, and of a labour the most easy to destroy.

Let us suppose a man who, to the fancy of being possessed of such an article, should join that of seeing constantly at work all those hands which must be employed to complete it; such a fancy never produces any other effect, but that of tertiating or doubling the price of things. The Patriarchs of old, busied and amused themselves, no doubt, in setting to work those whom they enabled to eat; they lived too near the time when man was condemned to labour, to maintain them in idleness. The modern Patriarch of whom I am speaking, provided with a pound weight of flax, which costs him 6d. divides it among 25 working people, who give it every preparation necessary to answer the purpose it is intended for. After an entire month of the most slavish precautions, the most minute details, a thread, hardly perceptible to the naked eye, presents to the warm imagination of the proprietor, the idea of the chef-d’œuvre of which this thread is to be the foundation; after 4 or 5 months more, devoted to the most patient and assiduous industry, he is at last put in possession of some slips of lace, weighing in all 4 or 5 drachms, picked out and sorted, thanks to the last refinement of art, from that pound of flax which had cost six-pence. Five-pence three farthings, and a few fractions, are then, it seems, in the strictest calculation, the only real loss—the only devastation which is occasioned by luxury carried to the highest pitch of extravagance; and this loss is compensated by some very curious pieces of workmanship, which it is impossible to value at less than 227l. 10s. being the amount of 4550 days work at 12d. paid to each of the 25 working people, who have owed their subsistence, for six months, to that pretended inutility.—Amongst all the passions with which Providence has been pleased to gratify the rich for the advantage of the poor, name me only one that occasions less devastation, and maintains a greater number of indigent persons, than luxury carried to excess. O ye rigid men, who have left off wearing lace, join with me who have left it off too,—join with me in teaching those who continue to wear it, how many of their brethren they nourish without knowing it! Make them virtuous by teaching them, that in order to be so, they need only do, from a sentiment of humanity, what hitherto perhaps they have done through a motive of puerile vanity, or from a principle of ostentation, which, when considered, needs to be considered with some indulgence.

Another aspect, whimsical enough perhaps, but by no means foreign to the title of this pamphlet, would be that under which we should view those prodigies of art and patience, as the work not only of 25 artificers who were busied upon it for six months, but also of 12 or 15 husbandmen whose existence and labour were indispensable for the sustenance, during the same time, of the 25 labouring people employed in that great work.... A peevish man would perhaps exclaim, Was it indeed worth while to be born, if all ends with this life?—And yet, even in this case, thread-lace ought not to be proscribed: it was not worth while indeed to come into the world, solely to make lace; but, once born, we must work at something, in order to bear, without weariness, every instant even of a life which should not require lace-making for its support: as to the nature of the work, let us not find fault with that of others, before we justly estimate our own.... Can we find many of our fellow-creatures, who on their death-bed are able to shew the work of their whole life ... worth the smallest shred of lace then in being?

After this single instance of luxury, by which 25 men are fed during six months at the expence of another, by daily reducing his revenue from 80 to 55, I think that, without being an enthusiast or a declaimer, it would be difficult, even for a good man in the right sense of the word, to withstand the pleasure (although perhaps rather of the mischievous kind) of observing that little more is wanted beyond two such fancies as we have stated, to bring the Proprietor, reduced in the origin from 240 shillings to 80, and then from 80 to 55—to bring him, I say, exactly to the level of the cultivator, whom he has brought down to 9d. or 10d. and of the mechanic on whom he has bestowed 11 or 12d.; however, I am willing to allow him 24 for his real, personal, and daily consumption. Twenty-four pence! will it be said, What signifies being so rich, to consume so little! Yes, twenty-four pence; and this is by much too much, if we deduct, as we ought, from the price of each article supposed to be consumed by the rich, the sum that remains in the hands of the pilferers of all kinds, who stand, unknown to him, between him and that article.—How! what say you then to that plate of green-peas which costs 6, 8, or 10 guineas!—But, my good friend the consumer of green peas, if you knew how many pilferers it conceals, of whom you have not the least idea! if you knew how many wants it has supplied to some, how many indulgences of luxury it has procured to others, before it found its way to the table of an Epicure, or of an ostentatious man!—Let us try to enumerate them: workers of mines and quarries, masons, carpenters, glaziers, colliers, lock-smiths, English and French sailors for the common-spice trade; Dutch seamen, for the more precious kinds; ships of war of the three Powers, indispensable for the protection of the merchantmen employed on those objects; wood-fellers in Sweden, sail-cloth weavers in Russia, ship-builders, pilots, admirals of the three nations, husbandmen busied in the four parts of the world in procuring food for themselves, in order to prepare food for all those wood-fellers, glaziers, admirals, &c. exclusive of the Dutch gardener, and the French cook who alone can worthily crown the mighty operation.—Imagination loses itself in that single plate of green peas. How many reductions from 16 pence to 8, and from 8 to 4, have been required to produce it! It is inconceivable that it should not sell for more than 6 or 8 guineas;—but if each of those pilferers above mentioned takes back the small portion by which he has increased the intrinsic value of the article.... O ye, who must have swallowed up 500 properties, in order to eat, without being guilty of extravagance, that plate of green peas, and who flatter yourselves with the idea of having consumed on that day fifty or sixty crowns worth, learn and reflect henceforward, without remorse and without vanity, that you have not spent above half one penny, the real value of any other dish of greens which you might have substituted to the peas you have consumed.

Scrutinise, in the same manner, your wearing apparel; choose, like a child, what pleases most the eyes of the body; or, like a fastuous man, all that is most imposing to the eyes of the imagination; or, miser-like, that which costs least money; or, in fine, like a man of sense, what your means or your taste incline you to wear; the difference, as to essentials, is little or none. It cannot be positively asserted, that your consumption will be more or less considerable in one than in the other case; but recollect that thread lace, for which you could not pay less than 227l. 10s. because there stand between you and the pound of flax from which it has been extracted, 35 or 40 intermediate pilferers, to be fed during six months;—this lace, however, in spite of that extravagant price, could not, as you have seen, be set down to account amongst the articles of your real and personal consumption, for more than sixpence, supposed to be the intrinsic value of a pound weight of flax, which has gone through so many hands to be converted into lace. Now, on this principle, you might be wrapped in lace from head to foot: and your entire mummy, instead of presenting to the eye of a sworn appraiser a consumption of 30 or 40,000l. would in this instant of its highest splendor, only present him with a devastation of 200lb. of flax, sacrificed to decorate that mummy, or to hide its defects.—And as the object would be 200lb. of flax, the value of which is fully known by the number of people to whom it would afford support, instead of dealing so lightly as I did with a single pound, when I introduced my Patriarch, the appraiser would reckon with you rigorously; he would consider, that in the hands of the Arts, no part of the works of the creation can be lost; that, as it is their triumph, so it is their duty, to divide into 10, 20, or 30 parts, whatever requires such a division, in order that each may receive the degree of utility of which it is susceptible, and which the Arts are bound to account for to society: the appraiser would then carry you to the lace-merchant, in order to lay before you ten different sorts of an inferior lace, taken from parts chosen successively after that which serves you for a wrapper, and descending still from pilfery to pilfery, he would at last inveigle you into the cabins of some pretended wretch, where he would shew you the quantity of coarse and substantial shirts, necessary to teach you that 3 or 4 lb. of flax, at the most, are the only possible devaluations your mummy can be reproached with, as two shillings are the only expence your vanity can boast of in the 25 or 30,000l. which you could presume to have consumed.

Yet, let us grant something to the pretended importance of being possessed of 500 properties, each of them sufficient to the support of one man. I shall accordingly suppose you to be habitually cloathed in those stuffs, which, to the richness of the materials that compose them, join the perfection of workmanship, (which concerns you, as you have seen, in no other light, but that of either a benevolent, or an unintentional provider for the necessary consumption of the labouring man);—but 10 lb. of silk, as they come out of Nature’s hands, are not worth 30 shillings:—without enquiring why they may then be valued at 30 shillings, bring all the other parts of your dress to the touchstone I have furnished you with; consider, that if you wear the same coat every day, it would be far from being worn out at the end of the year,—and how far it would be of course from standing for two or three pence in the account of your daily consumption;—add thereto your real and personal wastings in coals, wood, pomatum, essences, elixirs, &c. valued after the same principle;—at what a distance you still remain from the 24 pence I have granted you for consumption!—And do not say that you renew your coat every season;—had you swallowed up 5000 instead of 500 properties, and should you change cloaths every day, your real consumption would not be the greater for it: would not your valet de chambre, to whom you should have given that suit of cloaths, for which you had paid 40 guineas, and which you had worn only once—would not, I say, your valet de chambre sell it for 15 guineas to an old cloaths-man, who would get 20l. for it from a strolling player?—Be pleased now to trace that suit from Paris to Lisle, to Brussels, Dresden, Poland, Russia; see how many people will get a livelihood by carrying it about; how many guineas it will bring to the travelling Roscius, who will shine in so many countries at your expence; reflect, on the revolutions which the elegance of that dress will occasion in the modes at Petersburgh; how many draughtsmen, embroiderers, working people of all sorts, will be employed and fed, (thanks to your luxury), in copying that master-piece of taste and fancy.—This is not all; you might probably, at the end of 15 years, meet again in Paris with the same suit, cut into small pieces, in the hands of some ladies of the first rank, busily engaged in unweaving the rags, to send, as soon as possible, those precious relics of your seemingly spoiled cloaths, to Lyons, &c. where ten workmen are waiting its arrival, to get bread by restoring to it a great part of its former value, under another form.—And you would presume to have consumed it?... The work of God is not so easily destroyed, nor his beneficence so easily concentered.

Was it worth being so rich, to consume so little?

Were you to say, Is it worth while to commit an injustice in order to grow rich, when we can consume but so little, and when the means are so numerous of pilfering so lawfully all that is wanted for consumption? I could then understand you;—but since you are in possession of 500 properties without having been guilty of injustice, it is something to reflect that they are really to you, the source of numberless enjoyments which you have it in your power to render worthy of a rational being: and, as the continuance of those enjoyments depends entirely on the health and bodily strength of so many others who are to contribute thereto, it is something to be conscious that we find our own pleasures in the interest of others; it is something to reflect, that these pleasures are a very gentle mean, devised most probably by an universal Watchfulness, to induce you to provide men destitute of every thing, with that modicum of goods which was not granted to them, and which, nevertheless, being necessary for their sustenance, is sufficient to their moderation, and prevents their feeling the privation of all the rest: it is something to reflect, that you feed in fact 50, 100, 500 perhaps of your brethren, amongst whom there are 10, 15, 30, as well fed as yourself, since they live on what comes from your table. As to the others, whose faces you will never see, since some of them are at Pekin, in Arabia, at Constantinople, and others in France, Russia, &c. be assured that, with much less meat than you, but more bread, potatoes, or rice, and a few glasses of an acid liquor, the idea of which, whilst I venture to speak of it, is enough to crisp all your nerves, they are as contented, as happy as you, because they consume, without any reflection, without any solicitude for the morrow, all they want, in order to view that morrow with the same tranquillity.—Would it not be unjust in that Being, who weigheth the mountains in a balance, if there were, amongst men, one condition more unfortunate than another? Would he not be unjust, if amongst men, there were one condition more blessed than another? I suppose, indeed, that there exists a Being, who weigheth the mountains in a balance, as others have supposed that there is a future life, where happiness is more visibly equal; and I have hitherto ventured upon so many suppositions!—yet I would beg leave to offer one more, relating though indirectly perhaps to the object now under consideration; but this shall be the last: I will ask (upon the supposition that there really exists a Being, not only Estimator, Moderator, but Creator also of all that thinks, wishes, and can be happy) ... yes, I presume to ask, whether the created being, capable of conceiving the idea of giving immortality to the creature capable of wishing for it, of fostering the hopes, and feeling the value of it, would not be greater than the Creator himself, if the Creator had not conceived such an idea?—I freely confess, that I should think myself better than the Creator, had the Creator conceived such an idea without putting it in execution.

I now return to the point which requires no kind of supposition, I mean the real consumption.—Let us pass from that very insignificant possessor of 500 properties, to the greatest Monarch upon earth.—What difference is there between his consumption and that of the meanest of his subjects?—He has the choice of every thing, such is the ne plus ultra of his power: three, four, or five pounds weight of nourishing food, are really as sufficient for the one as they are necessary to the other;—and on all points, what is the object that procures to the Monarch either advantage or pleasure, the price of which as paid by him, were it even of fourfold the value, is not exactly composed, both of the amount of the sustenance that was necessary to the production of that object, and of a sum which will infallibly pay for other productions, which must be purchased to forward new ones—from which the people will constantly have deducted their necessaries, before they are permitted to satisfy the superfluities, the luxury of any whosoever?—Such is that never-ending screw, that adorable chain, which nothing can stop or break, unless it be the insanity of a monster, who should receive that fourfold price, and bury it under ground, lest it should prove useful to society.—That wretch was very consistent with his feelings, who wished the Roman people to have but one head, that he might exterminate the whole nation at a single blow; but the phœnix will ever rise from its ashes; and Humanity, with all her resources, all her rights, would be reproduced from the very stones, were it possible that not a single head should escape the sword of that consistent being who might wish to cut them all off.

Thoughts on the Colonies.

The question concerning luxury leads to the investigation of some ideas on the Colonies; I do not mean that of taxing them, either in a direct or indirect manner, for the reason truly specious, that the wars undertaken for their protection, having loaded the nation with taxes to an enormous amount, it is but just that they should come in for a share of the burden.

It has been observed, that a national debt contracted, no matter for what, occasioning in every thing an indispensable increase of price, the Colonies pay their quota of such a debt (notwithstanding the drawbacks) when they purchase goods at the rate to which the said debt has advanced them: it must also have been noticed, even how necessary it was that the price of commodities from the Colonies should increase in proportion to the price of those of the Mother-country, in order that the former might be able to answer that advance of prices, without hurting the two essential points, consumption and re-production; whence it follows, that if new taxes are introduced, either directly or indirectly, to defray their pretended proportion in the interest of the national debt, neither harm nor good will result, if the price of their commodities be increased in the same proportion; but that if they be taxed, without that increase in the price of their commodities, they will consume by so much less of national goods or of foreign ones paid for in national merchandise, that is, to the amount of the sum which the tax shall have taken from them: this point is evident. Thus it is, that after the war in 1755, all Europe was obliged, as has been shewn, to increase her prices, so as to put them on a level with those in England; and had not Great Britain submitted to that reciprocal advance, and all the rest of Europe condescended to receive only, for the 13 effective millions of their own goods, the 13 nominal millions of that quantity of English commodities which was worth 14, on account of the taxes only, the nominal million which would have remained in the hands of England, would have been without value, and no longer reproduced for want of consumption, for want of means to pay for it, and to encourage such a reproduction.

I think also that it is useless to examine whether the colonies can add any thing to the real power of a nation, since, in order to be convinced of the very reverse, it is enough to observe, that if 2 or 300 ships mounting from 10 to 120 guns be required, in order to protect effectually an extent of between 1500 and 2000 leagues of colonial coasts, distant 1000, 1500, nay 4000 leagues from the mother-country, the 100,000 men employed in time of war, on those floating citadels, are always furnished by the Metropolis, and do not in any manner exempt her either from erecting those permanent citadels which must be scattered along the coasts of the mother-country, or from providing the number of men necessary to defend them in case of an invasion. In this point of view, the colonies would therefore rather diminish than increase the national power.

On the other hand, experience has just taught us, that as soon as those very colonies, for which it is pretended so much blood has been spilt, and so much money wasted, are in a situation to stand up in their own defence, there is no depending upon them, but inasmuch as they are on the footing of allies; and interest alone fixes the duration of every alliance.

The above three objects deserve not, methinks, any further dissertation: the question that merits a more particular scrutiny, is that which concerns the utility of those very colonies, when their weakness is a pledge of their fidelity.

That utility consists in securing to the mother-country, 1st, an exclusive mart for such goods as she thinks proper to export there; and 2dly, the exclusive sale of the returns, in which, it is said, she finds a compensation for the expence she is at to carry her goods to that market.

I shall investigate, under various points of view, all relative to those two objects, the utility of those colonies whose commerce is fully ascertained, before I speak of any other; and I shall only draw the necessary inferences from the most incontrovertible facts.

1st.

We find in the Statements of Sir Charles Whitworth, that the exports from England to the colonies, whose independence can no longer be disputed, amounted annually, upon a medium of 5 years, taken from 1769 to 1773, to the sum of 2,491,230l.

Now the two wars of 1739 and 1755, undertaken, it is said, for the protection of those colonies, that is, to preserve to the mother-country the monopoly of them, have cost Great Britain 99,141,625l.; and these 99 millions, though the interest has been reduced as often as possible, still cost England annually 3,500,000l.

It is then a sum of 3,500,000l. which, even so early as the year 1762, England had resolved to pay annually, in order to preserve, and the better to secure to herself the exclusive privilege of exporting annually to North-America, European goods to the amount of 2,491,230l.

2dly.

The imports from those colonies into Great Britain, upon a medium of the said 5 years, did not exceed the sum of 1,208,665l.—Great Britain, therefore, has enjoyed during the space of 5 years, a pretended balance of 1,282,565l. against those colonies;—but is that glorious balance any thing more than the advantage of having given to those colonies, in the space of 5 years, a credit in the sum of 6,412,825l. supposing that such sum was the amount of her claims in that part of America, or of the half, if in fact half only of that sum remained due to her, notwithstanding the enormous appearance in Sir Charles Whitworth’s Statements?

3dly.

If the colonies, now independent, will henceforth call in all the other nations of Europe to a share in the advantage of crediting them in the same manner, can it be supposed that England will not find in Europe, some other nation willing to receive that part of the English credit, which the independent colonies shall no longer think proper to make use of? In this case, can any thing more be required, on the part of England, than to manufacture in less quantity such goods as suit only the inhabitants of America, and somewhat more of those that may suit the different nations of Europe; and to this first operation to add the complaisance of receiving a greater quantity of their goods than she has imported hitherto?—In this case likewise, what ruinous consequences could England experience by exporting her goods to her neighbours, instead of sending them to America?