profit to the buyer, that commodity will be the less dealt in. If a
second blundering interposition be used to correct the blunder of the
first and an attempt is made to force the purchase of the commodity, (of
labor, for instance,) the one of these two things must happen: either
that the forced buyer is ruined, or the price of the product of the
labor in that proportion is raised. Then the wheel turns round, and the
evil complained of falls with aggravated weight on the complainant. The
price of corn, which is the result of the expense of all the operations
of husbandry taken together, and for some time continued, will rise on
the laborer, considered as a consumer. The very best will be, that he
remains where he was. But if the price of the corn should not compensate
the price of labor, what is far more to be feared, the most serious
evil, the very destruction of agriculture itself, is to be apprehended.
Nothing is such an enemy to accuracy of judgment as a coarse
discrimination, a want of such classification and distribution as the
subject admits of. Increase the rate of wages to the laborer, say the
regulators,--as if labor was but one thing, and of one value. But this
very broad, generic term, _labor_, admits, at least, of two or three
specific descriptions: and these will suffice, at least, to let
gentlemen discern a little the necessity of proceeding with caution in
their coercive guidance of those whose existence depends upon the
observance of still nicer distinctions and subdivisions than commonly
they resort to in forming their judgments on this very enlarged part of
economy.
The laborers in husbandry may be divided,--First, Into those who are
able to perform the full work of a man,--that is, what can be done by a
person from twenty-one years of age to fifty. I know no husbandry work
(mowing hardly excepted) that is not equally within the power of all
persons within those ages, the more advanced fully compensating by knack
and habit what they lose in activity. Unquestionably, there is a good
deal of difference between the value of one man's labor and that of
another, from strength, dexterity, and honest application. But I am
quite sure, from my best observation, that any given five men will, in
their total, afford a proportion of labor equal to any other five within
the periods of life I have stated: that is, that among such five men
there will be one possessing all the qualifications of a good workman,
one bad, and the other three middling, and approximating to the first
and the last. So that, in so small a platoon as that of even five, you
will find the full complement of all that five men _can_ earn. Taking
five and five throughout the kingdom, they are equal: therefore an error
with regard to the equalization of their wages by those who employ five,
as farmers do at the very least, cannot be considerable.
Secondly, Those who are able to work, but not the complete task of a
day-laborer. This class is infinitely diversified, but will aptly enough
fall into principal divisions. _Men_, from the decline, which after
fifty becomes every year more sensible, to the period of debility and
decrepitude, and the maladies that precede a final dissolution. _Women_,
whose employment on husbandry is but occasional, and who differ more in
effective labor one from another than men do, on account of gestation,
nursing, and domestic management, over and above the difference they
have in common with men in advancing, in stationary, and in declining
life. _Children_, who proceed on the reverse order, growing from less to
greater utility, but with a still greater disproportion of nutriment to
labor than is found in the second of those subdivisions: as is visible
to those who will give themselves the trouble of examining into the
interior economy of a poor-house.
This inferior classification is introduced to show that laws prescribing
or magistrates exercising a very stiff and often inapplicable rule, or a
blind and rash discretion, never can provide the just proportions
between earning and salary, on the one hand, and nutriment on the other:
whereas interest, habit, and the tacit convention that arise from a
thousand nameless circumstances produce a _tact_ that regulates without
difficulty what laws and magistrates cannot regulate at all. The first
class of labor wants nothing to equalize it; it equalizes itself. The
second and third are not capable of any equalization.
But what if the rate of hire to the laborer comes far short of his
necessary subsistence, and the calamity of the time is so great as to
threaten actual famine? Is the poor laborer to be abandoned to the
flinty heart and griping hand of base self-interest, supported by the
sword of law, especially when there is reason to suppose that the very
avarice of farmers themselves has concurred with the errors of
government to bring famine on the land?
In that case, my opinion is this: Whenever it happens that a man can
claim nothing according to the rules of commerce and the principles of
justice, he passes out of that department, and comes within the
jurisdiction of mercy. In that province the magistrate has nothing at
all to do; his interference is a violation of the property which it is
his office to protect. Without all doubt, charity to the poor is a
direct and obligatory duty upon all Christians, next in order after the
payment of debts, full as strong, and by Nature made infinitely more
delightful to us Pufendorf, and other casuists, do not, I think,
denominate it quite properly, when they call it a duty of imperfect
obligation. But the manner, mode, time, choice of objects, and
proportion are left to private discretion; and perhaps for that very
reason it is performed with the greater satisfaction, because the
discharge of it has more the appearance of freedom,--recommending us
besides very specially to the Divine favor, as the exercise of a virtue
most suitable to a being sensible of its own infirmity.
The cry of the people in cities and towns, though unfortunately (from a
fear of their multitude and combination) the most regarded, ought, in
_fact_, to be the _least_ attended to, upon this subject: for citizens
are in a state of utter ignorance of the means by which they are to be
fed, and they contribute little or nothing, except in an infinitely
circuitous manner, to their own maintenance. They are truly _fruges
consumere nati_. They are to be heard with great respect and attention
upon matters within their province,--that is, on trades and
manufactures; but on anything that relates to agriculture they are to be
listened to with the same _reverence_ which we pay to the dogmas of
other ignorant and presumptuous men.
If any one were to tell them that they were to give in an account of all
the stock in their shops,--that attempts would be made to limit their
profits, or raise the price of the laboring manufacturers upon them, or
recommend to government, out of a capital from the public revenues, to
set up a shop of the same commodities, in order to rival them, and keep,
them to reasonable dealing,--they would very soon see the impudence,
injustice, and oppression of such a course. They would not be mistaken:
but they are of opinion that agriculture is to be subject to other laws,
and to be governed by other principles.
A greater and more ruinous mistake cannot be fallen into than that the
trades of agriculture and grazing can be conducted upon any other than
the common principles of commerce: namely, that the producer should be
permitted, and even expected, to look to all possible profit which
without fraud or violence he can make; to turn plenty or scarcity to the
best advantage he can; to keep back or to bring forward his commodities
at his pleasure; to account to no one for his stock or for his gain. On
any other terms he is the slave of the consumer: and that he should be
so is of no benefit to the consumer. No slave was ever so beneficial to
the master as a freeman that deals with him on an equal footing by
convention, formed on the rules and principles of contending interests
and compromised advantages. The consumer, if he were suffered, would in
the end always be the dupe of his own tyranny and injustice. The landed
gentleman is never to forget that the farmer is his representative.
It is a perilous thing to try experiments on the farmer. The farmer's
capital (except in a few persons and in a very few places) is far more
feeble than commonly is imagined. The trade is a very poor trade; it is
subject to great risks and losses. The capital, such as it is, is turned
but once in the year; in some branches it requires three years before
the money is paid: I believe never less than three in the turnip and
grass-land course, which is the prevalent course on the more or less
fertile sandy and gravelly loams,--and these compose the soil in the
south and southeast of England, the best adapted, and perhaps the only
ones that are adapted, to the turnip husbandry.
It is very rare that the most prosperous farmer, counting the value of
his quick and dead stock, the interest of the money he turns, together
with his own wages as a bailiff or overseer, ever does make twelve or
fifteen per centum by the year on his capital. I speak of the
prosperous. In most of the parts of England which have fallen within my
observation I have rarely known a farmer, who to his own trade has not
added some other employment or traffic, that, after a course of the most
unremitting parsimony and labor, (such for the greater part is theirs,)
and persevering in his business for a long course of years, died worth
more than paid his debts, leaving his posterity to continue in nearly
the same equal conflict between industry and want, in which the last
predecessor, and a long line of predecessors before him, lived and died.
Observe that I speak of the generality of farmers, who have not more
than from one hundred and fifty to three or four hundred acres. There
are few in this part of the country within the former or much beyond the
latter extent. Unquestionably in other places there are much larger.
But I am convinced, whatever part of England be the theatre of his
operations, a farmer who cultivates twelve hundred acres, which I
consider as a large farm, though I know there are larger, cannot proceed
with any degree of safety and effect with a smaller capital than ten
thousand pounds, and that he cannot, in the ordinary course of culture,
make more upon that great capital of ten thousand pounds than twelve
hundred a year.
As to the weaker capitals, an easy judgment may be formed by what very
small errors they may be farther attenuated, enervated, rendered
unproductive, and perhaps totally destroyed.
This constant precariousness and ultimate moderate limits of a farmer's
fortune, on the strongest capital, I press, not only on account of the
hazardous speculations of the times, but because the excellent and most
useful works of my friend, Mr. Arthur Young, tend to propagate that
error (such I am very certain it is) of the largeness of a farmer's
profits. It is not that his account of the produce does often greatly
exceed, but he by no means makes the proper allowance for accidents and
losses. I might enter into a convincing detail, if other more
troublesome and more necessary details were not before me.
This proposed discretionary tax on labor militates with the
recommendations of the Board of Agriculture: they recommend a general
use of the drill culture. I agree with the Board, that, where the soil
is not excessively heavy, or incumbered with large loose stones, (which,
however, is the case with much otherwise good land,) that course is the
best and most productive,--provided that the most accurate eye, the most
vigilant superintendence, the most prompt activity, which has no such
day as to-morrow in its calendar, the most steady foresight and
predisposing order to have everybody and everything ready in its place,
and prepared to take advantage of the fortunate, fugitive moment, in
this coquetting climate of ours,--provided, I say, all these combine to
speed the plough, I admit its superiority over the old and general
methods. But under procrastinating, improvident, ordinary husbandmen,
who may neglect or let slip the few opportunities of sweetening and
purifying their ground with perpetually renovated toil and undissipated
attention, nothing, when tried to any extent, can be worse or more
dangerous: the farm may be ruined, instead of having the soil enriched
and sweetened by it.
But the excellence of the method on a proper soil, and conducted by
husbandmen, of whom there are few, being readily granted, how, and on
what conditions, is this culture obtained? Why, by a very great increase
of labor: by an augmentation of the third part, at least, of the
hand-labor, to say nothing of the horses and machinery employed in
ordinary tillage. Now every man must be sensible how little becoming the
gravity of legislature it is to encourage a board which recommends to
us, and upon very weighty reasons unquestionably, an enlargement of the
capital we employ in the operations of the hand, and then to pass an act
which taxes that manual labor, already at a very high rate,--thus
compelling us to diminish the quantity of labor which in the vulgar
course we actually employ.
What is true of the farmer is equally true of the middle-man,--whether
the middle-man acts as factor, jobber, salesman, or speculator, in the
markets of grain. These traders are to be left to their free course;
and the more they make, and the richer they are, and the more largely
they deal, the better both for the farmer and consumer, between whom
they form a natural and most useful link of connection,--though by the
machinations of the old evil counsellor, _Envy_, they are hated and
maligned by both parties.
I hear that middle-men are accused of monopoly. Without question, the
monopoly of authority is, in every instance and in every degree, an
evil; but the monopoly of capital is the contrary. It is a great
benefit, and a benefit particularly to the poor. A tradesman who has but
a hundred pound capital, which (say) he can turn but once a year, cannot
live upon a _profit_ of ten per cent, because he cannot live upon ten
pounds a year; but a man of ten thousand pounds capital can live and
thrive upon five per cent profit in the year, because he has five
hundred pounds a year. The same proportion holds in turning it twice or
thrice. These principles are plain and simple; and it is not our
ignorance, so much as the levity, the envy, and the malignity of our
nature, that hinders us from perceiving and yielding to them: but we are
not to suffer our vices to usurp the place of our judgment.
The balance between consumption and production makes price. The market
settles, and alone can settle, that price. Market is the meeting and
conference of the _consumer_ and _producer_, when they mutually discover
each other's wants. Nobody, I believe, has observed with any reflection
what market is, without being astonished at the truth, the correctness,
the celerity, the general equity, with which the balance of wants is
settled. They who wish the destruction of that balance, and would fain
by arbitrary regulation decree that defective production should not be
compensated by increased price, directly lay their _axe_ to the root of
production itself. They may, even in one year of such false policy, do
mischiefs incalculable; because the trade of a farmer is, as I have
before explained, one of the most precarious in its advantages, the most
liable to losses, and the least profitable of any that is carried on. It
requires ten times more of labor, of vigilance, of attention, of skill,
and, let me add, of good fortune also, to carry on the business of a
farmer with success, than what belongs to any other trade.
Seeing things in this light, I am far from presuming to censure the late
circular instruction of Council to lord-lieutenants, but I confess I do
not clearly discern its object. I am greatly afraid that the inquiry
will raise some alarm, as a measure leading to the French system of
putting corn into requisition. For that was preceded by an inquisition
somewhat similar in its principle, though, according to their mode,
their principles are full of that violence which _here_ is not much to
be feared. It goes on a principle directly opposite to mine: it presumes
that the market is no fair _test_ of plenty or scarcity. It raises a
suspicion, which may affect the tranquillity of the public mind, "that
the farmer keeps back, and takes unfair advantages by delay"; on the
part of the dealer, it gives rise obviously to a thousand nefarious
speculations.
In case the return should on the whole prove favorable, is it meant to
ground a measure for encouraging exportation and checking the import of
corn? If it is not, what end can it answer? And I believe it is not.
This opinion may be fortified by a report gone abroad, that intentions
are entertained of erecting public granaries, and that this inquiry is
to give government an advantage in its purchases.
I hear that such a measure has been proposed, and is under deliberation:
that is, for government to set up a granary in every market-town, at the
expense of the state, in order to extinguish the dealer, and to subject
the farmer to the consumer, by securing corn to the latter at a certain
and steady price.
If such a scheme is adopted, I should not like to answer for the safety
of the granary, of the agents, or of the town itself in which the
granary was erected: the first storm of popular frenzy would fall upon
that granary.
So far in a political light.
In an economical light, I must observe that the construction of such
granaries throughout the kingdom would be at an expense beyond all
calculation. The keeping them up would be at a great charge. The
management and attendance would require an army of agents,
store-keepers, clerks, and servants. The capital to be employed in the
purchase of grain would be enormous. The waste, decay, and corruption
would be a dreadful drawback on the whole dealing; and the
dissatisfaction of the people, at having decayed, tainted, or corrupted
corn sold to them, as must be the case, would be serious.
This climate (whatever others may be) is not favorable to granaries,
where wheat is to be kept for any time. The best, and indeed the only
good granary, is the rick-yard of the farmer, where the corn is
preserved in its own straw, sweet, clean, wholesome, free from vermin
and from insects, and comparatively at a trifle of expense. This, and
the barn, enjoying many of the same advantages, have been the sole
granaries of England from the foundation of its agriculture to this day.
All this is done at the expense of the undertaker, and at his sole risk.
He contributes to government, he receives nothing from it but
protection, and to this he has a _claim_.
The moment that government appears at market, all the principles of
market will be subverted. I don't know whether the farmer will suffer by
it, as long as there is a tolerable market of competition; but I am
sure, that, in the first place, the trading government will speedily
become a bankrupt, and the consumer in the end will suffer. If
government makes all its purchases at once, it will instantly raise the
market upon itself. If it makes them by degrees, it must follow the
course of the market. If it follows the course of the market, it will
produce no effect, and the consumer may as well buy as he wants;
therefore all the expense is incurred gratis.
But if the object of this scheme should be, what I suspect it is, to
destroy the dealer, commonly called the middle-man, and by incurring a
voluntary loss to carry the baker to deal with government, I am to tell
them that they must set up another trade, that of a miller or a
meal-man, attended with a new train of expenses and risks. If in both
these trades they should succeed, so as to exclude those who trade on
natural and private capitals, then they will have a monopoly in their
hands, which, under the appearance of a monopoly of capital, will, in
reality, be a monopoly of authority, and will ruin whatever it touches.
The agriculture of the kingdom cannot stand before it.
A little place like Geneva, of not more than from twenty-five to thirty
thousand inhabitants,--which has no territory, or next to none,--which
depends for its existence on the good-will of three neighboring powers,
and is of course continually in the state of something like a _siege_,
or in the speculation of it,--might find some resource in state
granaries, and some revenue from the monopoly of what was sold to the
keepers of public-houses. This is a policy for a state too small for
agriculture. It is not (for instance) fit for so great a country as the
Pope possesses,--where, however, it is adopted and pursued in a greater
extent, and with more strictness. Certain of the Pope's territories,
from whence the city of Rome is supplied, being obliged to furnish Rome
and the granaries of his Holiness with corn at a certain price, that
part of the Papal territories is utterly ruined. That ruin may be traced
with certainty to this sole cause; and it appears indubitably by a
comparison of their state and condition with that of the other part of
the ecclesiastical dominions, not subjected to the same regulations,
which are in circumstances highly flourishing.
The reformation of this evil system is in a manner impracticable. For,
first, it does keep bread and all other provisions equally subject to
the chamber of supply, at a pretty reasonable and regular price, in the
city of Rome. This preserves quiet among the numerous poor, idle, and
naturally mutinous people of a very great capital. But the quiet of the
town is purchased by the ruin of the country and the ultimate
wretchedness of both. The next cause which renders this evil incurable
is the jobs which have grown out of it, and which, in spite of all
precautions, would grow out of such things even under governments far
more potent than the feeble authority of the Pope.
This example of Rome, which has been derived from the most ancient
times, and the most flourishing period of the Roman Empire, (but not of
the Roman agriculture,) may serve as a great caution to all governments
not to attempt to feed the people out of the hands of the magistrates.
If once they are habituated to it, though but for one half-year, they
will never be satisfied to have it otherwise. And having looked to
government for bread, on the very first scarcity they will turn and bite
the hand that fed them. To avoid that _evil_, government will redouble
the causes of it; and then it will become inveterate and incurable.
I beseech the government (which I take in the largest sense of the word,
comprehending the two Houses of Parliament) seriously to consider that
years of scarcity or plenty do not come alternately or at short
intervals, but in pretty long cycles and irregularly, and consequently
that we cannot assure ourselves, if we take a wrong measure, from the
temporary necessities of one season, but that the next, and probably
more, will drive us to the continuance of it; so that, in my opinion,
there is no way of preventing this evil, which goes to the destruction
of all our agriculture, and of that part of our internal commerce which
touches our agriculture the most nearly, as well as the safety and very
being of government, but manfully to resist the very first idea,
speculative or practical, that it is within the competence of
government, taken as government, or even of the rich, as rich, to supply
to the poor those necessaries which it has pleased the Divine
Providence for a while to withhold from them. We, the people, ought to
be made sensible that it is not in breaking the laws of commerce, which
are the laws of Nature, and consequently the laws of God, that we are to
place our hope of softening the Divine displeasure to remove any
calamity under which we suffer or which hangs over us.
So far as to the principles of general policy.