To tell the people that they are relieved by the dilapidation of their
public estate, is a cruel and insolent imposition. Statesmen, before
they valued themselves on the relief given to the people by the
destruction of their revenue, ought first to have carefully attended to
the solution of this problem:--Whether it be more advantageous to the
people to pay considerably, and to gain in proportion; or to gain little
or nothing, and to be disburthened of all contribution? My mind is made
up to decide in favour of the first proposition. Experience is with me,
and, I believe, the best opinions also. To keep a balance between the
power of acquisition on the part of the subject, and the demands he is
to answer on the part of the state, is the fundamental part of the skill
of a true politician. The means of acquisition are prior in time and
in arrangement. Good order is the foundation of all good things. To be
enabled to acquire, the people, without being servile, must be tractable
and obedient. The magistrate must have his reverence, the laws their
authority. The body of the people must not find the principles of
natural subordination by art rooted out of their minds. They must
respect that property of which they cannot partake. They must labour
to obtain what by labour can be obtained; and when they find, as they
commonly do, the success disproportioned to the endeavour, they must be
taught their consolation in the final proportions of eternal justice.
Of this consolation whoever deprives them, deadens their industry, and
strikes at the root of all acquisition as of all conservation. He that
does this is the cruel oppressor, the merciless enemy of the poor and
wretched; at the same time that by his wicked speculations he exposes
the fruits of successful industry, and the accumulations of fortune, to
the plunder of the negligent, the disappointed, and the unprosperous.