effect to paralyse their exertions, and consequently to spread poverty and misery throughout the land, by drying up the only source of wealth. It necessarily follows, therefore, on M. Quesnay's theory, that the entire expences of government, and the various public burdens, must, howsoever imposed, be ultimately defrayed out of the produit net, or rent of the landlords; and consistently with this principle, he proposed that all the existing taxes should be repealed, and that a single tax (Impot unique,) laid directly on the net produce, or rent, of the land, should be imposed in their stead.

But, however much impressed with the importance of agriculture over every other species of industry, Quesnay did not solicit for it any exclusive favour or protection. He successfully contended that the interests of the agriculturists, and of all the other classes, would be best promoted by establishing a system of perfect freedom. "Qu'on maintienne," says he in one of his general Maxims, "l'entière liberté du commerce; car la police du commerce interieur et exterieur la plus sure, la plus exacte, la plus profitable à la nation et à l'etat, consiste dans LA PLEINE LIBERTE DE LA CONCURRENCE. Quesnay showed that it could never be for the interest of the proprietors and cultivators of the soil to fetter or discourage the industry of merchants, artificers, and manufactu

* Physiocratie, Première Partie, p. 119.

rers; for the greater the liberty they enjoy, the greater will be their competition, and their services will, in consequence, be rendered so much the cheaper. Neither, on the other hand, can it ever be for the interest of the unproductive class to harass and oppress the agriculturists, either by preventing the free exportation of their products, or by any restrictive regulations whatsoever. When the cultivators enjoy the greatest degree of freedom, their industry, and, consequently, their net surplus produce the only fund from which any accession of national wealth can be derived-will be carried to the greatest possible extent. According to this "liberal and generous system," the establishment of perfect liberty, perfect security, and perfect justice, is the only, as it is the infallible, means of securing the highest degree of prosperity to all classes of the society.

"On a vu," says the ablest expositor of this system, M. Mercier de la Riviere, "qu'il est de l'essence de l'ordre que l'interet particulier d'un seul ne puisse jamais etre separée de l'interet commun de tous; nous en trouvons une preuve bien convaincante dans les effets que produit naturellement et necessairement la plénitude de la liberté qui doit regner dans le commerce, pour ne point blesser la propriété. L'interet personnel encouragée par cette grande liberté, presse vivement et perpetuellement

*Wealth of Nations, Vol. III. p. 17.

chaque homme en particulier, de perfectionner, de multiplier les choses dont il est vendeur; de grossir ainsi la masse des jouissances qu'il peut procurer aux autres hommes, afin de grossir, par ce moyen, la masse des jouissances que les autres hommes peuvent lui procurer en echange. Le monde alors va de lui meme; le desir de jouir, et la liberté de jouir, ne cessant de provoquer la multiplication des productions et l'accroissement de l'industrie, ils impriment à toute la société un mouvement qui devient une tendance perpetuelle vers son meilleur etat possible.”*

We shall have other opportunities of examining the principles of this very ingenious theory. It is sufficient at present to remark, that, in assuming agriculture to be the only source of wealth, because the matter of which all commodities are composed must be originally derived from the earth, M. Quesnay and his followers mistook altogether the nature of produc tion, and really supposed wealth to consist of matter; whereas, in its natural state, matter is very rarely pos sessed of immediate and direct utility, and is always. destitute of value. It is only by means of the labour which must be laid out in appropriating matter, and in fitting and preparing it for our use, that it acquires exchangeable value, and becomes wealth. Human industry does not produce wealth by making any additions to the matter of our globe; this being a quantity susceptible neither of augmentation nor di

II.

* L'Ordre Naturel et Essentiel des Sociétés Politiques, Tome p. 444.

minution. Its real and only effect is to produce wealth by giving utility to matter already in exist ence; and it has been repeatedly demonstrated, that the labour employed in manufactures and commerce is just as productive of utility, and consequently of wealth, as the labour employed in agriculture. Neither is the cultivation of the soil, as M. Quesnay supposed, the only species of industry which yields a surplus produce after the expences of production are deducted. When agriculture is most productive, that is, when none but the best of the good soils are cultivated, no rent, or produit net, is obtained from the land; and it is only after recourse has been had to poorer soils, and when, consequently, the productive powers of the labour and capital employed in cultivation begin to diminish, that rent begins to appear: So that, instead of being a consequence of the superior productiveness of agricultural industry, rent is really a consequence of its becoming less productive than others!

The Economical Table, a formula constructed by M. Quesnay, and intended to exhibit the various phenomena attendant on the production of wealth, and its distribution among the productive, proprietary, and unproductive classes, was published at Versailles, with accompanying illustrations, in 1758; and the novelty and ingenuity of the theory which it expounded, its systematic and scientific shape, and the liberal system of commercial intercourse which it recommended, speedily obtained for it a very high de

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gree of reputation. It is to be regretted that the friends and disciples of Quesnay, among whom we have to reckon the Marquis de Mirabeau, Mercier de la Riviere, Dupont de Nemours, Saint Peravy, Turgot, and other distinguished individuals, in France, Italy, and Germany, should, in their zeal for his peculiar doctrines, which they enthusiastically exerted themselves to defend and propagate, have exhibited more of the character of partizans, than of (what there is the best reason to think they really were) sincere and honest inquirers after truth. Hence it is that they have always been regarded as a sect, known by the name of Economists, or Physiocrats;—and that their works are characterized by an unusual degree of sameness. †

t

* See Appendix, Note A, for some further remarks on the Economical theory.

† The following are the principal works published by the French Economists :

Tableau Economique, et Maximes Generales du Gouvernement Economique, par Francois Quesnay, 4to, Versailles, 1758. Theorie de l'Impot, par M. de Mirabeau, 4to, 1760.

La Philosophie Rurale, par M. de Mirabeau, 4to, and 3 Tomes 12mo, 1763.

L'Ordre Naturel et Essentiel des Societes Politiques par Mercier da la Riviere, 4to, and 2 Tomes 12mo, 1767.

Sur l'Origine et Progrès d'une Science Nouvelle, par Dupont de Nemours, 1767.

La Physiocratie, ou Constitution Naturelle du Gouvernement le plus avantageux au Genre Humain; Recueil des Principaux Ouvrages Economiques de M. Quesnay, rédigé et publié par Dupont de Nemours, 2 Parties, 1767.