Customs, and House-Rent would raise as great a Revenue to the Crown as would be loft in the former Cafe. And as the Comfumption of this New Body would be a new Market for the Fruits of the Country, all the Lands, efpecially those most adjacent, would rife in their yearly Value, and pay greater yearly Taxes to the Publick. The Gain in this Cafe would be as fenfible as the former Lofs.

WHATSOEVER is affefs'd upon the General, is levied upon Individuals. It were worth the while then to confider what is paid by, or by means of, the meanest Subjects, in order to compute the Value of every Subject to the Prince.

FOR my own part, I fhould believe that Seven Eighths of the People are without Property in themselves or the Heads of their Families, and forced to work for their daily Bread; and that of this Sort there are Seven Millions in the whole Ifland of Great Britain: And yet one would imagine that feven Eighths of the whole People fhould confume at least three Fourths of the whole Fruits of the Country. If this is the Cafe, the Subjects without Property pay three Fourths of the Rents, and confequently enable the Landed Men to pay three Fourths of their Taxes. Now if fo great a Part of the Land-Tax were to be divided by Seven Millions, it would amount to more than three Shillings to every Head. And thus as the Poor are the Caufe, without which the Rich could not pay this Tax, even the pooreft Subject is upon this Account worth three Shillings yearly to the Prince.

AGAIN: One would imagine the Confumption of feven Eighths of the whole People, fhould pay two Thirds of all the Customs and Excifes. And if this Sum too fhould be divided by seven Millions, viz. the Number of poor People, it would amount to more than feven Shillings to every Head: And therefore with this and the former Sum every poor Subject, without Property, except of his Limbs or Labour, is worth at least ten Shillings yearly to the Sovereign. So much then the Queen lofes with every one of her old, and gains with every one of her new Subjects.

WHEN

WHEN I was got into this Way of thinking, I prefently grew conceited of the Argument, and was juft preparing to write a Letter of Advice to a Member of Parlia ment, for opening the Freedom of our Towns and Trades,

for taking away all manner of Diftinctions between the

Natives and the Foreigners, for repealing our Laws of Parish Settlements, and removing every other Obftacle to the Increase of the People. But as foon as I had recollected with what inimitable Eloquence my Fellow-Labourers had exaggerated the Mischiefs of felling the Birth-right of Britons for a Shilling, of fpoiling the pure British Blood with foreign Mixtures, of introducing a Confufion of Languages and Regions, and of letting in Strangers to eat the Bread out of the Mouths of our own People, I became fo humble as to let my Project fall to the Ground, and leave my Country to increase by the ordinary Way of Generation.

I

may

AS I have always at Heart the Publick Good, fo I am ever contriving Schemes to promote it; and I think without Vanity pretend to have contrived fome as wife as any of the Caftle-builders. I had no fooner given up my former Project, but my Head was presently full of draining Fens and Marshes, banking out the Sea, and joining new Lands to my Country; for fince it is thought impracticable to increase the People to the Land, I fell immediately to confider how much would be gained to the Prince by increasing the Land to the People.

IF the fame omnipotent Power which made the World, fhould at this time raise out of the Ocean and join to Great Britain an equal Extent of Land, with equal Buildings, Corn, Cattle and other Conveniences and Neceffaries of Life, but no Men, Women, nor Children, I should hardly believe this would add either to the Riches of the People, or Revenue of the Prince; for fince the prefent Buildings are fufficient for all the Inhabitants, if any of them fhould forfake the old to inhabit the new Part of the Island, the Increase of House-Rent in this would be attended with at least an equal Decrease of it in the other: Befides, we have fuch a Sufficiency of Corn and Cattle, that we give Bounties to our Neighbours to take what exceeds of

F 3

the

any

of

the former off our Hands, and we will not fuffer the latter to be imported upon us by our Fellow Sub jects; and for the remaining Product of the Country 'tis already equal to all our Markets. But if all these Things fhould be doubled to the fame Buyers, the Owners muft be glad with half their present Prices, the Landlords with half their prefent Rents; and thus by fo great an Enlargement of the Country, the Rents in the whole would not increase, nor the Taxes to the Publick.

ON the contrary, I fhould believe they would be very much diminished; for as the Land is only valuable for its Fruits, and these are all perishable, and for the moft part muft either be used within the Year, or perifh without Ufe, the Owners will get rid of them at any rate, rather than they fhould wafte in their Poffeffion: So that 'tis probable the annual Production of thofe perishable things, even of one tenth Part of them, beyond all Poffibility of Ufe, will reduce one Half of their Value. It feems to be for this Reason that our Neighbour Merchants who ingrofs all the Spices, and know how great a Quantity is equal to the Demand, deftroy all that exceeds it. It were natural then to think that the Animal Production of twice as much as can be used, muft reduce all to an Eighth Part of their prefent Prices; and thus this extended Island would not excced one fourth Part of its prefent Value, or pay more than one fourth Part of the prefent Tax.

IT is generally obferved, That in Countries of the greatest Plenty there is the pooreft Living; like the Schoolmen's Afs in one of my Speculations, the People almoft ftarve between two Meals. The Truth is, the Poor, which are the Bulk of a Nation, work only that they may live; and if with two Days Labour they can get a wretched Subfiftence for a Week, they will hardly be brought to work the other four: But then with the Wa Vages of two Days they can neither pay fuch Prices for their Provifions, nor fuch Excifes to the Govern

ment.

THAT Paradox therefore in old Hefiod πλέον ήμισυ avros, or Half is more than the Whole, is very applicable to the present Cafe; fince nothing is more true in political Arithmetick, than that the fame People with

half

127 half a Country is more valuable than with the Whole. I begin to think there was nothing abfurd in Sir W. Petty, when he fanfied if all the Highlands of Scotland and the whole Kingdom of Ireland were funk in the Ocean, fo that the People were all faved and brought into the Lowlands of Great Britain; nay, though they were to be reimburft the Value of their Eftates by the Body of the People, yet both the Sovereign and the Subjects in general would be enriched by the very Lofs.

IF the People only make the Riches, the Father of ten Children is a greater Benefactor to his Country, than he who has added to it roooo Acres of Land and no People. It is certain Lewis has join'd vaft Tracts of Land to his Dominions : But if Philarithmus fays true, that he is not now Mafter of fo many Subjects as before ; we may then account for his not being able to bring fuch mighty Armies into the Field, and for their being neither fo well fed, nor clothed, nor paid as formerly. The Reafon is plain, Lewis muft needs have been impoverished not only by his Lofs of Subjects, but by his Acquifition of Lands.

T

No 201. Saturday, October 20.

I

Religentem effe oportet, Religiofum nefas.

Incerti Autoris apud Aul. Gell.'

Tis of the laft Importance to feafon the Paffions of a Child with Devotion, which feldom dies in a Mind that has received an early Tincture of it. Though, it may feem extinguished for a while by the Cares of the World, the Heats of Youth, or the Allurements of Vice, it generally breaks out and discovers it felf again as foon as Difcretion, Confideration, Age, or Misfortunes have brought the Man to himself. The Fire may be covered and overlaid, but cannot be intirely quenched and fmothered.

A State of Temperance, Sobriety, and Juftice, without Devotion, is a cold, lifeless, infipid Condition of Virtue; and is rather to be ftiled Philofophy than Religion. Devotion opens the Mind to great Conceptions, and fills it with more fublime Ideas than any that are to be met with in the most exalted Science; and at the fame time warms and agitates the Soul more than fenfual Pleasure.

IT has been obferved by fome Writers, that Man is more diftinguished from the Animal World by Devotion than by Reafon, as feveral Brute Creatures difcover in their Actions fomething like a faint Glimmering of Reason, though they betray in no fingle Circumstance of their Behaviour any Thing that bears the leaft Affinity to Devotion. It is certain, the Propenfity of the Mind to Religious Worship, the natural Tendency of the Soul to fly to fome fuperior Being for Succour in Dangers and Diftreffes, the Gratitude to an invifible Superintendent which arifes in us upon receiving any extraordinary and unexpected good Fortune, the Acts of Love and Admiration with which the Thoughts of Men are fo wonderfully transported in meditating upon the Divine Perfections, and the univerfal Concurrence of all the Nations under Heaven in the great Article of Adoration, plainly fhew that Devotion or Religious Worship must be the Effect of Tradition from fome firft Founder of Mankind, or that it is conformable to the natural Light of Reason, or that it proceeds from an Instinct implanted in the Soul it felf. For my part, I look upon all these to be the conCurrent Causes, but which ever of them shall be affigned as the Principle of Divine Worship, it manifeftly points to a Supreme Being as the first Author it.

I may take fome other Opportunity of confidering thofe particular Forms and Methods of Devotion which are taught us by Chriftianity; but shall here obferve into what Errors even this Divine Principle may fometimes lead us, when it is not moderated by that right Reason which was given us as the Guide of all our Ac

tions

THE two great Errors into which a mistaken Devotion may betray us, are Enthusiasm and Superftition.

THERE is not a more melancholy Object than a Man who has his Head turned with religious Enthusiasm.

A