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day labourers and manufacturers, to the more animating and manly occupation of cultivating a small farm for their own account" (introd.). His theory, indeed, is more far-reaching. Starting from LOCKE's theory of property, he reasons that although "all right of property is founded either in occupancy or labour" (§ 1), "in every country where agriculture has made considerable progress, these two rights are blended together, and that which has its origin in labour is suffered to eclipse the other, founded in occupancy" (§ 8). The natural right to an equal share of the soil being thus in conflict, as in America, with the right to the additional produce of a fertile soil by labour, the problem of agrarian legislation consists in its solution. The present state of land-tenure not only allows the land-holder to monopolise the original and accessory or improved, but also the contingent or improvable value of the soil (§ 14). This is "a most oppressive privilege, by the operation of which the happiness of mankind has been for ages more invaded and restrained than by all tyranny of the kings, the imposture of priests, and the chicane of lawyers taken together, though these are supposed to be the greatest evils that afflict the societies of human kind" (§ 28); "a monopoly which tends not less to the starving of their fellowcitizens, than a monopoly of bakers without any control or inspection of the magistrate would do. It will not produce its effects very suddenly, Indeed, it is only a lingering piecemeal famine, under which the individual languishes, and the race becomes dwarfish, debilitated, and deformed " (§ 33). "What other cause than this pernicious monopoly can be assigned why population has been so long at a stand in Europe, and does not advance with nearly the same rapidity as in America" (§ 34, cp. also § 36). This passage seems to have been adopted by Godwin, and the fact is known to have served as a battle- ground to MALTHUS. Ogilvie certainly first accentuated the well-known sentence of A. SMITH, with whom he sympathises in matters of free trade, concerning the unearned increment (see INCREMENT, THE UNEARNED). "Whoever enjoys any revenue, not proportioned to such industry or exertion of his own, or of his ancestors, is a freebooter, who has found means to cheat or to rob the public, and more especially the indigent of that district in which he lives. But the hereditary revenue of a great landholder is wholly independent of his industry, and secure from every danger that does not threaten the whole state" (§ 39). By the abolition of this monopoly, the poor laws would be rendered superfluous; the tendency of reform in land must consist in uniting the essential equality of a rude state with the orders, refinements, and accommodations of cultivated ages (§ 43). Laws limiting the extent of land acquired by individuals could be introduced in new settlements; but the author sets his highest hopes, similar to the PHYSIOCRATS, in absolute monarchs; his ideal is a military and social royalty, as the prototype of which he proposes Frederick the Great (§ 49, 61, 74). such events he proposes a scheme, "a progressive agrarian law," as he calls it, the principal points of which are the following:-That every citizen aged twenty-one years or upwards may, if not

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already in possession of land, be entitled to claim from the public a certain portion, not exceeding forty acres, to be assigned him in perpetuity for cultivation and residence; that the claimant shall have right to choose the situation of his allotment on any farm, freehold, or uncultivated common within his own parish; this allotment shall be set apart, and its landmarks fixed by the magistrate, with the aid of an assize, etc.; the ground thus set apart shall be submitted to the cognisance of an assize, or of arbitrators, who shall determine what reserved perpetual rent the claimant must pay to the landlord, etc.; he is obliged to reside upon his farm, has right to transmit it to his heirs, but if he sells to another, who shall not reside upon it, one-tenth part of the price, or the reserved rent, shall belong to the public (§ 51). But if this reform would be made "wholly consonant to natural justice," it should be accentuated by the following provisions: "that lands acquired in this manner shall not be transmitted by will, but according to the established rules of succession to landed property, the original lord of the manor being ultimus haeres; no allotment shall be united to another by succession; it shall not be lawful to break down any such allotment in order to divide it among children, until in any county the uncultivated lands are wholly exhausted; persons acquiring such allotments shall be obliged to perform double service in the militia of their country; in every competition that may arise, orphans and those that have served in the army or navy shall be preferred to all others; finally, the acquisitors "shall pay to the lord of the manor certain aids and services of a feudal nature, so regulated as to produce that degree of connection and dependence which may be expedient for preserving order and subordination in the country without danger of giving rise to oppression and abuse" (§ 71).

In order to hasten the development of small farms, Ogilvie advocated a tax imposed on large farms and short leases, a tax on barren lands, and finally a tax on all augmentation of rents, which he seems to consider as an impôt unique, but in a sense approaching more to that of Henry GEORGE (App.) than of the physiocrats. Ogilvie also proposes the appointment of a special board, in order "to purchase such estates exposed to sale, and to divide them into small farms of a single plough only, to be given off in perpetual property for a full reserved rent" (§ 63). He suggests similar reforms to be introduced in India and Ireland (§ 74). Ogilvie's ideas, although insisting on the injustice of the landholder's monopoly, are rather similar to the aims of modern social politics with its "allotment," "homestead laws," with intended regulation of agrarian succession in Austria and Germany, than on the lines of land nationalisation. modern Christian socialist, he appeals to an "alliance between the church and the plough ' (§ 59). This explains as well the grounds of difference between him and Godwin, as the slender recognition of the merits of his little work among his English contemporaries.

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The Essay on the Right of Property in Land

OLIPHANT-ONE POUND NOTE

has been reprinted in 1838, 12mo, and recently edited with biographical notes by Mr. D. C. Macdonald, under the title, Birthright in Land, London, 1891. The editor has utterly failed to grasp Ogilvie's importance for economic history, but gives valuable references concerning Ogilvie and his contemporaries amidst much declamatory matter. He quotes: Pryse Lockhart Gordon, Personal Memoirs, London, 1830.-Donald Sage, Memorabilia Domestica, Wick, 1889.-Fr. Douglas, A general description of the East Coast of Scotland, Paisley, 1782.-Jas. Hall, Travels in Scotland, 1807.-M'Culloch, Literature of Political Economy.-Sir James Mackintosh, Memoirs, 1835.

[See M'Culloch's Literature of Political Economy, p. 310, for Sir James Mackintosh's unfavourable opinion of Ogilvie.]

8. B.

OLIPHANT, CHARLES (19th century), writer to the signet, drew up the Report on Friendly and Benefit Societies, exhibiting the law of sickness as deduced from Returns by Friendly Societies in different parts of Scotland, to which are subjoined tables showing the rates of contribution necessary for the different allowances, according to the ages of the members at entry, etc., issued by a committee of the Highland Society, Edinburgh, 1824, 8vo. The report is noteworthy as being the first serious attempt to work out a scale of contributions from trustworthy statistics. The inquiry was confined to the age and sickness of members, and was not extended to deaths. The tables of the average duration of sickness among persons of various ages were founded on the experience of 73 different benefit societies, belonging to 16 out of the 33 Scotch counties, both Lowland and Highland, and representing 104,218 years of life. The conclusions are to some extent vitiated by the fact that these societies contained many members who had joined from philanthropic motives, and had never made any claim to the benefits. In 1825 Oliphant gave evidence before the Select Committee of the House of Commons, which sat in that year and in 1827, the outcome of whose labours was the Act of 1829, 10 George IV. c. 56 (see FRIENDLY SOCIETIES).

[Baernreither, English Associations of Working Men, London, 1889, 8vo, p. 235, mentions the report.]

H. E. E.

OLIVARES, DAMIAN DE (beginning of the 17th century). His Memorial sobre las fábricas de Toledo, presented to the junta or board convoked in 1620 by Philip III., in order to ascertain the causes of the decay of Spanish manufactures, gives statistical information on the quantities produced, wages paid, etc., in the

sik and woollen manufactures of Toledo and

the country around. An analysis of this Memorial was inserted by MARTINEZ DE LA MATA (2.v.) in his own Memoriales (pp. 22, 24, 34), themselves reprinted in CAMPOMANES' Apendice á la Educacion Popular (Madrid, 1775). "The opinion," writes Olivares, "that trade with foreigners ought to go on, must certainly

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ONE POUND NOTE. An issue of one pound notes has taken place at various dates and under various circumstances in England and Wales. They still exist and form a large part of the circulation of the issuing banks of Scotland and Ireland, nearly £13,000,000 out of £23,000,000 in the former case, and £6,250,000 out of £17,000,000 in the latter, being below £5, which is practically understood to be £1 notes, in December 1924. In England they never appear to have formed proportionately so large a part of the circulation. The Bank of England was allowed to issue them for the first time by the Act of 1797, in which year also the country banks were permitted to do the same. This power, as far as the country banks were concerned, was withdrawn by the Act of 1822, and the Bank of England withdrew its notes about the same period. Since that date no serious proposal has been made, till that of Lord GOSCHEN in 1892, to employ one pound bank notes in England. His plan was connected with the desire to increase the gold reserve at the Bank of England. As the arrangement would have increased the fluctuations in the reserve, it does not appear that any great stability could have been looked for. Lord Goschen had not apparently much confidence in his plan, and the feeling of the business community on its withdrawal was, on the whole, one of satisfaction. Before the War the lowest note of the Bank of France was 50 francs (£2); Bank of Germany 20 marks (£1); Bank of Holland 10 florins (16s. 8d.); Bank of Belgium 20 francs (16s.). These small issues were, we believe, by the desire of their governments. After 1872 the Bank of France issued notes for 20 francs and 25 francs (16s. and 20s.), but withdrew them as rapidly as possible from the fact that they were forged with much facility. In the speech on the Bank Charter in the House of Commons, 6th May 1844, Sir R. Peel expressed a very strong opinion against the issue of notes for a lower sum than £5, in order to preserve an adequate amount of specie in circulation throughout the country (see also CURRENCY NOTES, Appendix to Vol. I.).

[Tooke and Newmarch, History of Prices, vols.

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i.-vi.-Malachi Malagrowther (Sir Walter Scott) on the Proposed Change of Currency, etc., 1826.— R. H. Inglis Palgrave, The Bank Rate and the Money Market in England, France, Germany, Holland, and Belgium, 1844-1900, 1903.]

ONELY, REV. RICHARD (1723-1787), rector of Speldhurst, Kent, author of An Account of the Care taken in most Civilised Nations for the Relief of the Poor, London, 1758, 2nd ed., 1772, 8vo. The civilised nations dealt with are the Jewish theocracy, the early Christian church, the Egyptian, Greek, and Roman states. pamphlet closes with a brief and bald epitome of the English poor laws.

H. E. E.

The

ONEROUS PROPERTY, such as property consisting of land burdened with the payment of rent or other onerous covenants, shares on which there is a liability, unprofitable contract rights, etc., may be disclaimed by a trustee in bankruptcy within three months after his appointment, or within two months of his becoming aware of it. The disclaimer determines the interest of the bankrupt in the property, but does not affect the rights or liabilities of third parties (see MORTGAGEE). Leases may

not be disclaimed without the consent of the

court, and, as regards any onerous property, the power to disclaim is lost if the trustee, within a certain period of receiving a requisition from an interested party, fails to declare his intention. The damages arising through the operation of a disclaimer (e.g. the rent which a lessor loses by the disclaimer of a lease) are proveable as a debt in the bankruptcy. [Bankruptcy Act, 1883, § 55.]

E. S. ONEROUS UTILITY. See GRATUITOUS UTILITY.

OPEN FIELD SYSTEM. See MANOR and THREE-FIELD SYSTEM.

OPEN POLICY (Marine Insurance). By a valued policy a valuation is put on the subject matter insured. On the other hand, an open policy does not fix the value of the subject matter insured, but, subject to the limit of the sum insured, leaves the amount payable by the insurer to be ascertained after loss. For the purpose of ascertaining the amount, certain more or less arbitrary rules have been worked out by the judges, who have hesitated between two conflicting principles of indemnity, but in the main have adhered to the principle that the assured ought to be put in the same position as he was in when the adventure commenced, and not in the position which he would have been in had it been carried to a successful termination. [See Arnould's Marine Insurance, ed. 6, p. 67 et seq.]

M. D. C.

OPERARIUS. A manorial tenant who actually worked for his lord on the land at various kinds of agricultural labour, and had not commuted his services for a money payment (see MANUOPERATIONES). In the Testa de Nevill, p. 186, the annual services of a

villanus are valued at 8d., but those of a nativus operarius at 8s. 44d.

R. H.

Opium,

OPIUM,* AS A STATE MONOPOLY. the inspissated juice of the poppy, is produced on a large scale in India, China, and Persia. The opium in common use in Europe for medicinal purposes is as a rule of the so-called Smyrna or Turkey variety, and is obtained mostly from Asia Minor and Persia. That which is produced in India and China is less rich in morphia than the former variety, and is used by many Asiatic races, including the Chinese and the populations of India, as narcotic and stimulant. It is both eaten and

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smoked; the latter form of consumption being chiefly, though by no means exclusively, prevalent in China.

Opium is of interest to economists chiefly because, throughout that part of India which is British territory, it is the subject of an extensive state monopoly. This is of considerable antiquity, dating back to a period anterior to the establishment of British rule in India. Under the Mogul empire the trade in opium was an imperial monopoly, and farmed at a quit-rent. Up to the period of the British acquisition of Bengal and Behar, the Dutch were the chief purchasers. Instructions to make opium a part of the investment were first issued by the British East India Company in 1683. During the anarchy which prevailed throughout the decay and fall of the Mogul empire in the middle of the 18th century, the imperial monopoly fell into abeyance; trade was disorganised; cultivation fell off; and the opium produced was so generally adulterated that it yielded very poor prices. Even after the restoration of comparative peace in 1765, disorder continued. At length, in 1773, Warren Hastings, then governor-general of Bengal, assumed on behalf of the East India Company a monopoly of all opium produced in Bengal, Behar, and Orissa, subject to certain concessions secured to the Danes, the Dutch, and the French, which have now either lapsed or been commuted for a money payment.

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The rights thus acquired were at first farmed; but in 1797 the direct or "agency" system was introduced, and is still in force. Under this system, as now administered, the cultivation of the poppy plant is generally prohibited throughout British Indian territory. It is permitted, however, in eleven districts of Bengal and twenty-nine districts of the North-Western Provinces under license; the cultivators, who receive periodical advances from government, are bound under penalties to deliver the whole of their crop to the agent at a rate previously fixed. This rate has fluctuated slightly. From 1881-82 to 1893-94 it was Rs.5 per seer (1 lb. 14 oz. nearly) of 70° consistence, i.e. 70 parts in 100 being pure opium, the remainder being water It is now Rs.6 per seer.

OPIUM

The opium delivered to the agents is manufactured at the two state factories, situated at Patna, and at Ghazipur near Benares, into "provision" opium, adapted for export to China, and "excise" opium, for consumption in India. The average cost of a chest (=140 lbs.) of provision opium has varied during the last ten years from Rs. 412 to Rs. 449. The same opium, when sold at the government auction for export to China, has realised average prices ranging from Rs.1037 to Rs.1251 per chest. The excess of the sale price over the cost price may be regarded as the duty which the existence of the state monopoly enables the government to impose. This at present exceeds Rs.800 per chest, i.e. is not far short of twice the cost price of the drug.

In most of the native states of India poppy cultivation is prohibited. But in an important group, the majority of which are situated in Central India and Rajputana, a large amount of opium-the so-called Malwa opium-is produced. In these states the British government has no concern with the cultivation, manufacture, or sale; but the native rulers levy a variety of imposts, among which is usually included a special rate of land-tax on land suitable for poppy. This opium is not permitted to enter or pass through British territory, for local consumption or export to China, save under passes granted by a British agent, and on payment of a heavy transit or import duty. The rate of duty has varied from time to time, and is now Rs.650 per chest (=140 lbs.) of 90° consistence. This is equivalent to Rs.527 on opium of the consistence of Bengal opium. The British government is enabled to levy this duty by reason of the fact that the opium cannot reach the sea for export to China without passing through British territory.

The propriety of maintaining the Bengal monopoly has been frequently considered by Indian and other authorities. Regarded from an administrative standpoint, the monopoly system is, it is now generally conceded, superior

In

to any that could be substituted for it. 1864 it was condemned, on purely economic grounds, by Sir Charles Trevelyan, then Indian finance minister, who held that its abolition would be "attended with the same good effects as the throwing open the India and China trade, and the abolition of the Bengal salt monopoly," Le by a large expansion of the trade. Such a result would not, at the present day, be ordinarily regarded as favouring the abolition of the optum monopoly. Other authorities, including Sir W. Muir, have attacked the monopoly on the ground that it casts upon government "the odiam... of not only encouraging the growth of the poppy, but of itself being the direct trafficker in the drug and its monopolist." On the other hand, Sir J. P. Grant, a former lientenant-governor of Bengal, has maintained

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that "the distinction, as a question of ethics, between raising a revenue from opium by an excise on consumption and a duty on exportation, and raising the same revenue by monopolising the manufacture, is fanciful and false." As a measure of finance, the abolition of the monopoly and its replacement by an export duty is easily shown to be disastrous. The state profit on a chest of Bengal opium is over Rs. 800, whereas the export duty on a similar chest of Malwa opium is only Rs.527. It follows that if the quantity of opium produced remained the same, there must be an enormous loss of revenue; while if the revenue remained the same, the quantity of opium produced must be very largely increased.

The policy of China in regard to the local production and import of opium has varied from time to time, cultivation and import being alternately prohibited and permitted. It is known that the poppy was extensively cultivated in China, and opium imported from abroad many years before the English became concerned in the trade. It is frequently alleged that the Chinese wars of 1840-42 and 1856-58 were waged in order to compel that country to receive Indian opium. Two of the best authorities, however, Mr. H. N. Lay and Sir Thomas Wade, strenuously deny that this charge has any basis of truth. They affirm that opium was a mere incident of the first war, and had no concern whatever with the second; and that the object of both wars was to compel the Chinese to | have political and commercial relations with us. The opium trade became legal after the Treaty of Tientsin (1858). The tariff duty and likin, or inland transit duty, are levied together and regulated under the Chefoo Convention (1876).

The Indian opium trade in all its bearings has lately formed the subject of an exhaustive inquiry by a royal commission appointed in 1893. The report states that the evil arising from the use of opium is less than has been represented in England, and that the commissioners have no evidence of therefrom; that no case has been made out for extensive moral or physical degradation arising prohibition, nor could such a measure with justice

be extended to the native states; that the Bengal monopoly is the best system for regulating the production of opium in British India; and that the present treaties which govern the admission of opium into China have been deliberately accepted by the Chinese government, and admitted by the latter to contain all that they desire. The finding is, in substance, that unless China should hereafter declare a wish to prohibit import, there are no grounds for interfering either with the export trade, or with the production and local consumption in India. [See OPIUM in App.]

1 There still exists, however, in the minds of many persons in England, a strong desire to see the British government in India cease to appear as the manufacturer of an intoxicant. Notwithstanding the recent changes

in China, matters at the present time (1912) remain practically in the same position as described in the article on OPIUM in the Appendix to this volume.

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OPTIMISM

[Dr. G. Watt, Dictionary of the Economic Products of India, London, 1892, vol. vi. pt. i. art. "Opium."-Report of a Commission appointed by the Government of India to inquire into the Working of the Opium Department in Bengal and the N.W.P., Calcutta, 1883.-Mr. H. N. Lay, Note on the Opium Question: a Brief Account of our Relations with China, London, 1892.-Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, vol. liii. pp. 670950; vol. cxliv. pp. 1391-1846.-Correspondence relating to China, presented to parliament in 1840.-Final Report of the Royal Commission on Opium, 1893-95.]

E. N. B.

OPTIMISM. The term optimism is difficult to define. Strictly it should signify the belief that everything which exists is the best possible. But as there is scarcely any pessimist who denies absolutely the existence of good, so there is scarcely any optimist who denies absolutely the existence of evil. Optimism therefore can describe only the belief that good greatly preponderates in the world, or that evil admits of being resolved ultimately into good. Such a belief may be the result either of temperament or of a process of logical inference. In so far as it is the result of a happy temperament, it cannot be communicated to those whose disposition is less cheerful. In so far as it is the result of logical inference it may take various forms. All who regard the universe as the work of reason, in other words, all theists, must be optimists in one sense or another. But among theists even within the bounds of the Christian church there may be wide differences in the nature of their optimism. Some may concentrate their minds on the corruption of man and others upon the benevolence of his Creator. St. Augustine or CALVIN would hardly be termed optimists in the ordinary use of that word. Paley was an optimist in every sense. Now one of the characteristics of the period in which modern political economy took its rise, the period between the close of the Thirty Years' war and the outbreak of the French Revolution, was a general optimism. Religious wars and persecutions had impressed the most active minds with indifference or disgust for the theological views which came down from the middle ages, and which were permeated with distrust of human nature and aversion to the pursuits of the world. In contrast to these views the antique conception of nature kept alive by the Roman law again attracted philosophers and became the germ of new moral and political theories. Natural religion took the place of revelation, and natural goodness of asceticism. Natural instincts were again regarded as innocent and deserving of gratifica. tion. Much stress was laid on those amiable and social instincts which find their fulfilment in promoting the happiness of others. Providence, it was held, had so ordered the world that each man in seeking to satisfy his own

desires contributed to the general welfare. Virtue was identified with the rational pursuit of happiness, and thus was made to appear easy and natural. From these first principles the inference in favour of freedom was irresistible. Restraint or compulsion was in itself an evil because it was painful, and in most cases restraint or compulsion was unnecessary, since human instincts harmonised by divine wisdom tended of themselves to bring about the good of mankind.

This form of optimism pervades the discussion of education, of legislation, and of economics by the most celebrated writers of the 18th century. It is very noticeable in the writings of the PHYSIOCRATS and of Adam SMITH. Adam Smith cannot indeed be charged with taking too exalted a view of human nature. He assumes that men are generally employed in promoting their own interests, and he objects to any regulation that can be dispensed with, because he thinks that it is likely to be inspired by selfishness. Adam Smith's optimism lies rather in overrating the ability of the individual to perceive his interest, and in assuming a providential harmony between the selfinterest of various individuals if placed in a state of legal freedom and equality. It is only after a prolonged discipline that the ordinary civilised man has attained even to his present imperfect knowledge of what is good for him, and even now the pursuit of his own welfare by each individual constantly brings him into conflict with others.

Since Adam Smith wrote upon morals and economics, optimism has been discouraged by several causes. In the first place, the French Revolution showed that the glorification of natural impulses might end in crimes and disorders as great as had ever been produced by fanaticism. In the next place, the struggle of nation with nation, and of class with class, for the last hundred years, has compelled us to see that there is no pre-established harmony between the appetites of different human beings. In the third place, the rise in the standard of comfort has produced an all but universal discontent. Mankind are probably more comfortable than in any former age, yet the difference between that which they enjoy and that to which they think themselves entitled is more noticeable than ever. Lastly, the progress of science has disturbed the cheery, old-fashioned view of nature. MALTHUS showed that nature has not provided an abundant subsistence for an indefinite number of persons. Darwin showed the evolution of life to have been a process of almost infinite length involv ing wholesale waste and destruction. who have adopted a formal and philosophical pessimism are few, but those who maintain the easy optimism of the 18th century are fewer There are many who propose to make mankind

Those

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