work, are bought and fold, and diftributed to
their proper confumers. The quantity of mo-
ney, therefore, which can be annually employed
in any country, must be determined by the value
of the confumable goods annually circulated
within it. These must confift either in the im
mediate produce of the land and labour of the
country itself, or in fomething which had been
purchased with some part of that produce. Their
value, therefore, muft diminish as the value of
that produce diminishes, and along with it the
quantity of money which can be employed in
circulating them. But the money which by this
annual diminution of produce is annually thrown
out of domeftic circulation, will not be allowed
to lie idle. The intereft of whoever poffeffes it,
requires that it fhould be employed. But having
no employment at home, it will, in spite of all
laws and prohibitions, be fent abroad, and em-
ployed in purchafing confumable goods which
may be of some ufe at home. Its annual export-
ation will in this manner continue for fome time
to add fomething to the annual confumption of
the country beyond the value of its own annual
produce. What in the days of its prosperity had
been faved from that annual produce, and em-
ployed in purchafing gold and filver, will con-
tribute for fome little time to fupport its con-
fumption in adverfity. The exportation of gold
and filver is, in this cafe, not the cause, but
the effect of its declenfion, and may even, for
fome little time, alleviate the mifery of that de-
clenfion.
VOL. II.

C

THE

С НА Р.

III.

воок

II.

THE quantity of money, on the contrary, muft in every country naturally increase as the value of the annual produce increases. The value of the confumable goods annually circulated within the fociety being greater, will require a greater quantity of money to circulate them. A A part of the increafed produce, therefore, will naturally be employed in purchafing, wherever it is to be had, the additional quantity of gold and filver neceffary for circulating the reft. The increase of those metals will in this cafe be the effect, not the caufe, of the public profperity. Gold and filver are purchased every-where in the fame manner. The food, clothing, and lodging, the revenue and maintenance of all thofe whofe labour or stock is employed in bringing them from the mine to the market, is the price paid for them in Peru as well as in England. The country which has this price to pay, will never be long without the quantity of thofe metals which it has occafion for; and no country will ever long retain a quantity which it has no occafion for.

WHATEVER, therefore, we may imagine the real wealth and revenue of a country to confift in, whether in the value of the annual produce of its land and labour, as plain reafon feems to dictate; or in the quantity of the precious metals which circulate within it, as vulgar prejudices fuppofe; in either view of the matter, every prodigal appears to be a public enemy, and every frugal man a public benefactor.

THE

THE effects of mifconduct are often the fame CHA P. as thofe of prodigality. Every injudicious and unsuccessful project in agriculture, mines, fisheries, trade, or manufactures, tends in the fame manner to diminish the funds deftined for the maintenance of productive labour. In every fuch project, though the capital is confumed by productive hands only, yet, as by the injudicious manner in which they are employed, they do not reproduce the full value of their consumption, there must always be fome diminution in what would otherwife have been the productive funds of the fociety.

IT can seldom happen, indeed, that the circumstances of a great nation can be much affected either by the prodigality or misconduct of individuals; the profufion or imprudence of fome, being always more than compenfated by the frugality and good conduct of others.

WITH regard to profufion, the principle which prompts to expence, is the paffion for prefent enjoyment; which, though fometimes violent and very difficult to be reftrained, is in general only momentary and occafional. But the principle which prompts to fave, is the defire of bettering our condition, a defire which, though generally calm and difpaffionate, comes with us from the womb, and never leaves us till we go into the grave. In the whole interval which feparates those two moments, there is fcarce perhaps a single instant in which any man is so perfectly and completely fatisfied with his fituation, as to be without any wifh of alteration or imĆ 2 provement

BOOK
II.

provement of any kind.
kind. An augmentation of
fortune is the means by which the greater part
of men propofe and wish to better their condi-
tion. It is the means the most vulgar and the
moft obvious; and the moft likely way of aug-
menting their fortune, is to fave and accumulate
fome part of what they acquire, either regularly
and annually, or upon fome extraordinary occa-
fions. Though the principle of expence, there-
fore, prevails in almoft all men upon fome occa-
fions, and in fome men upon almost all occafions,
yet in the greater part of men, taking the whole
courfe of their life at an average, the principle of
frugality feems not only to predominate, but to
predominate very greatly.

WITH regard to misconduct, the number of prudent and fuccefsful undertakings is everywhere much greater than that of injudicious and unfuccefsful ones. After all our complaints of the frequency of bankruptcies, the unhappy men who fall into this misfortune make but a very fmall part of the whole number engaged in trade, and all other forts of bufinefs; not much more perhaps than one in a thoufand. Bankruptcy is perhaps the greatest and most humiliating calamity which can befal an innocent man. The greater part of men, therefore, are fufficiently careful to avoid it. Some, indeed, do not avoid it; as fome do not avoid the gallows.

GREAT nations are never impoverished by private, though they fometimes are by public prodigality and misconduct. The whole, or almoft the whole public revenue, is in most

countries

countries employed in maintaining unproductive CHAP. hands. Such are the people who compofe a numerous and fplendid court, a great ecclefiaftical establishment, great fleets and armies, who in time of peace produce nothing, and in time of war acquire nothing which can compenfate the expence of maintaining them, even while the war lafts. Such people, as they themselves produce nothing, are all maintained by the produce of other men's labour. When multiplied, therefore, to an unneceffary number, they may in a particular year confume fo great a fhare of this produce, as not to leave a fufficiency for maintaining the productive labourers, who fhould re-. produce it next year. The next year's produce, therefore, will be lefs than that of the foregoing, and if the fame diforder should continue, that of the third year will be ftill less than that of the fecond. Those unproductive hands, who should be maintained by a part only of the fpare revenue of the people, may confume fo great a fhare of their whole revenue, and thereby oblige so great a number to encroach upon their capitals, upon the funds deftined for the maintenance of productive labour, that all the frugality and good conduct of individuals may not be able to compenfate the waste and degradation of produce occafioned by this violent and forced encroach

ment.

THIS frugality and good conduct, however, is upon most occafions, it appears from experience, fufficient to compenfate, not only the private prodigality and mifconduct of indivi