820
THE NATUllE AND CAUSES OE
ingenious arts and the liberal professions, being no longerupon a level with other trades, would be so much desertedthat they would soon return to that level.
The emoluments of offices are not, like those of trades andprofessions, regulated by the free competition of the market,and do not, therefore, always bear a just proportion to whatthe nature of the employment requires. They are, perhaps,in most countries, higher than it requires; the persons whohave the administration of government being generally dis-posed to reward both themselves and their immediate de-pendents rather more than enough. The emoluments ofoliices, therefore, can in most cases very well bear to betaxed. The persons, besides, who enjoy public offices, es-pecially the more lucrative, are in all countries the objects ofgeneral envy; and a tax upon their emoluments, even thoughit should be somewhat higher than upon any other sort ofrevenue, is always a very popular tax. In England, for ex-ample, when by the land-tax every other sort of revenue wassupposed to be assessed at four shillings in the pound, it wasvery popular to lay a real tax of five shillings and sixpencein the pound upon the salaries of offices which exceeded ahundred pounds a year; the pensions of the younger branchesof the royal family, the pay of the officers of the army andnavy, and a few others less obnoxious to envy, excepted.There are in England no other direct taxes upon the wagesof labour.
ARTICLE IV.
Taxes which, it is intended, should fall indifferently upon everydifferent Species of Revenue.
The taxes which, it is intended, should fall indifferentlyupon every different species of revenue, are capitation taxes,and taxes upon consumable commodities. These must bepaid indifferently from whatever revenue the contributors maypossess ; from the rent of their land, from the profits of theirstock, or from the wages of their labour.
Capitation taxes, if it is attempted to proportion them tothe fortune or revenue of each contributor, become altogetherarbitrary. The state of a man’s fortune varies from day today, and without an inquisition more intolerable than any tax,and renewed at least once every year, can only be guessed at.