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THE NATURE AND CAUSES OF

bably less judicious than theirs) it has, in proportion to itsnatural strength, been still more enfeebled. The debts ofSpain are of very old standing. It was deeply in debt be-fore the end of the sixteenth century, about a hundred yearsbefore England owed a shilling. France , notwithstandingall its natural resources, languishes under an oppressive loadof the same kind. The republic of the United Provinces isas much enfeebled by its debts as either Genoa or Venice.Is it likely that in Great Britain alone a practice, which hasbrought either weakness or desolation into every other coun-try, should prove altogether innocent?

The system of taxation established in those different coun-tries, it may be said, is inferior to that of England. I be-lieve it is so. But it ought to be remembered, that when thewisest government lias exhausted all the proper subjects oftaxation, it must, in cases of urgent necessity, have recourseto improper ones. The wise republic of Holland has uponsome occasions been obliged to have recourse to taxes as in-convenient as the greater part of those of Spain . Anotherwar begun before any considerable liberation of the publicrevenue had been brought about, and growing in its progressas expensive as the last war, may, from irresistible necessity,render the British system of taxation as oppressive as that ofHolland, or even as that of Spain . To the honour of ourpresent system of taxation, indeed, it lias hitherto given solittle embarrassment to industry, that during the course evenof the most expensive wars, the frugality and good conductof individuals seem to have been able, by saving and accu-mulation, to repair all the breaches which the waste and ex-travagance of government had made in the general capitalof the society. At the conclusion of the late war, the mostexpensive that Great Britain ever waged, her agriculturewas as flourishing, her manufactures as numerous and asfully employed, and her commerce as extensive, as theyhad ever been before. The capital, therefore, which sup-ported all those different branches of industry, must havebeen equal to what it had ever been before. Since the peace,agriculture has been still further improved, the rents ofhouses have risen in every town and village of the country,a proof of the increasing wealth and revenue of the people;and the annual amount of the greater part of the old taxes,of the principal branches^of the excise and customs in parti-cular, has been continually increasing, an equally clear