Against the solidity of this hypothesis, in the full latitude of the terms, very cogent reasons may be offered. These have relations to the strong influence of habit and the spirit of imitation; the fear of want of success in untried enterprises; the intrinsic difficulties incident to first essays toward a competition with those who have previously attained to perfection in the business to be attempted; the bounties, premiums, and other artificial encouragements with which foreign nations second the exertions of their own citizens in the branches in which they are to be rivalled.
Experience teaches that men are often so much governed by what they are accustomed to see and practice that the simplest and most obvious improvement in the most ordinary occupations is adopted with hesitation, reluctance, and by slow gradations. The spontaneous transition to new pursuits in a community long habituated to different ones may be expected to be attended with proportionably greater difficulty. When former occupations ceased to yield a profit adequate to the subsistence of their followers, or when there was an absolute deficiency of employment in them, owing to the superabundance of hands, changes would ensue, but these changes would be likely to be more tardy than might consist with the interest either of individuals or of the society. In many cases they would not happen, while a bare support could be insured by an adherence to ancient courses, though a resort to a more profitable employment might be practicable. To produce the desirable changes as early as may be expedient, may therefore require the incitement and patronage of government.
The apprehension of failing in new attempts, is, perhaps, a more serious impediment. There are dispositions apt to be attracted by the mere novelty of an undertaking; but these are not always those best calculated to give it success. To this, it is of importance that the confidence of cautious, sagacious capitalists, both citizens and foreigners, should be excited. And to inspire this description of persons with confidence, it is essential that they should be made to see in any project which is new—and for that reason alone, if for no other, precarious—the prospect of such a degree of countenance and support from Government, as may be capable of overcoming the obstacles inseparable from first experiments.
The superiority antecedently enjoyed by nations who have preoccupied and perfected a branch of industry constitutes a more formidable obstacle than either of those which have been mentioned, to the introduction of the same branch into a country in which it did not exist before. To maintain between the recent establishments of one country and the long-matured establishments of another country a competition upon equal terms, both as to quality and price, is in most cases impracticable. The disparity in the one or in the other or in both must necessarily be so considerable as to forbid a successful rivalship without the extraordinary aid and protection of government.
But the greatest obstacle of all to the successful prosecution of a new branch of industry in a country in which it was before unknown consists, as far as the instances apply, in the bounties, premiums, and other aids which are granted in a variety of cases by the nations in which the establishments to be imitated are previously introduced. It is well known (and particular examples, in the course of this
