A prosperous commerce is now perceived and acknowledged, by all enlightened statesmen, to be the most useful, as well as the most productive, source of national wealth; and has accordingly become a primary object of their political cares. By multiplying the means of gratification; by promoting the introduction and circulation of the precious metals, those darling objects of human avarice and enterprise, it serves to vivify and invigorate all the channels of industry, and to make them flow with greater activity and copiousness. The assiduous merchant, the laborious husbandman, the active mechanic, and the industrious manufacturer....all orders of men, look forward with eager expectation, and growing alacrity, to this pleasing reward of their toils. The often agitated question between agriculture and commerce, has, from indubitable experience, received a decision, which has silenced the rivalships that once subsisted between them, and has proved, to the entire satisfaction of their friends, that their interests are intimately blended and interwoven. It has been found, in various countries, that in proportion as commerce has flourished, land has risen in value. And how could it have happened otherwise? Could that which procures a freer vent for the products of the earth; which furnishes new incitements to the cultivators of land; which is the most powerful instrument in increasing the quantity of money in a state....could that, in fine, which is the faithful handmaid of labour and industry, in every shape, fail to augment the value of that article, which is the prolific parent of far the greatest part of the objects, upon which they are exerted? It is astonishing, that so simple a truth should ever have had an adversary; and it is one, among a multitude of proofs, how apt a spirit of ill informed jealousy, or of too great abstraction and refinement, is to lead men astray from the plainest paths of reason and conviction.
The ability of a country to pay taxes, must always be proportioned, in a great degree, to the quantity of money in circulation, and to the celerity with which it circulates. Commerce, contributing to both these objects, must of necessity render the payment of taxes easier, and facili-
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