attentive reader will have perceived in it the fruitful seed which is
destined in its future growth to smother Protectionism, at once with
the various other isms whose object is to exclude the law of
COMPETITION from the government of the world. Competition, no
doubt, considering man as producer, must often interfere with his
individual and _immediate_ interests. But if we consider the great
object of all labor, the universal good, in a word, Consumption, we
cannot fail to find that Competition is to the moral world what the
law of equilibrium is to the material one. It is the foundation of
true gratification, of true Liberty and Equality, of the equality of
comforts and condition, so much sought after in our day; and if so
many sincere reformers, so many earnest friends to public right, seek
to reach their end by _commercial legislation_, it is only because
they do not yet understand _commercial freedom_.




CHAPTER V.

OUR PRODUCTIONS ARE OVERLOADED WITH INTERNAL TAXES--


This is but a new wording of the Sophism before noticed. The
demand made is, that the foreign article should be taxed, in order to
neutralize the effects of the internal tax, which weighs down domestic
produce. It is still then but the question of equalizing the
facilities of production. We have but to say that the tax is an
artificial obstacle, which has exactly the same effect as a natural
obstacle, i.e. the increasing of the price. If this increase is so