forms the principal revenue of the great mass of the people.

Foreign commerce adds to the wealth of a state, according to
Dr Adam Smith's definition, though not according to the
definition of the economists. Its principal use, and the reason,
probably, that it has in general been held in such high
estimation is that it adds greatly to the external power of a
nation or to its power of commanding the labour of other
countries; but it will be found, upon a near examination, to
contribute but little to the increase of the internal funds for
the maintenance of labour, and consequently but little to the
happiness of the greatest part of society. In the natural
progress of a state towards riches, manufactures, and foreign
commerce would follow, in their order, the high cultivation of
the soil. In Europe, this natural order of things has been
inverted, and the soil has been cultivated from the redundancy of
manufacturing capital, instead of manufactures rising from the
redundancy of capital employed upon land. The superior
encouragement that has been given to the industry of the towns,
and the consequent higher price that is paid for the labour of
artificers than for the labour of those employed in husbandry,
are probably the reasons why so much soil in Europe remains
uncultivated. Had a different policy been pursued throughout
Europe, it might undoubtedly have been much more populous than at
present, and yet not be more incumbered by its population.

I cannot quit this curious subject of the difficulty arising
from population, a subject that appears to me to deserve a minute
investigation and able discussion much beyond my power to give
it, without taking notice of an extraordinary passage in Dr