Other nations have confined the whole commerce of their colonies to a particular port of the mother country. The trade which was carried on in this manner (as all the merchants engaged in it would find it for their interest to act in concert) would necessarily be conducted very nearly upon the same principles as that of an exclusive company. For a long time this was the policy of Spain, and the price of European goods was accordingly enormous in all the Spanish colonies, p. 156.

Other nations leave the trade of their colonies free to all their subjects, who may carry it on from all the different ports of the mother country. Under this

policy the colonies are enabled both to sell their own produce and to buy the goods of Europe at a reasonable price. This has been the policy of England, and in most cases the policy of France, pp. 156–57.

In the exportation of their own surplus produce too, it is only with regard to certain commodities that the colonies of Great Britain are confined to the market of

the mother country. These commodities having been enumerated in the Act of Navigation, are called enumerated commodities. The rest are called non-enumerated, and may be exported directly to other countries, provided it is in British or Plantation ships. Among these last are some of the most important productions of America and the West Indies: grain of all sorts, lumber, salt provisions, fish, sugar, and rum. If the whole surplus produce of America in grain, salt provisions, and in fish, had been put into enumeration, and thereby forced into the market of Great Britain, it would have interfered too much with the produce of the industry of our own people. The non-enumerated commodities could originally be exported to all parts of the world. Lumber and rice were afterwards confined, as to the European market, to the countries that lie south of Cape Finisterre; and by the 6th of Geo. III.

c. 52, all non-enumerated commodities were subjected, owing to the jealousy of manufactories, to the like restriction, pp. 157-59.

The enumerated commodities are two sorts-(1) such as are either the peculiar produce of America or as are not produced in the mother country; (2) such as are not the peculiar produce of America, but which are and may be produced in the mother country, though not in quantities sufficient to supply the demand. The largest importation of goods of the first kind could not discourage the growth, or interfere with the sale of any part of the produce of the mother country. The importation of commodities of the second kind might be so managed, it was supposed, as to interfere, not with the sale of those of the same kind which were produced at home, but with that of those which were imported from foreign countries. The most perfect freedom of trade is permitted between the British colonies and the West Indies, both in the enumerated and in the non-enumerated commodities. The liberality of England, however, towards the trade of her colonies has been confined chiefly to what concerns the market for their produce, either in its rude state or in the very first stage of manufacture—a restriction more impertinent than hurtful in the present condition of the colonies, pp. 159-63.

Great Britain, too, as she confines to her own market some of the most important productions of the colonies, so in compensation she gives to some of them an advantage in that market, sometimes by imposing higher duties upon the like productions when imported from other countries, and sometimes by giving bounties upon their importation from the colonies, p. 163.

With regard to the importation of goods from Europe, England has likewise dealt more liberally with her colonies (by means of the system of drawbacks) than any other nation; they are, however, by no means independent foreign countries, p. 163.

Of the greater part of the regulations concerning the colony trade, the merchants who carry it on have been the principal advisers. We must not wonder, therefore, if, in the greater part of them, the interest of the merchants has been more considered than either that of the colonies or that of the mother country. Though the policy of Great Britain has been dictated by the same mercantile spirit as that of other nations, it has been less oppressive than that of any of them. In everything except their foreign trade the liberty of the English colonists to manage their own affairs their own way is complete, and there is more equality among the English colonists than among the inhabitants of the mother country, pp. 164-66.

The absolute governments of Spain, Portugal, and France take place in their colonies. It is in the progress of the North American colonies, however, that the superiority of the English policy chiefly appears. The progress of the sugar colonies of France has been, perhaps, superior to those of England, owing to the liberty they have of refining their own sugar, and also to the better management of their slaves. That the condition of the slaves is better under an arbitrary than under a free government is supported by the history of all ages and nations. The prosperity of the English sugar colonies has been, in a great measure, owing to the great riches of England, of which a part has overflowed on those colonies. But the prosperity of the sugar colonies of France has been entirely owing to the good conduct of the colonists, which must have had some superiority over that of the English, and in nothing so much as in the good management of their slaves, pp. 166-68.

The policy of Europe, therefore, seems to have little to boast of either in the original establishment or so far

1 Maine, Ancient Law, v.; Coulange, La Cité Antique, 131; Cairnes's Slave Power, iv.

as concerns their internal government, in the subsequent prosperity of the colonies of America. Folly and injustice' seem to have been the principles which directed the first project of establishing those colonies. The adventurers who formed some of the later establishments joined to the chimerical project of finding gold and silver mines, motives more reasonable and more laudable: but even these motives do very little honour to the policy of Europe, p. 169.

The English Puritans fled from restraint at home to freedom in America,2 and established the four governments of New Englan The English Catholics, treated with still greater injustice, established that of Maryland; the Quakers that of Pennsylvania. The Portuguese Jews were banished to Brazil.3 In effectuating some of the most important of these establishments (e.g. Mexico and Peru), the governments of Europe had as little merit as in projecting them. When these establish

The word 'injustice' seems to be used vaguely and without any definite meaning.

2 Their conduct was not actuated by any objection to persecution in the abstract, but merely to an objection to being persecuted. Wherever they had the power the Puritans were among the most remorseless of persecutors, and one of their standing complaints against the Church of England was that she treated Romanists in a manner severe indeed according to our modern notions, but which in comparison with that dictated by the desires of the Puritans might be called lenient. Thus the Act of Uniformity was in the end a great benefit to the cause of toleration by enlisting in that service the interested energies of the most intolerant of men. For the mode in which they treated those who differed from them, see Robertson, Hist. of America, x.; Gardiner, Pers. Gov. of Charles 1. vol. i. p. 191 seq.

It was made a crime to use the prayers of the English Liturgy even in private devotion!

This is not to be wondered at. When a Romanist persecutes, he persecutes in accordance with his principles (see, for example, Perrone, who boldly maintains the position 'Tolerantia religiosa impia est et absurda,' Præl. Theol. I. p. 368); when an Anglican persecutes, he persecutes in defiance of his principles. There is more excuse for the former, but more hope for the latter.

See, for a general account of the history of persecution, Lecky, Hist. of Rationalism, vol. ii. pp. 1–140.

ments were effectuated, and had become so considerable as to attract the attention of the mother country, the first regulation she made was to confine their market, and to enlarge her own at their expense. In one way only has Europe contributed either to the first establishment or to the present grandeur of the colonies of America. It bred and formed the men who were capable of achieving such great actions, and of laying the foundation of so great an empire, pp. 169, 170.

PART III.

Of the advantages which Europe has derived from the discovery of America, and from that of a passage to the East Indies by the Cape of Good Hope.

THE advantages which Europe has derived from the discovery and colonisation of America may be divided:

I. Into the general advantages which Europe, considered as one great country, has derived from those great events; and,

II. Into the particular advantages which each colonising country has derived from the colonies which belong to it.

The general advantages which Europe has derived. from America consist―(1) in the increase of its enjoyments, by being furnished with a variety of commodities, which it would otherwise not have possessed; and (2) in the augmentation of its industry, either directly or indirectly, pp. 171, 172.

The exclusive trade of the mother countries tends to diminish both the enjoyments and industry of Europe in general, and of the American colonies in particular. By rendering the colony produce dearer in all other countries, it lessens its consumption, and thereby cramps the industry of the colonies, and both the enjoyments and the industry of other countries which both enjoy