CAROLINE. Let me see gold and silver are dug out of the mines, but I know they do not alone constitute wealth; houses are built by men; corn, and the produce of the earth result from agriculture; manufactures are produced by industry. All wealth, therefore, seems to me to proceed from labour. MRS. B. It is very true that labour is a most essential requisite to the creation of wealth, and yet it does not necessarily ensure its production. The labour of the savage who possesses no wealth is often more severe than that of our common ploughman, whose furrows teem with riches. The long and perilous excursions of savages in search of prey; the difficulty which, from want of skill, they must encounter in every process of industry, in constructing the simplest habitations, fabricating the rudest implements;—all concur to increase their toil. Labour is the lot of man; whether in a barbarous or a civilised state, he is destined to earn his bread by the sweat of his brow. But how is it that in the one case labour is productive of great wealth, whilst in the other it affords barely the necessaries of life? CAROLINE. The skill and ardour of the savage are absorbed in the chase, and when he is compelled to undertake some simple domestic industry, such as the construction of a hut, or the fabrication of weapons, he works neither with the activity and zeal nor with the steady perseverance of men in civilised society. Savages, you know, are proverbially noted for their idleness. MRS. B. Inducements must then be found to rouse them from that idleness; motives to awaken their industry and habituate them to regular labour. Men are naturally disposed to indolence; all exertion requires effort, and efforts are not made without an adequate stimulus. The activity we behold in civilised life is the effect of education; it results from a strong and general desire to share not only in the necessaries of life, but in the various comforts and enjoyments with which we are surrounded. The man who has reaped the reward, as well as undergone the fatigues of daily exertion, willingly renews his efforts, as he thus renews his enjoyments. But the ignorance of a savage precludes all desires which do not lead to the immediate gratification of his wants; he sees no possessions which tempt his ambition-no enjoyments which animate his desires; nothing less than the strong impulse of want rouses him to exertion; and, having satisfied the cravings of hunger, he lies down to rest without a thought of the future. CAROLINE. But if the desires of savages are so few and so easily satisfied, may not their state be happier than that of the labouring classes in civilised countries, who wish for so much, and obtain so little? MRS. B. The brutish apathy which results from gross ignorance can scarcely deserve the name of content, and is utterly unworthy that of happiness. Goldsmith, in his Traveller, justly as well as beautifully observes, that 66 Every want that stimulates the breast Becomes a source of pleasure when redress'd.' Besides, it is only occasionally that a savage can indulge in this state of torpid indifference. If you 'consult any account of travels in a savage country, you will be satisfied that our peasantry enjoy a comparative state of affluence and even of luxury. But let us suppose a civilised being to come among a tribe of savages, and succeed in teaching some of them the arts of life-he instructs one how to render his hut more commodious, another to collect a little store of provisions for the winter, a third to improve the construction of his bows and arrows; what would be the consequences ? CAROLINE. One might expect that the enjoyment derived from these improvements would lead their countrymen to adopt them, and would introduce a general spirit of industry. MRS. B. Is it not more probable that the idle savages would, either by force or fraud, wrest from the industrious their hard-earned possessions; that the one would be driven from the hut he had constructed with so much labour, another robbed of the provisions he had stored, and a third would see his well-pointed arrows aimed at his own breast? Here then is a fatal termination to all improvement. Who will work to procure such precarious possessions, which expose him to danger instead of ensuring their enjoyment? . CAROLINE. But these evils would be prevented if laws were made for the protection of property. MRS. B. True; but the right of property must be established before it can be protected; for nature has given mankind every thing in common, and property is of human institution. It takes place in such early stages of society that one is apt to imagine it of natural origin; but until it has been established by law, no man has a right to call any thing his own. CAROLINE. What, not the game he has killed, the hut he has built, or the implements he has constructed? These may be wrested from him by force; but he who thus obtains them acquires no right to them. MRS. B. When a man has produced any thing by his labour, he has, no doubt, in equity the fairest claim to it; but his right to separate it from the common stock of nature, and appropriate it to his own use, depends entirely upon the law of the land. In the case of property in land, for instance, it is the law which decrees that such a piece of ground shall belong to Thomas, such another to John, and a third to James; that these men shall have an exclusive right to the possession of the land and of its produce; that they may keep, sell, or exchange it; give it away during their lives, or bequeath it after their deaths. And, in order that this law should be respected, punishments are enacted for those who should transgress it. It is not until such laws have been made for the institution and protection of property, of whatever description it be, that the right of property is established. CAROLINE. You astonish me! I thought that property in land had always existed; I had no idea that it was a legal institution, but imagined that it had originated from the earliest period of the world. We read that in the time of the ancient patriarchs, when families became too numerous, they separated; and that those who went to settle elsewhere fed their flocks, and occupied the land without molestation. There was no one to dispute their right to it; and after their deaths the children inhabited and cultivated the land of their fathers. If we were to found a colony in a desert island, every man would cultivate as much ground as he wanted for his own use, and each having an equal interest in the preservation of his possessions, property would thus be established by general agreement, without any legal institution. MRS. B. This general agreement is a kind of law; a very imperfect one it is true, and which was perhaps originally founded on the relative strength of individuals. If one man attempts to carry off the cattle or the fruits of another, the latter opposes force to force; if he is stronger or better armed, he either kills his antagonist or drives him away; if weaker, he is despoiled, or he calls in his neighbours to his succour, shows them the common danger, and may induce them to unite with him in taking vengeance on the aggressor. Many incidents of this nature must occur before regular laws are instituted; that is to say, before a blic authority is established, which shall protect |