the tremendous uncertainty of human greatness, and triply purified by the fcenes of horror and of pity, which we have witneffed in our country, contemplates a wretched political Charlatan, weighing in a fcale of horrors fo much positive benefit against fo much probable advantage, and when, with the dexterity of a conjuror, he has shifted his weights from fcale to fcale, declares the balance in favour of violated right, broken faith, and unfeeling rapacity.-Generous and ever enlightened merchants, magnanimous but always deluded Irishmen, do I hear your tremulous voice calling on me to palter with this anonymous writer, or to diffect and tear to pieces his induftriously circulated, but incongruous rhapfody-No, No, I do not hear it, and I fhall therefore not be diverted from a liberal mode of argument to reply to it; but I fhall treat it "as I would the miferable falf"hoods, which an infect race of corrupt poli"ticians would fly-blow into every weak and "rotten part of your country, in vain hopes, -“that their maggots would take wing, and that

their importunate buzzing would found fomething like the voice of the nation,”—I shall pass on. I fhall defpife it; for aught I know, that very scandalous and outrageous libel on the -Conftitution and people of Ireland, might be

the

the publication of fome hackneyed fcribe, who for these some ten or twelve years has been paid for endeavouring to perfuade the people of Ireland, that their country was rapidly flourishing, that their Conftitution was the pride and envy of the world, and that every attempt at improvement was like heightening the beauties of Paradife, or mending the air of Elyfium.

The neceffary confequence of the depreffion of the home market, I contend, would be the encouragement of foreign productive labour, the diminution of the rents of land, and the encrease of the number of our unproductive labourers. The fupporters of an Union will contend, that though an Union might stop the pursuit of manufactures, yet it would direct the industry of Ireland to the improvement of the land, and that the converfion of wafte into cultivated land is of much greater importance to Ireland, than manufacturing induftry: they likewise urge, with great force and energy, that the incorporated Parliament will take care and fecure, by proper 'regulations, the domeftic market for Irish manufactures to this my anfwer is, that I will not truft my market to an incorporated Parliament, which, in all human probability, will be compofed of men, and the defcendants of men, who will make the breach of all faith the guaᏀ

rantee

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rantee of their future integrity; but that I will look boldly at the extent of the mischief, and, notwithstanding every difficulty, will endeavour to fee the pernicious confequences of my folly and my temerity. "Let the people of any other country, more fimple, and of a less mercurial caft, judge of a dangerous measure only by actual grievance: I will anticipate the evil, and judge of the preffure of the grievance by the danger of the experiment; augur misgovernment at a distance, and fnuff the approach of tyranny even in the tainted breeze.'

Agriculture, it is faid by feveral political economifts, is the most beneficial and productive object of human industry, nothing it is faid can afford so advantageous an employment for capital and labour, as the converfion of mountains into cultivated farms; nothing can contribute more to the population, ftrength, and real riches of a country.

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2dly, It is faid by political economists, that to endeavour to accelerate the growth of manufactures, is in fact to endeavour by force and art, to transfer the natural current of industry from a more to a lefs beneficial channel, and that whatever has fuch a tendency, muft neceffarily be injurious; that the fharp-fighted guidance of private intereft, will infallibly find the best employment

employment, and that to leave induftry to itself, is in almost every cafe the foundest and the fimpleft policy.

3dly, As immediately referable to Ireland it may be faid that, as the deficiency of capital diminishes, the chance of fuccefsful competiti on with the manufacturers of Europe, the only injures herself by an unavailing exertion."

4thly, It may be faid that an unreasonable and premature spring to certain fabrics, by great duties, prohibitions, bounties, and forced expedients, facrifices the intereft of the community to thofe of particular claffes, and that by the mif direction of labour, a virtual monopoly is given to the perfons employed on fuch fabrics, and an enhancement of price, the inevitable confequence of every monopoly, must be incurred at the expence of other parts of the fociety; and it is far preferable that these perfons fhould be engaged in the cultivation of the earth, and that we fhould procure in exchange for its productions the commodities with which foreigners are able to fupply us in greater perfection and upon better terms. I know no other fpecious arguments which can be urged by the fupporters of Union, to gull the people, and reconcile them to the depreffion of their home-trade. It is a general theory, and as fuch admits numerous excepti

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ons, and blends great error with the truth which it inculcates.

I admit that the agricultural system has intrinfically a. ftrong, but not an exclufive, claim to pre-eminence over every other kind of induftry; but I contend that it is advanced by the due encouragement of manufactures. Great writers on political economy have maintained, that agriculture is not only the most productive, but the ONLY productive, species of industry; their calculations and facts are disputable, and their arguments too delufive and inconclufive to require refutation.

The fact is, land is a stock or capital, and the RENT of land from the tenant is the ordinary profit of that stock; in the same manner that the surplus which arises out of any manufactory, after replacing its ordinary expences, is the ordinary profit of the Capital, funk in the profecution of that manufactory; and the only question as to the fuperior productiveness of agriculture or manufactures, is, whether the furplus after, defraying the expences of a given Capital employed in the purchase and improvement of a piece of land, is greater or less than that of a LIKE capital employed in the profecution of a manufactory; or whether the whole value produced from a given Capital employed in one way

be