620 IRELAND AN.li HER COMMENTATORS. 



were to cease to import British manufactures to the amount of the 

 expenditure of absentees, is it rational to suppose, that England 

 could by any possibility import Irish produce to the same extent ? 

 The most favourable representations cannot make absentee expendi- 

 ture exceed four millions, which is but one million more than the 

 expenditure on British commodities in i825. " Can it be then," 

 asks Mr. Stanley, " that the expenditure of the four millions has not 

 the same effect proportionately, as the expenditure of the five millions 

 in causing the consumption of produce?" 



Aye, but say the repealers, if we had a parliament of our own, we 

 could then fix a tax of 75 per cent, on absentees, and make them 

 spend their incomes at home. Not so ; Mr. Flood could not do it, 

 when the Irish parliament was in the zenith of its power in 1773. 

 Besides if it were done, it would amount to absolute confiscation. 

 There are not, perhaps, half-a-dozen large proprietors in the whole 

 of Ireland that receive more than 75 per cent, out of their nominal 

 rents. When such an impost is talked of, it is forgotten that there 

 are such persons as mortgagees on Irish estates ; and if absentees 

 were taxed, the purchase money of domains would be withdrawn at 

 once, amounting to at least thirty years' rent. 



It is not to the residence of present absentees that Ireland should 

 look for an exemption from her grievances. We could easily adduce 

 arguments more potent then the foregoing in proof of this. But we 

 have said sufficient to demonstrate the futility of building chimeras 

 of national greatness on any such foundation. One fact in these 

 matters is worth a volume of speculations. Admit that all the money 

 annually taken out of the country by absentees were spent in the 

 country the profit on the whole four millions would at 10 per cent, 

 amount but to four hundred thousand pounds. But let only half a 

 million of labourers now partially employed at about eightpence a- 

 day be enabled to earn an additional shilling a day, and their expen- 

 diture among the middle classes would amount to nearly eight mil- 

 lions a year. 



Mr. Inglis advocates with much earnestness the necessity of go- 

 vernment opening canals, and facilitating the carriage of merchandize, 

 and improving in various ways the natural advantages of the 

 country. This like the popular notion of absentees, sounds very 

 satisfactorily, but it should be received with circumspection. The 

 already great length of our remarks, precludes the possibility of our 

 entering into the question minutely. Adam Smith* is decidedly op- 

 posed to the interference of government in such matters ; the author 

 of " An Essay on the production of Wealth," investigates the subject 

 with much diligence, and in our opinion clearly manifests the cor- 

 rectness of the opinion of the great economist. A perusal of the 

 essay will amply repay the reader, but we can only quote a single 

 sentence in support of the author's view. " With respect to the in- 

 ternal trade of a country, the whole art of governing is comprised in 

 giving security to property, and opening an uninterrupted field to 

 individual exertion." 



* Wealth of Nations, Book V., Chap. I. Part III. 



