4.6o •Benefits arifuig from the Application' of inanimate Jirjl Movers. 



tlirough their grounds and premifes, a.nd which an intelligent obferver need not walk mai^ 

 miles in any country to point out, their property and revenue might immediately receive a 

 confiderable accefllon; and the community would be ftili more effectually benefited. The 

 inceffant demands for the employment of fuch forces in grinding corn, colours, drugs, to- 

 bacco ; in cutting bark and other tanners' and dyers' materials ; in fawing wood ; in la- 

 minating, drawing, or fafnioning metallic bodies ; in fpinning, v.'cavlng, fulling, &c. the 

 products of the organized kingdoms by arts already praclifed, excliifivc of the many im- 

 provements which may be expe£led in their application, are too numerous to afford the 

 leaft reafon for any proprietor to fear a want of employment, or to confider the ere£liou 

 of a mill in a proper fituation as a fpeculation of the leaft danger or probable difadvantagc. 

 Similar obfervations are to a certain extent applicable in favour of the nfe of horfes inftead 

 of men, and (learn inftead of horfes, in every cafe where the power is required to be great 

 or long continued, and the fkill either little, or capable of being fupplied by machinery. 



I am teiTipted to digrefs for a moment from my fubjedl by the natural recurrence of a 

 political refleftion, fo obvious that it fcarcely ever fails to be made when the extenuon of 

 machinery and the application of inanimate powers are confidered. It is ftated by certain 

 humane but miftaken objeftors, that the fcheme of mechanical and chemical improve- 

 ment is pointed againft the human fpecies, and tends to drive them out of the fyftcm of 

 beneficial employment. Two creatures offer themfelves to me for employment and fup- 

 port — a man and a horfe. I mult invariably prefer the latter, and leave the former to 

 ..ftarve. Two other beings — a horfe and a fteam-engine, are candidates for my favour. My 

 preference to the latter tends to exterminate the fpecies of the former. In both cafes 

 it is ftated, that the number of intelligent creatures capable of the enjoyment of happinefs 

 muft be diminiflied for want of fupport ; and that, on the whole, the fum of the propofcd 

 improvements is not only a lefs proportion of good to fociety, but a pofitive acceffion of 

 much mifery to the unemployed poor. 



On this wide and extended argument, which can in facfl be maintained againft improve- 

 ments in no other way than by infifting that tlie favage ftate, with all its wants, its igno- 

 rance, its ferocity, and its privations, is preferable to the focial intercourfe of effort and 

 divifion of labour we are habituated to prefer, it may be fufficient to obferve, that the topic 

 includes matter not only for reafoning and indudlion, but alfo-for experiment. By refe- 

 rence to the matter of fafl:, though it muft be allowed that new improvements, which 

 change the habits of the poor, muft at firft expofe them to temporary inconvenience and 

 diftrefs, againft which, in fairnefs, it is the duty of fociety to defend them ; yet the inva- 

 riable refult of fuch improvements is to better the condition of mankind. The nations 

 which have ftiewn the moft ingenuity and induftry in this way are not only the richeft, the 

 moft populous, the moft intelligent, and the beft defended ; but the provinces of thofe 

 rations are feen to flourifh in proportion to their refpedlive degrees of adivity in this re- 

 fpe£t. And from thefe exertions it is, as Smith* emphatically remarks, that " the accom- 

 modation of an European prince does not always fo much exceed that of an induftrious 

 and frugal peafant, as the accommodation of the latter exceeds that of many an African 

 kin£, the abfolute mafter of the lives and liberties often thoufand naked favages." 



• Wealth of Nations, i. ch. L 



Eut 



