500 Transactioyis. — Miscellaneous. 



mercial history of the world for the last century is a tribute 

 to her energy and wisdom. But no commercial policy adds 

 anything to her resources, puts another pound of coal in her 

 mines, or adds another acre to her domain. Little country 

 though she is, her history has been glorious, and her pro- 

 sperity may remain exceptional relatively to her resources; but 

 she must, in spite of any wisdom of policy, give way in the 

 mere magnitude of her activities to countries with far greater 

 resources. Sandow in strength must acknowledge the supe- 

 riority of the elephant ; train he ever so wisely, though he 

 may excel other men he must remain a mere man. We 

 cannot transcend the limitations of nature. 



If other countries gain markets in their colonies and 

 possessions in which their exports have special preference 

 they are still further favoured. England has not attempted 

 to exact such preference in her colonies. This has directly 

 been an economic loss to her, but a great gain to them. But, 

 on the other hand, if she had attempted to enforce such a 

 policy the Empire no doubt would long ago have been dis- 

 membered, and she would have lost the preference, and with 

 it the allegiance of the colonies. The complaints that have 

 frequently been made that after all the spending of all the blood 

 and treasure in South Africa the country has been open to 

 the trade of all parts on equal terms sound very strange 

 coming from an English colony. What right has England to 

 enforce either preference with or the free admission of her 

 goods into South Africa that she does not equally possess to 

 enforce them on New Zealand? Those that raise their voices 

 in condemnation of the policy of England in South Africa in 

 this respect would be the first to resent and resist the ap- 

 plication of any such policy to New Zealand. Still it is un- 

 doubted that preference to the Mother-country obtained from 

 a colony or possession is a direct benefit to the Mother- 

 country. In so far as England's rivals have achieved such a 

 position of preference by the extension of their possessions 

 they have gained an advantage in respect to their commerce. 



Their advantage has been still further increased in so far 

 as they have excelled the United Kingdom in the matter of 

 technical education, in the improvement of and ready adop- 

 tion of the best of machinery, and in the more economical 

 apphcation of their labour. 



These considerations at least should all be taken mto 

 account in attempting to interpret how far the statistics of 

 English trade prove or disprove the wisdom of I'^ngland's 

 free-trade policy, and I hope I have proved that it is abso- 

 lutely unjust to draw from tlie figures we have examined 

 any inference prejudicial to her commercial policy. And if in 

 the future other nations do exhibit a much greater progress, 



