36 The Edinburgh Review, No. 72 



indifference to the heir of an indivi- 

 dual, whose share of tlie expenses of a 

 war amounts to 1000/. whether he pays 

 it at once, and leaves him 1000/. less, 

 or does not pay it, and leaves him 

 1000/. more, subject to a constant 

 charge of 50/. a-year," — where, for 

 general application, is the logic, then ? 

 The proprietor who has an income of 

 1000/. or 500/. a-year, may sell so much 

 of his estate or stock as will enable 

 Jiim to pay a whole year's income at 

 once, and be in no worse condition 

 than if he were permanently taxed to 

 the amount of 100/. or 50/. a-year. But, 

 suppose a professional man, or any 

 other description of person having no 

 other property than the annual income 

 of his talents and exertions, to be in 

 the receipt of 1000/. or of 500/. a-year, 

 can he take the tithe of his estate in 

 Irahiio market, and raise his 1000/. or 

 600/. at once, instead of paying his 

 100/. or his 50/. annually? The consi- 

 deration of this will show at once the 

 enormous iniquity of another part of 

 the reviewer's proposition, viz. an 

 equal tax upon permanent and upon 

 precarious income. A tax, of twenty 



[Feb. I, 



become indemnified from the burthen, 

 it must fall with the more crushing 

 weight upon every other description 

 of the precarious annuitants of taleut 

 and industry. Into the supposititious 

 assertion, that the wages of labourers 

 would be in this, and other cases of 

 such taxation as he proposes, so 

 "increased subsequently to the impo- 

 sition of the tax, sis to preserve them 

 in their former relative position," had 

 we space to dilate, we could prove 

 that our denial has rested upon facts 

 and has-beens, not upon hypothetical 

 wouhl-bes, — like the affirmations of the 

 reviewer. Let the reader, therefore, 

 refer to Bishop Fleetwood's " Chro- 

 nicon Preciosum," and other authentic 

 documents of the comparative propor- 

 tions between the prices of labour and 

 of the necessaries of lite at different 

 periods ; and not only will the hyjio- 

 thesis before us be blown into the air, 

 but the conclusion would be irresisti- 

 ble, that all inordinate taxation even- 

 tually falls, has fallen, and ever must 

 fall, almost exclusively on thoj)roduc- 

 tive labourer ; as surely as that out of 

 the produce of his labour it must 

 percent, for example, on the income^ eventually be paid. But such appeals 



of the permanent proprietor takes from 

 liim only the one-hundredth part of his 

 actual property ; for it touches only 

 tlie interest upon his property : but a 

 tax of twenty per cent, on the income 

 of mere personal exertion, takes away 

 an actual tenth ; for the income, in such 

 case, is at once both principal and 

 interest. It tithes the very capital 

 itself as fast as it is produced; and, in 

 ninety-nine instances out of every hun- 

 dred, must effectually preclude all 

 possibility of provision for a family 

 from mere personal exertion. The 

 curious attempt at illustration, from 

 the exclusive profession of the law, 

 ■seems to point out the profession of 

 the writer ; and may suggest the idea 

 of his conviction that he would not be 

 one of those whom such a tax would 

 drive from the profession, and that, 

 consequently, his fees might be in- 

 creased in number and amount from 

 the diminution of present and the ex- 

 clusion of fresh competitors, so as to 

 make him no loser by the burthen. 

 But he forgets that his proposed tax is 

 to affect all professions and callings; 

 that those who are driven from one 

 must seek refuge in another ; and that, 

 accordingly, in proportion as the re- 

 maining practitioners of the law might 



to the facts of past and present expe- 

 rience as would demonstrate the 

 distinction that ought ever to be 

 regarded between a tax on permanent 

 property and a tax upon precarious 

 income, suit not the political philo- 

 sophy of the criticism of the Edinburgh 

 Review. 



The second article, A Letter to the 

 Chairman of tlte Committee of the House 

 of Commons, on the Game Laws, is 

 treated much more lairly ; and the 

 public in general, we trust, will go at 

 least the full length with the revie-.ver 

 in the reprobation of a system of laws 

 which, being in direct violation of all 

 natural justice, and irrcconcileablc to 

 all intelligible ideas of property, arc 

 demonstrably the nurse of every spe- 

 cies of atrocious crime, as well as 

 characterised by a vainly-oppressive 

 tyranny. We are of opinion, however, 

 as indeed the reviewer seems to be, 

 that something more than the proposed 

 measure of " licensing the sale of 

 game," viz. the complete abolition of 

 the Game Laws, is necessary for the 

 remedy of the evil. That the piescnt 

 laws are impotent to their end is on all 

 hands admitted ; and in a country like 

 tins Ihey ever must be so. lor tlicrc 

 is a law of moral rigiit more cogent 



than 



