ae 
Notices respecting New Books. 149 
pleasure in tracing the slow but certain progress of reason ard 
liberality. ‘ During the reign,’ says he, ‘ of Heary VIL. it was 
prohibited to export horses, as if that exportation did not en- 
eourage the breed, and make them more plentiful in the king- 
dom. Prices were also affixed to woollen cloths, to caps and 
hats, and the wages of labourers were regulated by law. It is 
evident that these matters ought always to be left free, and be 
intrusted to the common course of lusimess and ecommerce.’ — 
‘ For a like reason,’ the historian continues, ‘the law enacted 
against inclosures, and for the keeping up of farm-houses, 
scarcely deserves the praises bestowed on it by Lord Bacon. If 
husbandmen understand agriculture, and have a ready vent for 
their commodities, we need not dread a diminution of the people 
employed in the country. During a century and a hall after 
this period, there was a frequent renewal of laws and edicts 
against depopulation; whence we may infer, that none of them 
were ever execuied. The natural course of improvement at last 
provided a remedy. 
«« These acute and decisive strictures on the impolicy of some 
laws highly applauded by Bacon, while they strongly illustrate 
the narrow and mistaken views in political economy entertained 
by the wisest statesmen and philosophers two centuries ago, afford 
at the same time a proof of the general diffusion which has since 
taken place among the people of Great Britain, of juster and 
more enlightened opinions on this important branch of legisla- 
tion. Wherever such doctrines find their way into the page of. 
history, it may be safely inferred that the public mind is not ine 
disposed to give them a welcome reception. 
«The ideas of Bacon converning the education of youth, 
were such as might be expected fromi a philosophical statesman, 
On the conduct of education in general, with a view to the de- 
velopment and improvement of the intellectual character, he has. 
suggested various usetul hints in different parts of his works ; but 
what I wish chiefly to remark at present is, the paramount im- 
portance which he has attached to the education of the people, 
—comparing (as he has repeatedly done) the effects of early cul- 
ture on the understanding and the heart, to the abundant har- 
vest which rewards the diligent husbandman for the toils of the 
spring. ‘To this analogy he seems to have been particularly 
anxious to attract the attention of his readers, by bestowing on 
education the title of the Georgics of the mind ; identifying, by 
a happy and impressive metaphor, the two proudest functions 
intrusted to the legislator,—the encouragement of agricultural 
industry, and the care of national instruction. In both instances, 
the legislator exerts a power which is literally productive or 
a@eative; compelling, in the one case, the unprofitable desert 
K3 to 
