.292 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book VII. 



hoiife, or by day labourers, that he gets from the neighbouring town 

 or village, he has no cottager living upon his farm, fuch as we have 

 in Scotland, as I fliall obferve afterwards. Such farms may be rec- 

 koned the defolation of a country ; and, therefore, the IngrofTuig of 

 farms is very properly mentioned by Dr Price *, as one caufe of the. 

 depopulation of England. 



I come now to fpeak of the third and lafl: clafs of men in the 

 country, which Ihould be by far the moft numerous ; and, indeed, 

 it is from the number of them that we denominate a country popu- 

 lous or not populous. They are, too, of the greateft utility in a 

 country ; and, indeed, I may fay of indifpenfible necefTity : For they 

 are the breed of fervants, day labourers, mechanics, and tradefmen 

 of all kinds, and, what I think ot the greatell confequence, of fol- 

 diers of the beft kind ; for they furniih that rujiicoriim inafiula milU 

 ium proles^ with which the Romans conquered the world. They 

 furnifh alfo failcrs for the navy ; and, in fnort, they fi^l all the lower 

 offices of peace and war, of number infinite and of abfolute necefh- 

 tv for carrying on the bufmefs of the nation. But in travelling 

 through England, 1 fee towns, villages, and farms, though not near fo 

 many farms as, 1 think, fliould be ; but of cottages 1 hardly fee one 

 by itfelf ; whereas, in a populous country, the landfcape fhould be 

 dotted with cottages. This, I am perfuaded, was the cafe when Ju- 

 lius Csefar law the country of England, which very naturally made him^ 

 fay that there was in it infmita hom'tnum multiiudo ; and he adds, cre- 

 hcrrwia atdificia f. What remains of cottagers in England, I am 

 told is to be found in little villages or hamltts as they call them, but 

 very few upon the farms, where I think they ought chiefly to be. 



There was a time, I am perfuaded, when the cottagers were more 

 numerous in England ; and the memory of them is ftill prelerved in 



fome 



• See p. 278 of this vol. t Comment, lib. 5. cap. 12. 



