1 68 TAXATION AND FINANCE. 



The Hollanders, who had acquiesced for very life in excises, 

 had been educated under a system which was severely en- 

 forced, as it had been long obeyed. But nothing could be 

 more crude and ill-arranged than the English financial system. 

 Governments kept office long after they ceased to possess a 

 working majority in the Commons. Private members pro- 

 posed taxes. The country swarmed with financial quacks, 

 who were constantly putting forward their schemes in pam- 

 phlets, and urging them in the lobby and the Court of Re- 

 quests. In consequence, financial expedients in the way of 

 excises were constantly financial failures. Parliament put excise 

 duties on glass, on stone-ware, on pottery, and put them on so 

 unwisely that they ruined the industry. The safest subject 

 of taxation was beer and spirits. But the legislature only 

 taxed the common brewer and the manufacturing distiller, 

 and left private brewing and private distilling alone. Davenant 

 assures us that this practice or policy of Parliament rendered 

 the produce of the excise disappointing, and recommended 

 a malt-tax, which was imposed in 1697. But even here, as 

 seems obvious from comparing the prices of barley and malt, 

 the tax was paid by the purchaser at the time of sale. 



There was no remedy then but to borrow money, to assign 

 the product of particular taxes to the payment of the interest, 

 and to rely for the greater part of the charges of government 

 on direct taxation. A land-tax of four shillings in the pound, 

 a tax on personal property, gains of office and salaries, on 

 annuities or profits, and even on workmen's wages, and poll- 

 taxes, were inevitable. It was necessary too, in order to secure 

 funds for current expenditure, to anticipate revenue by tallies, 

 issued at a heavy discount, for the very sufficient reason that the 

 holder of these securities had generally to experience the in- 

 convenience of deferred payments. In addition to which, the 

 vicious system under which the officials of the Exchequer, 

 beyond and above their percentages, were allowed to handle 

 and deal with the balances of public money in their hands, 

 till such time as their audit came round, instead of paying 



