WEALTH OF NATIONS. 259 



so far effected that beer is no longer directly taxed. 

 But these taxes especially, on the upper classes, do not 

 fall in proportion to income, for they are proportioned 

 to expenditure only, which varies much more in the 

 higher classes than in the middle and lower ranks. 

 Absentees, too, pay no such taxes, and accordingly Dr. 

 Smith is an advocate for absentee taxes, giving Ireland 

 as an example of the effects of persons being non- 

 resident on their estates, and wholly forgetting that an 

 Irish family residing in England contributes to the re- 

 venue by which Ireland is governed and defended, as 

 much as a Scotch family living in London does to the 

 government and defence of Scotland ; or a Yorkshire 

 family to that of Yorkshire. He shows, however, very 

 clearly that all taxes upon consumable commodities sin 

 against the fourth maxim ; they keep and take more 

 from the people than almost any others, creating a 

 number of excise and customs officers, by raising prices 

 and discouraging consumption, by vexatious prosecu- 

 tions for smuggling, and by vexatious visits of officers. 

 He here discusses the alcavala, or tax on sales of all 

 kinds, in Spain, at first of ten and even fourteen per 

 cent., and afterwards of six per cent., and a similar tax 

 of three per cent, on all contracts in the Spanish king- 

 dom of Naples. He institutes an interesting compari- 

 son between the old system of taxation in France, and 

 that of England, giving the clear advantage to the 

 latter. 



Upon the whole it must be admitted, that the long 

 chapter on taxation, (one of the longest, having 153 

 pages), though from the variety of the facts brought 

 together, it is exceedingly entertaining, is less instruc- 

 tive than any other part of the ' Wealth of Nations ;' 

 because the principles are not very fully and carefully 

 discussed, because the whole operation of the different 

 taxes described is not accurately traced, and because, 

 therefore, the important point of their ultimate inci- 

 dence is not accurately and satisfactorily pursued and 



