396 VEGETABLE SUBSTANCES. 



1 Quarterly Review ' has recently observed with great 

 truth, that l the cost of conveying flour from Quebec 

 to Liverpool or Manchester, is scarcely more now 

 than that of its land-carriage, a century back, from a 

 distance of fifty miles.' The inference from this 

 statement is undeniable. If the manufacturers of 

 Lancashire cannot receive corn from countries that 

 have corn to spare in exchange for cottons, because 

 it is thought essential that the sandy and gravelly 

 wastes of England shall be under the plough, the 

 progress of civilization, which is the progress of 

 man in wealth and comfort, is just as effectually 

 impeded as if the legislators of a century back had 

 ordained that Lancashire should grow its own corn 

 alone, and have no communication with the corn- 

 growing counties of Norfolk and Essex. The only 

 semblance of reasoning by which the principle of 

 excluding foreign produce can be maintained, is, that 

 a country may be deprived by war of its foreign 

 supplies. In the fear of war, then, a system is set 

 up which perpetuates war. More wars have been 

 engendered by the commercial system of exclusion 

 than by all the other follies and passions of subjects 

 and rulers. The true way to keep mankind in peace 

 is to let them prove how dependent every nation is 

 upon the other for the profitable employment of its 

 people, and for the general comforts of its people, re- 

 sulting from that profitable employment. 



THE END. 



