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Travels in France 



swept from their very foundations. This poHcy must consist, 

 first, in making it the interest, as much as possible, of every 

 class in the state, except those absolutely without property,^ to 

 support the established government; and also to render it as 

 palatable as the security of property will allow, even to these; 

 farther than this none can look; for it is so directly the interest 

 of the people, without property, to divide with those who have it, 

 that no government can be established which shall give the poor 

 an equal interest in it with the rich; 2— the visible tangible 

 interest of the poor (if I may use the expressions), and not the 

 ultimate and remote which they will never voluntarily regard, 

 is a pure democracy, and a consequent division of property the 

 sure path to anarchy and despotism. The means of making a 

 o-overnment respected and beloved are, in England, obvious; 

 taxes must be immensely reduced ; assessments on malt, leather, 

 candles, soap, salt, and windows must be abolished or lightened; 

 the funding system, the parent of taxation, annihilated for ever 

 by taxing the interest of the public debt — the constitution that 

 admits a debt carries in its vitals the seeds of its destruction; 

 tithes^ and tests abolished; the representation of parliament 



1 The representation of mere population is as gross a violation of sense, 

 reason, and theory as it is found pernicious in practice ; it gives to ignor- 

 ance to govern knowledge ; to uncultivated intellect the lead of intelligence ; 

 to savage force the guide of law and justice; and to folly the governance 

 of wisdom. Knowledge, intelligence, information, learning, and wisdom 

 ought to govern nations, and these are all found to reside most in the 

 middle classes of mankind; weakened by the habits and prejudices of the 

 "real, and stifled by the ignorance of the vulgar. — Author's note. 

 ° » Those who have not attended much to French affairs might easily 

 mistake the representation of territory and contribution in the French 

 constitution as something similar to what I contend for — but nothing is 

 more remote; the number chosen is of little consequence, while persons 

 without property are the electors. Yet Mr. Christie says (vol. i. p. 196) 

 that property is a base on which representation ought to be founded; and 

 it is plain he thinks that property is represented, though the representa- 

 tives of the property are elected by men that do not possess a shilling! It 

 is not that the proprietors of property should have voices in the election 

 proportioned to their property, but that men who have a direct interest in 

 th" plunder or division of property should be kept at a distance from 

 power. Here lies the great difficulty of modern legislation, to secure pro- 

 perty and at the same time secure freedom to those that have no property. 

 In England there is much of this effected for the small portion of every 

 man's income that is left to him after public plunder is satiated (the poor, 

 the parson, and the king take 50 to 60 per cent, of every man's rent), but 

 the rest is secure. In America the poor, the parson, and the king take 

 nothing (or next to nothing) and the whole is secure. In France all seems 

 to be at the mercy of the populace. — Author's note. 



' The exaction of tithes is so absurd and tyrannical an attack on the 

 property of mankind that it is almost impossible for them to continue in 

 any country in the world half a century longer. To pay a man by force 

 £1000 a year for doing by deputy what would be much better done for 



