POLITICAL ECONOMY. 



them off in great numbers. As soon as they begin to appf/ 

 themselves to pasturage, their means of subsistence are 

 brought within narrower limits, requiring only that degree 

 of wandering necessary to provide fresh pasturage for their 

 cattle. Their flocks ensuring them a more easy subsistence, 

 their families begin to increase ; they lose in a great mea- 

 sure their ferocity, and a considerable improvement takes 

 place in their character. 



By degrees the art of tillage is discovered, a small tract of 

 ground becomes capable of feeding a greater relative number 

 of people ; the necessity of wandering in search of food ia 

 superseded ; families begin to settle in fixed habitations ; 

 and the arts of social life are introduced and cultivated. 



In the savage state scarcely any form of government is 

 established ; the people seem to be under no control but that 

 of their military chiefs in time of warfare. The possession 

 of flocks and herds in the pastoral state introduces property, 

 and laws are necessary for its security ; the elders and lead- 

 ers therefore of these wandering tribes begin to establish 

 laws, to violate which is to commit a crime and to incur a 

 punishment. This is the origin of social order ; and when 

 in the third state the people settle in fixed habitations, the 

 laws gradually assume the more regular form of a monarchical 

 or republican government. Every thing now wears a new 

 aspect ; industry flourishes, the arts are invented, the use of 

 metals is discovered ; labour is subdivided ; every one ap- 

 plies himself more particularly to a distinct employment, in 

 which he becomes skilful. Thus, by slow degrees, this peo- 

 ple of savages, whose origin was so rude and miserable, be- 

 come a civilized people, who occupy a highly cultivated 

 country, crossed by fine roads, leading to wealthy and popu- 

 lous cities, and carrying on an extensive trade with other 

 countries. 



The whole business of political economy is to study the 

 causes which have thus co-operated to enrich and civilize a 

 nation. This science, therefore, is essentially founded upon 

 history, — not the history of sovereigns, of wars, and of in- 

 trigues, — but the history of the arts, and of trade, of discove- 

 ries, and of civilization. We see some countries, like Ame- 

 rica, increase rapidly in wealth and prosperity, whilst others, 

 like Egypt and Syria, are impoverished, depopulated, and 

 fsvlling to decay ; when the causes which produce these va- 



