Ch. xi. Bounties upon E.vportation. 165 



If cottons in this country were now to fall to half 

 their present price, we should undoubtedly export 

 a greater quantity than we do at present ; but I 

 very much doubt whether we should export double 

 the quantity, at least for many years, and yet we 

 must do this to enable us to command as much 

 foreign produce as before. In this case, as in 

 numerous others of the same kind, quantity and 

 value go together to a certain point, though not 

 at an equal pace ; but, beyond this point, a further 

 increase of quantity only diminishes the whole 

 value produced, and the amount of the returns 

 that can be obtained for it. 



It is obvious then that a country, notwithstand- 

 ing a high comparative price of labour and of ma- 

 terials, may easily stand a competition with fo- 

 reigners in those commodities to which it can apply 

 a superior capital and machinery with great ef- 

 fect ; although such a price of labour and materials 

 might give an undisputed advantage to foreigners 

 in agriculture and some other sorts of produce, 

 where the same saving of labour cannot take 

 place. Consequently such a country may find it 

 cheaper to purchase a considerable part of its 

 supplies of grain from abroad with its manufac- 

 tures and peculiar products, than to grow the 

 whole at home. 



If, from all or any of these causes, a nation be- 

 comes habitually dependent on foreign countries 

 for the support of a considerable portion of its 

 population, it must evidently be subjected, while 

 such dependence lasts, to some of those evils 

 which belong to a nation purely manufacturing 



