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by it. Lastly, it seems unjust that tradesmen or farmers should be 
forced to sell their manufactures or the produce of their ground to 
certain people only, * * * * for by this means the riches of 
the state may soon come into the hands of a few to the detriment 
and oppression of the rest.” 
We are also told by Grotius, who wrote more than a hundred 
years earlier than Puffeudorf, and more than two hundred years 
ago, that the Romans and Alexandrians had monopolies, and he 
thinks that all monopolies are not repugnant to the law of nature, 
for they may sometimes be permitted, he says, by the sovereigns, 
upon a just cause * * * * as may appear by the example of 
Joseph, when he was Governor of Egypt; but he also condemns 
with great severity, “those who combine to advance the value of 
their wares, or who charge a price unreasonable 
Grotius having quoted the example of Joseph in favor of monop¬ 
olies, Puffendorf contests him in this wise: “I cannot but take 
notice, by the way that Grotius brings the example of Joseph when 
he was Viceroy of Egypt, in justification of monopolies, though 
that example is not much to the purpose, for neither did the King 
hinder others from buying up the corn in the years of plenty, nor 
any from selling who had too much. Neither had the Alexandrians 
in Strabo the monopoly of Indian and Ethiopic commodities from 
any privilege, but from the situation of the place.'* 
It will be observed that this author here.endeavors to rescue the 
ancients from the odium of establishing monopolies, while he is 
compelled to admit that it was done extensively in Europe; but 
even there the very word monopoly was odious. The same writer 
says that “ monopolies of private men are specious and illegal, ' Y ' 
* * * that they are generally carried on by clandestine frauds 
and combinations, as if some few, by trick, should debar others 
from trading, * * * or if they should enter into a combina¬ 
tion to buy up all such sort of commodities, and then stifle them 
so that the scarcity may enhance the price.” Against them, he 
says, may be applied that of Appollonious Lyaneus Philostral, 1 i. 
c., 12, in the beginning, “ the earth is the mother of all, for she is 
just; but you, being unjust, have made her only a mother to your¬ 
selves.” The knavery of such ought as much to be condemned as 
those who enter into compact to raise extravagantly the price of 
other things by agreeing privately to sell nothing under such a 
