revive the horrors of war, and incur the risk of leaving destitute widows and orphans, in compliance with false and irreligious notions of honour; happy would it be for mankind if the influential in all civilised countries were to anticipate that period by commencing themselves a career of true glory-and, guided by the manifest conservative designs of Providence, instead of applying the principles of science in making their engines of destruction more effective and terrible, direct them to the construction of durable works of beneficence for the general good. "Science then Shall be a precious visitant; and then, And only then, be worthy of her name." Political economists may contend that Adam Smith confined his remarks to commerce and manufactures; but we reply, that the principle of competition, once publicly sanctioned in any sphere of exertion, must necessarily, in a greater or less degree, influence the whole character of individuals and of nations. The author of the "Wealth of Nations," as if conscious of the incompatibility of his economic principles with Christian morality, composed himself a theory of morals more comformable to his political theory, and he thus speaks of war, of which competition is the soul: "To compare the futile mortifications of a monastery to the ennobling hardships and hazards of war; to suppose that one day, or one hour, employed in the former, should, in the eye of the great Judge of the world, have more merit than a whole life spent honourably in the latter, is surely contrary to all our moral sentiments; to all the principles by which nature has taught us to regulate our contempt or admiration."-A. Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments: Sense of Duty. "Another lesson with my manhood came; I have unlearn'd contempt: it is the sin While the ministers of religion are inculcating the highest motives, the political economists are advocating, or virtually encouraging, the lowest. Hence arises confusion; in the mind virtue and vice, good and bad, are mingled, and new terms. must be invented to express the heterogeneous idea: accordingly, we hear of a "laudable ambition," a "becoming pride," as substitutes for those pure and exalted motives which all the institutions of society should tend to foster and strengthen, if we are really to live under a " Church and State." If a professor, after propounding a correct and beautiful theory of chemistry, were to proceed to manipulate in direct contravention of the principle he had laid down, great discredit would attach either to himself or his theory. Nor has it been sufficiently considered to what extent the discrepancy of sanctioning institutions, opposed to the spirit of religion, generates in the minds of youth either dissent or scepticism; that it impedes the progress of Christianity in distant lands is evident; the solitary missionary goes forth to proclaim the glad tidings of the Gospel, and the path is paved with fire and sword, by armed multitudes, for the messenger of peace. The condition of the people is considered sufficiently improved by an extension of manufactures, unaccompanied by any evils not susceptible of all the amelioration that can be desired; hence the factory system, through which tens of thousands of the rising generation are immured from morning till night in the unhealthy cottonmill, and doomed, amidst noise and dust, to one unvarying harassing employment, is the acme of their schemes, and free-trade, as a means of extending this system more widely, becomes an increasing object of solicitude. That free-trade would produce a collateral benefit, by amalgamating the interests of different countries, and rendering it as difficult for their rulers to induce or force the people of one nation to slaughter the people of another, as now to excite hostility between neighbouring counties, is highly probable; but the immediate consequences would be to consign to the heated, demoralising factory, additional thousands of young persons and little children from the agricultural districts. A purer philosophy has taught that "the leading feature of a sound state, both of body and mind, is, to desire little and to be satisfied with even less," but the "leading feature" of the material philosophy is to multiply factitious wants, and in the wild career of society vain and pernicious desires are perpetually encouraged, but never satisfied. Political Economy, to be taught as a science, should instruct in those rules which ought to govern the creation of wealth, or, if we may venture a definition, it is-The science which determines the best mode of production and distribution of that species of wealth most conducive to the physical, moral, intellectual, and spiritual improvement, and consequently to the greatest happiness of the whole population. Pursuing our inquiries with this standard for our guide, we should scarcely admit that twelve, or even ten, hours of tedious employment of children in an impure atmosphere was the "best mode of production," or that many articles of fashion manufactured were a "species of wealth," conducive to any improvement whatever. If we are informed that the system taught in Great Britain is the same, in its leading principles, as the Catechism of Political Economy, by the late Jean Baptiste Say, Professor in the Athénée Royal of Paris; as the systems of Krause and Storch, political economists of Germany; and, before its members were dispersed by the Russian Government, of Count Starbeck, of the University of Warsaw,—in fact, of all the professors in Europe; we have only to mark the immorality, selfishness, and increase of pauperism in every state, to be satisfied of the utter inutility or wretched consequences of such systems. Political Economy is unknown as a science throughout the civilised world: when rightly understood and reduced to practice, the present turmoil and confusion will give place to order and rapid improvement. The possibility of forming a superior public opinion, through the spread of vital Christianity and improved institutions, is entirely overlooked: competition and rivalry must still impel to action, for the idea appears to run through all the reasoning of the economists, that capricious wants and frivolous pursuits are never to be superseded by the rational desires, the benevolence, and enterprise, of more enlightened generations. The rules of production and distribution that have long prevailed, belong to a particular period in the progress of the species; and those which exist at present are characterised |