tion of one-half.

The most unprofitable of all commerce is that connected with foreign
dominion. To a few individuals it may be beneficial, merely because it
is commerce; but to the nation it is a loss. The expense of maintaining
dominion more than absorbs the profits of any trade. It does not
increase the general quantity in the world, but operates to lessen it;
and as a greater mass would be afloat by relinquishing dominion, the
participation without the expense would be more valuable than a greater
quantity with it.

But it is impossible to engross commerce by dominion; and therefore
it is still more fallacious. It cannot exist in confined channels, and
necessarily breaks out by regular or irregular means, that defeat
the attempt: and to succeed would be still worse. France, since the
Revolution, has been more indifferent as to foreign possessions, and
other nations will become the same when they investigate the subject
with respect to commerce.

To the expense of dominion is to be added that of navies, and when the
amounts of the two are subtracted from the profits of commerce, it will
appear, that what is called the balance of trade, even admitting it to
exist, is not enjoyed by the nation, but absorbed by the Government.

The idea of having navies for the protection of commerce is delusive.
It is putting means of destruction for the means of protection. Commerce
needs no other protection than the reciprocal interest which every
nation feels in supporting it--it is common stock--it exists by a
balance of advantages to all; and the only interruption it meets, is
from the present uncivilised state of governments, and which it is its
common interest to reform.*[26]

Quitting this subject, I now proceed to other matters.--As it is
necessary to include England in the prospect of a general reformation,
it is proper to inquire into the defects of its government. It is only
by each nation reforming its own, that the whole can be improved, and
the full benefit of reformation enjoyed. Only partial advantages can
flow from partial reforms.

France and England are the only two countries in Europe where a
reformation in government could have successfully begun. The one secure
by the ocean, and the other by the immensity of its internal strength,
could defy the malignancy of foreign despotism. But it is with
revolutions as with commerce, the advantages increase by their becoming
general, and double to either what each wo