obscure denomination of _stuff_. There are wholesale manufacturing
chemists, whose sole business is to crystallise alum, in such a form as
will adapt this salt to the purpose of being mixed in a crystalline
state with the crystals of common salt, to disguise the character of
the compound. The mixture called _stuff_, is composed of one part of
alum, in minute crystals, and three of common salt. In many other trades
a similar mode of proceeding prevails. Potatoes are soaked in water to
augment their weight.

The practice of sophisticating the necessaries of life, being reduced to
systematic regularity, is ranked by public opinion among other
mercantile pursuits; and is not only regarded with less disgust than
formerly, but is almost generally esteemed as a justifiable way to
wealth.

It is really astonishing that the penal law is not more effectually
enforced against practices so inimical to the public welfare. The man
who robs a fellow subject of a few shillings on the high-way, is
sentenced to death; while he who distributes a slow poison to a whole
community, escapes unpunished.

It has been urged by some, that, under so vast a system of finance as
that of Great Britain, it is expedient that the revenue should be
collected in large amounts; and therefore that the severity of the law
should be relaxed in favour of all mercantile concerns in proportion to
their extent: encouragement must be given to large capitalists; and
where an extensive brewery or distillery yields an important
contribution to the revenue, no strict scrutiny need be adopted in
regard to the quality of the article from which such contribution is
raised, provided the excise do not suffer by the fraud.

But the principles of the constitution afford no sanction to this
preference, and the true interests of the country require that it should
be abolished; for a tax dependent upon deception must be at best
precarious, and must be, sooner or later, diminished by the irresistible
diffusion of knowledge. Sound policy requires that the law should be
impartially enforced in all cases; and if its penalties were extended to
abuses of which it does not now take cognisance, there is no doubt that
the revenue would be abundantly benefited.

Another species of fraud, to which I shall at present but briefly
advert, and which has increased to so alarming an extent, that it loudly
calls for the interference of government, is the adulteration of drugs
and medicines