nd, except for the
sake of preserving record of great works.

The second of these principles is the only one which directly rises out
of the consideration of our immediate subject; but I shall briefly
explain the meaning and extent of the first also, reserving the
enforcement of the third for another place.

1. Never encourage the manufacture of anything not necessary, in the
production of which invention has no share.

For instance. Glass beads are utterly unnecessary, and there is no
design or thought employed in their manufacture. They are formed by
first drawing out the glass into rods; these rods are chopped up into
fragments of the size of beads by the human hand, and the fragments are
then rounded in the furnace. The men who chop up the rods sit at their
work all day, their hands vibrating with a perpetual and exquisitely
timed palsy, and the beads dropping beneath their vibration like hail.
Neither they, nor the men who draw out the rods or fuse the fragments,
have the smallest occasion for the use of any single human faculty; and
every young lady, therefore, who buys glass beads is engaged in the
slave-trade, and in a much more cruel one than that which we have so
long been endeavouring to put down.

But glass cups and vessels may become the subjects of exquisite
invention; and if in buying these we pay for the invention, that is to
say for the beautiful form, or colour, or engraving, and not for mere
finish of execution, we are doing good to humanity.

So, again, the cutting of precious stones, in all ordinary cases,
requires little exertion of any mental faculty; some tact and judgment
in avoiding flaws, and so on, but nothing to bring out the whole mind.
Every person who wears cut jewels merely for the sake of their value
is, therefore, a slave-driver.

But the working of the goldsmith, and the various designing of grouped
jewellery and enamel-work, may become the subject of the most noble
human intelligence. Therefore, money spent in the purchase of
well-designed plate, of precious engraved vases, cameos, or enamels,
does good to humanity; and, in work of this kind, jewels may be
employed to heighten its splendour; and their cutting is then a price
paid for the attainment of a noble end, and thus perfectly allowable.

I shall perhaps press this law farther elsewhere, but our immediate
concern is chiefly with the second, namely, never to demand an exact
finish, when it does not lead to a noble