t
cannot possibly exist. They have been likewise assimilated to
witchcraft, an ideal belief, arising in the times of ignorance. It is now
become the creed of legislators and ministers, that trade should be left
to regulate itself, that monopoly cannot exist.

With all the respect justly due to the learned writer who advanced so
bold an opinion, it may be asked, since many instances occur, both in
sacred and profane history, in ancient times, and in our own days, of
provisions, on particular occasions, selling at one hundred times their
natural price, (and, every price above the natural one, is called a
monopoly price,) how can it be asserted that they may not become an
object of monopoly in a more general way, though not at so exorbitant
a price?

How, it may be asked, can this thing, that has so often occurred in an
extreme degree, a thing that is allowed to be possible, be compared
with the miraculous effect of witchcraft, of the existence of which
there does not appear to be one authentic record? The one, at all
events, a natural, and the other, a supernatural effect. How are those to
be admitted in fair comparison?

If we know that, at the siege of Mantua, the provisions rose to one
hundred times their usual price, we may believe the same thing
possible, at the siege of Jerusalem, two thousand years ago, and at the
siege of Leyden, or at that of Paris. If we know that a guinea is given
for a

---
{123} Dr. Smith, in his Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the
Wealth of Nations. The author of the notes, and continuation, has,
indeed, answered his arguments; but that does not render it less
necessary to do so here.
-=-

[end of page #149]

bad dinner at an inn, which is not worth a shilling, merely because
some particular circumstance has drawn more people together than
can be provided for; and, because hunger admits not patiently of
delay, can we dispute the inclination to extortion on the one hand, and
the disposition to submit to it on the other?

If that is admitted, the interference of the law is allowable on the same
principle on which it regulates the interest of money, though not to the
same extent; that is, it is allowable, in particular instances, where the
effects are similar, but not in all instances, because, in all instances,
they are not similar. {124}

The rate of provisions is then liable, on particular occasions, to rise to
a monopoly price, such as that of those rare productions of na