4 Henry VII. cap. 8.

v 4 Henry VII. cap. 9.

v* 11 Henry VII. cap. 22.

v** 4 Henry VII. cap. 9.

The commodities whose price has chiefly risen, are butcher's meat, fowl,
and fish, (especially the latter,) which cannot be much augmented in
quantity by the increase of art and industry. The profession which then
abounded most, and was sometimes embraced by persons of the lowest rank,
was the church: by a clause of a statute, all clerks or students of
the university were forbidden to beg, without a permission from the
vice-chancellor.[*]

One great cause of the low state of industry during this period, was the
restraints put upon it; and the parliament, or rather the king, (for
he was the prime mover in every thing,) enlarged a little some of these
limitations; but not to the degree that was requisite. A law had been
enacted during the reign of Henry IV.,[**] that no man could bind his
son or daughter to an apprenticeship, unless he were possessed of
twenty shillings a year in land; and Henry VII., because the decay
of manufactures was complained of in Norwich from the want of hands,
exempted that city from the penalties of the law.[***] Afterwards the
whole county of Norfolk obtained a like exemption with regard to some
branches of the woollen manufacture.[****] These absurd limitations
proceeded from a desire of promoting husbandry, which, however, is never
more effectually encouraged than by the increase of manufactures. For a
like reason, the law enacted against enclosures, and for the keeping up
of farm houses,[v] scarcely deserves the high praises bestowed on it by
Lord Bacon. If husbandmen understand agriculture, and have a ready vent
for their commodities, we need not dread a diminution of the people
employed in the country. All methods of supporting populousness, except
by the interest of the proprietors, are violent and ineffectual. During
a century and a half after this period, there was a frequent renewal of
laws and edicts against depopulation; whence we may infer, that none
of them were ever executed. The natural course of improvement at last
provided a remedy.

* 11 Henry VII. cap. 22.

** 11 Henry VII. cap. 11.

*** 4 Henry VII. cap. 19.

**** 4 Henry VII. cap. 17.

v 12 Henry VII. cap. 1.

One check to industry in England was the erecting of corporations;
an abuse which is not yet entirely corrected. A law was enacted, that
corporations