ed state of the European governments
is injurious to commerce. Every kind of destruction or embarrassment
serves to lessen the quantity, and it matters but little in what part
of the commercial world the reduction begins. Like blood, it cannot be
taken from any of the parts, without being taken from the whole mass in
circulation, and all partake of the loss. When the ability in any
nation to buy is destroyed, it equally involves the seller. Could the
government of England destroy the commerce of all other nations, she
would most effectually ruin her own. It is possible that a nation may be
the carrier for the world, but she cannot be the merchant. She cannot
be the seller and buyer of her own merchandise. The ability to buy must
reside out of herself; and, therefore, the prosperity of any commercial
nation is regulated by the prosperity of the rest. If they are poor she
cannot be rich, and her condition, be what it may, is an index of the
height of the commercial tide in other nations. That the principles
of commerce, and its universal operation may be understood, without
understanding the practice, is a position that reason will not deny; and
it is on this ground only that I argue the subject. It is one thing
in the counting-house, in the world it is another. With respect to its
operation it must necessarily be contemplated as a reciprocal thing;
that only one-half its powers resides within the nation, and that
the whole is as effectually destroyed by the destroying the half that
resides without, as if the destruction had been committed on that which
is within; for neither can act without the other. When in the last, as
well as in former wars, the commerce of England sunk, it was because the
quantity was lessened everywhere; and it now rises, because commerce is
in a rising state in every nation. If England, at this day, imports
and exports more than at any former period, the nations with which she
trades must necessarily do the same; her imports are their exports, and
vice versa. There can be no such thing as a nation flourishing alone
in commerce: she can only participate; and the destruction of it in any
part must necessarily affect all. When, therefore, governments are
at war, the attack is made upon a common stock of commerce, and the
consequence is the same as if each had attacked his own. The present
increase of commerce is not to be attributed to ministers, or to any
political contrivances, but to its own natural