so much the more desperate, if your noble and grand lordships
will take into consideration, that in this decay of trades and
manufactures, we find a new reason of their farther fall, considering,
that from the time there is not continual employment, and an
uninterrupted sale, the workmen desert in such manner, that when
considerable commissions arrive, we cannot find capable hands, and we
see ourselves entirely out of a condition to execute these orders.

That the petitioners, with all the true friends of their country,
extremely affected with this alarming situation of so rich a source of
the public prosperity, have indeed sought the means of a remedy, in
amending some defects, from which it seemed to arise, at least in part;
but that the measures taken in this view, as is well know to your noble
and grand Lordships, have not had the desired effect; at least, that
they have not produced a re-establishment so effectual, that we have
been able to observe a sensible influence in the increase of the sales
of the manufactures of Leyden, as appears most evidently, by a
comparison of the pieces fabricated here, which have been heretofore
carried to the divers markets of this city, with those which are carried
there at this day; a comparison which a true citizen cannot of consider
without regret.

That experience has also taught the petitioners, that the principal
cause of the decay of the manufactures of Holland, particularly those of
Leyden, is not to be found in any internal vice, either in the capacity,
or the oeconomy of the inhabitants, but in circumstances which have
happened abroad; and to which it is, consequently, beyond the power of
the petitioners, or of any citizen whatsoever, to provide a remedy. That
we might cite, for example, the commerce of our manufactures with
Dantzic; and, through that commercial city, with all Poland; a commerce
which was carried on with success and advantage heretofore in our city,
but is absolutely interrupted at this day, and vanished, by the
revolution which has happened in that kingdom, and by the burthensome
duties to which the navigation of the Vistula has been subjected. But
that, without entering into a detail of similar particular shackles, of
which we might reckon a great number; the principal cause of the
languishing state of our manufactures consists in the jealous emulation
of the neighbouring nations, or rather of all the people of Europe;
considering that, in this age, th