ESSAY

ON THE

ANALOGY WHICH SUBSISTS BETWEEN THE OPERATIONS OF NATURE, AND THE OPERATIONS OF POLITICAL ECONOMY.

It has been said by some writers of natural history, that an antidote to the venom of the serpent is to be found within the body of the animal itself. We know not whether there be any truth in this assertion; but if there be, that must surely be a very beautiful mechanism by which those very organs which produce a deadly poison, produce also a remedy for its fatal effects; and surely that arrangement is a display of the most consummate wisdom by which the efficient cause of an evil is also the efficient cause of its cure.

Now there is a principle very much akin to this, which exists in almost all the operations of nature, a principle to which nature in a great measure owes that constancy for which she has been so greatly admired. The principle we refer to is this,-That an operation of nature

whenever it arrives at that stage in its progress, where its effects would begin to be detrimental, by a very beautiful constitution of things, gives rise to an operation of an opposite tendency, and thus works out a cure for those very evils which itself seemed to threaten. Thus, were we unacquainted with the workings of nature, and did we behold the sun day after day shining on the earth with unclouded splendor; and did we perceive that day after day in consequence of this the soil was becoming more parched; and did we farther know that without moisture, vegetation would cease, and the fruits of the earth could not come to perfection, we might well look forward with the most dismal foreboding to what would seem the inevitable consequence. But how would our fears give place to our admiration of the Creator's wisdom and goodness, when we were told that that sun which we were thus contemplating as the cause of so much misery, was at that very moment gathering by the influence of his rays, the waters of the ocean, and suspending them in mighty reservoirs above us, which would again gently descend over the whole surface of our earth, and thus refresh the drooping plants, and give a new impulse to the economy of vegetation. There is another very beautiful instance of the operation of this principle. When any particular region of the earth begins to be overheated, the air is rarified, -it consequently ascends; the cool air which is around, rushes in to supply its place, and thus does a refreshing breeze blow over that land which had else been in a short time rendered uninhabitable.

And now to apply this to the subject before us. In the operations of political economy, as well as in the operations of nature, there is a beautiful

constancy; and it is truly wonderful to think what a rough handling a nation will come through, and with what hardihood she will endure it;-to think how famine and pestilence, and foreign war, and internal commotion, will successively lay hold of her; and how she will escape from their grasp, and in a few short years will be nearly what she was before she was subjected to it. And as the operations of political economy resemble the operations of nature in their constancy, we think they also resemble them in the cause of this constancy; and we shall try to illustrate this by an example or two.

Thus, in every country there should be a certain relation between the produce and the population; and it is interesting to observe how the constancy of this relation is maintained, through all the changes to which a nation is exposed.

Let us suppose, for example, that by improvements in tilling the ground, in the rotations of the crops,&c. that the agricultural produce is increased, and thus the constancy of the relation between the produce and the population is for a time destroyed. There is in this instance a superabundance of produce, or what is the same thing, there is a deficiency of population. Now let us see how the original relation between them is again restored. The agricultural produce being increased, more corn is brought to market, and the demand, in the first instance at least, remains the same: the consequence is, corn is cheapened. The cheapening of corn again puts more of the inhabitants in a condition to support a family; marriages take place earlier, and the population is increased; and thus is the deficiency made up, and the proper relation

between the produce and the population again restored.

But it must be evident to every one, that were the population thus to go on increasing indefinitely, the proper relation would soon be more than restored, the ratio would become reversed, and instead of a superabundance of produce, there would soon be a redundancy of population. But here, too, may we behold the beautiful effect of that arrangement, by which the remedy for the evil is involved in the evil itself. As the population has now increased, the demand has also increased: but in this latter instance the supply has remained the same; the natural consequence of which is, that the price of corn rises. It is now of course more difficult to support a family;-marriages are discouraged, and thus does the very increase of population, as soon as it comes to that point where its farther increase would be detrimental, actually bring a check upon itself.

Again, from various causes we sometimes see an old manufacture abolished. And here there would seem to be a great and immediate evil; a vast number of operatives are thrown out of employment. And yet, if we consider the subject attentively, we shall find that here, too, as well as in the example already adduced, the evil, if let alone, will remedy itself. And wherever we thus see an old manufacture abolished, may we with confidence predict that the wealth which supported that manufacture, will either give rise to a new one, or will so divide itself among those that yet remain, as to give a new impulse to each. And thus will the evil be remedied, and that class of the community which have been thrust from their old occupation, will either find employment in a

new manufacture, or will be parceled out among the manufactures that yet remain. There is still as much food for them in the country as before, and all that they will suffer will merely be the temporary inconvenience attending a change of employment.

Were one of the mouths of the Nile to be stopped up, that river would not discharge less water into the ocean than it did before. The water which used to flow through that channel, would at first, it is true, flow backwards; but it would not continue to do so, nor would it even remain stationary; it would seek another direction, and it would either overflow the banks, and hollow out a new channel for itself, or it would divide itself and flow to the sea, through the channels that yet remained. And here, by the way, would we advert to that political delusion which would magnify the importance of any one branch of manufacture or commerce. The waters of the ocean would not be diminished by one drop, because they had ceased to receive the tribute of that stream. So long as the same body of water continued to flow on from the fountain head, so long would the monarch of waters know no diminution in his resources. And it were well if our statesmen, as well as our operatives, could perceive that the manufacture does not produce either the taxes in the one case, or the wages in the other; that it is merely the channel through which they flow. And that so long as the national ability remains the same, neither the revenues of the state, nor the wages of the operatives will suffer one iota of diminution by the decay of any one branch of commerce or manufacture. We do not say that in such an event there would be no loss