therefore, it is necessary to remove it. The persons, now alive, who had most pertinaciously supported the "war system," were Lord Grenville, late first lord of the treasury, Mr. Windham, late secretary of state for the war department, Mr. Grenville, late first lord of the admiralty, Lord Fitzwilliam, late president of the council, Lord Spencer, late secretary of state for the home department. Here were five cabinet ministers, all of whom had voted against the peace of Amiens; all of whom had undeviatingly contended, that no peace with Buonaparté, under circumstances, such as existed at the time when that treaty was made, could be safe; all of whom had contended, that, merely as a trial against time, the chances of war were better than the chances of peace. Now, look at the present cabinet, and you will find, sir, that there are some who were in office when the peace of Amiens was made; that almost the whole of them, not then in office, spoke in favour of that peace; and that there is not amongst them, nor, I believe, in any of the subaltern post of the ministry, one single man, who either spoke or voted against that peace. I do not say this in commendation of their conduct; for, my opinion is, that that peace was injurious as well as disgraceful to England; but, I say it for the purpose of showing, that the cause, to which you are desirous of attributing the rejection of the offer of Russian mediation has no foundation in fact, and is a pure invention of your own. I must say, too, that I look upon it as an invention proceeding from a motive, which, without the least exaggeration, may be called unprincipled;" for, that motive evidently is to endeavour to obtain vengeance on the ministers for your defeat at Liverpool, by representing them as being so pertinaciously attached to a system of war, that, while they remain in office, the country, whatever its sufferings may be, and however useless and hopeless may be the continuation of the contest, has not the smallest chance of a restoration of peace. --Having cleared up this point, I should now proceed to the Negociation of 1805; but, not having room to conclude it in the present sheet, I shall postpone it to my next, remaining, in the mean while, Your, &c. WM. COEBETT. Botley, 11th Feb. 1808. "PERISH COMMERCE." SIR,-Such is the motto you have adopted to several of your late speculations, but before I concur in the sentiment, I require more explanation, If I understand Mr. Spence, he does by no means maintain that foreign commerce is injurious, or that it shonld be either at once, or gradually given up. He says only that the loss of it would not be so hurtful as is generally imagined, which under our present circumstances is consoling, and I think he has in a great measure proved it. But if I understand you, Mr. Cobbett, you are for applying the axe to the root completely, and without ceremony. You maintain that natural wealth' cannot arise from foreign commerce. Now let us take the instance of Holland. You will not surely deny that Holland was a rich country. Though her commerce is almost annihilated she is still a rich country. Her riches were not at the former period, much more than now, adventitious or floating. They were fixed, permanent, realised. How were these riches acquired but by foreign commerce? Her territory, though fertile and cultivated to the uttermost, was small and never could afford subsistence to half of the inhabitants. Her riches could not therefore arise from agriculture or her own produce, or the internal consumption either of it or her manufactures. I conceive only one way of surmounting this example and still adhering to your doctrines as applied to this country. It may be said that the Dutch were merely Carriers. The gain of the Carriers though small is steady and certain. And are not we also Carriers, though not in the same proportion as the Dutch, regarding the extent of our commerce and theirs, because we have a great country to supply, and a luxurious people, while they were a small country and an economical frugal people. When we send bullion and our manufactured goods to the East Indies, and. bring back teas and other luxuries, or articles we might do without, are all these consumed by ourselves? Do we not send a surplus to other countries, and from thence derive a profit which is an addition to the natural wealth? Instancing the trade to the last, the most unprofitable commerce we follow, is giving you every advantage-Till I am better instructed, I shall hold my opinion that while the balance of foreign commerce is in our favour, however small that balance may be if the trade of export and import were precisely at par-it is highly advantageons for the country to preserve it, were it merely because it supports a multitude of industrious people. I don't speak of the. merchants or the capitalists, but the actualmanufacturers. I consider it a mere fallacy or sophistry, to say these, are really naid from the produce of our own soil. Were it so, the country would long ago have felt the burden of excessive population. But, fending their country, should be animated these manufacturers purchase the produce from the wages which commercial men are able from the surplus gain to afford. They are in truth maintained in a great measure by foreigners, and thus commerce and agriculture mutually tend to the support and encouragement of one another.—I. LEGISLATIVE REGULATIONS. SIR,-There are two subjects affecting the politics of this country, which, though, they have by no means escaped your notice, have not been immediately placed in a point of view as calling for legislative interference; though I confess, that to my humble apprehension, they seem to demand the early consideration of parliament. The first of these subjects relates to the liberty, which by our laws are given to subjects of this country, of becoming the proprietors of funded or landed property under the dominion of a foreign power. The second regards the propriety of a naval or military commander being directly, or indirectly, interested in the traffic of any merchandize, or other commercial speculation. No nation has ever yet depended for its support on the voluntary allegiance of its citizens. Laws have always been enacted to enforce allegiance, and to punish those who have withheld it: and though that nation must be weak indeed, whose subjects are kept in a state of obedience purely by means of force, and its existence must continue extremely precarious, yet have such compulsory laws, even in republics, been ever held essential; not as implying that the affections of the people were to be doubted,, but to correct that aberration from duty, which no state can be entirely free from, and to prevent the mischievous effects which the example of one disaffected citizen might produce, by contaminating the minds of others: such being the frailty of human nature, that even error has at all periods found its votaries. If then allegiance be so essential to the welfare and existence of a state in times of tranquillity, how much more important does it become in those unfortunate periods, when the distracted ambition of one nation, or the petulant arrogance of another, threatens her with near approaching hostility. It is then that allegiance, which before was scarcely more than a name, is called upon to assume a palpable existence. It is then that a state imperiously calls for her Nestors and her Ulysseses for the most vigorous and able counsels of her subjects. It is then that she expects that those who are delegated with the great and important trust of de with the zeal of a Nelson, and feel no satisfaction greater than that of " shaking-off this mortal coil," in so dear and honorable a cause. But, sir, that these purposes should be answered, it is essential that the INDIVIDUAL should not conflict with the PUBLIC interest. Self-love, however quaintly affected to be despised by some, is the great masterspring of the human machine, and statesmen and philosophers must invariably regard its operations, both in their speculations and practice. To effect therefore the advantages which result from true allegiance, the subject in all his interests must be connected with his country; he must have all his nearest and dearest objects insulated within her territories: by this means the subject and the state are identified in point of benefit, and to defend and protect the latter is to preserve the treasures of the former. But when the subject is unwisely permitted to become a fundholder or land proprietor in a foreign territory, his interest is immediately divided, and the Hercules, which but for this would have been of inestimable benefit to his native state, becomes a mere useless Colossus, striding the vast ocean, with one foot on either territory, but of utility to neither. But what if the interest of the subject should preponderate against his native country? We may be told that a hero would offer up all private interest at the shrine of patriotism; but let it be remembered that all men are not heroes. However we may boast of integrity and inflexible justice, we should reflect, that only one Lucius Junius Brutus has been met with in thirteen centuries; and that the conduct of this man (a chief magistrate!) in punishing his two sons for treason against the state, has been the subject of unceasing panegyric by all historians, from that period to the present: a sufficient example to prove how few are the instances in which public duty triumphs over private feeling. It is not, however, during the immediate period of a war that this distraction of interests in the subject is to be regarded; the most material consideration, is the conduct of such a man pending a negotiation, to preclude the necessity of a war. What concessions, were such an one minister, is it to be supposed that he would not make, to prevent that hostility, which would deprive him of a property upon which the splendour of his family might possibly depend! And with what advantage would that enemy treat with us, in whose power should be placed a considerable mass of the property of our subjects. Indeed view the subject as dispassionately, and with as little prejudice as you please, it is surrounded on all sides with the most glaring disadvantages: whether we are at present laboring under any inconveniences arising from any of the circumstances before noticed, I shall not anticipate; sufficiently clear it is, that the subjects of any power possessing property in a foreign state, must to such power prove extremely pernicious in its consequences; and I therefore trust that some early legislative provision, will put an end to so baneful a practice. With respect to the second of the subjects mentioned by me, regarding naval and military commanders, either directly or indirectly engaging in commercial speculations, I shall not enter into any reasoning to shew the impolicy of permitting such a species of traffic, as the observations I have already made on the former subject, are equally applicable to the present. Whether the articles of war, or any regulations affecting our army or navy, prohibit any officer naval or military from becoming a merchant I know not; but if there be any such prohibition, it certainly does not provide against the embarking a sum of money, or being interested in the profits of any mercantile adventure, or such a prohibition is indeed but little attended to, and should be better expressed. That a naval or military commander should be influenced with no interest that may induce even a momentary deviation from the strict performance of those services which his country justly expects from him, is so self evident, that I shall not occupy more of your time, Mr. Cobbett, than to express my earnest wishes, that a regulation to this effect, may also engage the carly attention of the ensuing parliament.- -W. F. S.-Lincoln's Inn, Jan. 18th, 1808. FUNDING SYSTEM. sug MR. COBBETT,-I take the liberty of gesting a few hints on the subject of our Public Debt and Sinking Fund, in consequence of the letter of C. S. which appeared in your last Register.I have neither time nor ability to enter into a minute discussion of the various opinions, which have at different times appeared in your Register on this most interesting and important subject; but as I have thought your ideas to have been sometimes erroneous, I shall content myself with a few observations, in hopes that you, who are more competent to the task, will pursue the enquiry, and either acknowledge the propriety of my opinions, or endeavour to convince me that I am wrong. Your correspondent quotes from the speech of Lord H. Petty, a passage to shew that it was the opinion of Mr. Pitt, as well as himself, that great mischief might arise from the extinguishing at once a very large portion of the national debt. He says, that by returning all their capital to the holders of stock, capital itself would cease to be of value and the nation might be nearly ruined. -In order to prove the fallacy of this reasoning, I shall first state that I consider the whole of the national debt to be an ideal property, entirely depending on the regular payment of an annual interest, raised by taxes from the people. The continual addition to the amount of the debt must lower the value of money by increasing the sum to be raised upon the people out of the produce of their industry.-Does not this depreciation lessen the real burthen of the debt, in proportion as a pound of the interest will buy less corn than it used to do? This is some consolation to me in comparing the present debt with that of former times, the real pressure there may have been nearly equal to what we experience now-Does not that part of the produce of the taxes which is received by the commissioners for the reduction of the national debt, as the interest of the stock redeemed, keep up the price of the stocks when brought into the market for the purchase of other stock, by providing a constant supply for those, who, from any cause, want to convert their fixed capital into money? In other words, does it not keep down the interest of money by making 3 per cent. worth more than it otherwise would be ?-If the operation of the Finking Fund should continue so long as to bring into the market more money as interest of the stock redeemed, than would buy the new stock wanted to be created for the exigencies of government, and. what should be brought for sale by individuals, I conceive it might so raise the price of stocks, or in other words lower the rate of interest as to make the annual revenue from every kind of property proportionably less, as was the case when consols were above 90.-In this view I conceive the Sinking Fund an assistance to the commercial world, which aways finds money scarce when interest is high. Suppose no part of the National Debt is wiped out, or suppose no tax producing part of the interest of the debt is repealed, but an addition is on the contrary annually made for the year's services, will not the real value of money, that is, its relative value to corn, continue to be depreciated, so as to raise the actual price of every property measured by the circulating medium, which I presume to continue to be Bank of England notes, whilst the proportion of revenue from such property is lessened, till it shall make corn nominally so much higher here than in other countries, and raise the exchange so much against England as to make bullion bear a higher value in that state than as coin? This would occasion two prices of every commodity, a money price and a paper price, or in other words cause the messure of property to be Bank of England notes compared with their value in the corn market, and give to those notes a price of so much silver per pound sterling, instead of saying as we now do, gold and silver are worth so many pound notes per ounce or larger weight. I conceive this has been hitherto prevented since the restriction on the bank and depreciation in the value of money, by an actual depression in the gene. ral market of the world for bullion, by the encreased quantity furnished from America, and the lessened demand for it in France, &c. since the revolution, when the church plate bas been melted down to aid the supply from America in the work of depression. When the relative proportion of the price of bullion to paper money shall be found to alter, will not this be corrected by cancelling a proportion of the debt, that is by taking off a certain quantity of taxes? For as increasing the taxes or the sum to be paid out of the produce of the estates of the country raises the nominal price of corn, and thus lowers the value of a pound note; I conceive the price of corn would be reduced, or the value of a pound note be raised by the contrary operation of lessening the taxes. I call it the nominal price of corn, presuming with Dr. Smith, that the real price as measured by labour is always nearly the same. If these ideas be correct, may not the alteration in the price of bank notes as measured by bullion, become the crite. rion to judge how soon a part of the debt should be extinguished?-As the commissioners only buy stock voluntarily offered for sale, it is impossible they can throw more capital into the hands of the public than shall be actually wanted, and as extinguishing the debt is only annihilating taxes, how can it have the effect to depreciate the value of circulating capital according to Lord H. Petty's statement. He appears to confound the present purchases of the commissioners with the ultimate extinction of the debt, which I have endeavoured to shew must be independent of each other.-The purchases by the commissioners must raise the price of stock, that is lessen the interest or revenue from capital-but the extinction of the debt will increase the value in corn, or real value of the interest or money so derived from capital.I remain, &c. LASEY. TITHES. SIR,As very great and important business, will in all probability, be agitated and discussed at the ensuing meeting of parlia ment; there is none of a domestic nature of equal weight and importance than the subject of tithes, as the abolition of which is fervently and seriously prayed for by thousands of his Majesty's faithful and loyal subjects, both clergy and laity; and although I much admire, and approve of your remarks and observations upon most subjects upon which you write, yet I am truly astonished at your objections for a commutation, in lieu of this most abominable and detestable of all taxes and imposts, this curse upon industry and agricultural improvements, which nothing can ameliorate but a total abolition. It is far from my wish that the clergy should sustain one farthing loss by any innovation or change in the tithing sys tem, my most ardent wish is to make the church truly respectable, and I am confident every landholder and occupier, will readily and cheerfully pay more by commutation than they do at present-When we consider the manifold disputes, the enmity and hatred which is established and riveted, between the tithe owner and farmer, not only for their lives, but frequently descend to generations; when we see our churches deserted, and religion fast declining; when we see in our courts of justice thousands of pounds spended in law, arising oftentimes from the most frivolous causes, must surely be a conviction how grievous and detestable the present tithing system must be to every one. To illustrate that disputes at law frequently arise from frivolous causes, I beg leave to state the case of a very industrious, honest, worthy friend of mine, residing in the western part of this country. The great bashaw Tythe-Monger, who is a layman, has been in the practice of taking his tithes in kind, and from an election pique he harboured against my friend, ordered his men whom he sent to collect his tithes, to treat him with every kind of insult and indignity; accordingly, when they first came to collect their tithes, they let their trace horses loose in a fine field of wheat, to eat and trample my friend's corn, while they loaded their carts; at another time they left open a gate which they passed through, and let a number of cattle into another field which was not cut, and did considerable damage; at another time broke open a gate, and went into another corn field, and carried away what they thought proper before the tithe was set out, and when my friend went to remonstrate, and pray they would discontinue to harrass and injure him in such manner, he received no other apology than the most heinous curses and scurrilous abuse, which was too much for John Bull to take, and he gave one of the fellows who was the most abusive and impertinent a box under the ear; and, I dare say, Mr. Cobbett, you and every reader of your Register, will say, what a pity but he had given him a good threshing. And for this great assault the great tithe-monger has actually instituted a suit against him, which is now pending in a court of law. To enumerate how very grievous and obnoxious the present tithe system is, would fill a volume of your Register. Consider, Sir, how many millions of acres of waste land would be brought into cultivation, if a commutation of tithes should fortunately take place, and how many of hands would be employed in such enltivation, which now is thrown out of employment by the rigorous decrees of Buonaparté. I am persuaded, but few landholders will begin this great national improvement, without an alteration takes place in tithes, for no sooner has the farmer brought his land into an excellent state of culture, at an immense expence, but in comes the tithe man immediately for the tenth of its produce.I beg to state the case of a gentleman who inclosed a part of Mindip Hills near Bristol. He made an excellent fence, ploughed it thrice over, and carried an immense quantity of manure; and for the first crop (which I believe was oats) the tithe man's demand was ten shillings per acre the whole value of the land per acre by the year, the gentleman discontinued any farther improvements in enclosing his waste land, from the rapacity of this man's exorbitant demand. Such vultures, such blood suckers are the generality of tithe owners. Whenever the abolition of tithes takes place (and which I hope I shall live to see) what a happy, pros perous, thriving country will Old England be. Our granaries will always be filled with corn, and in case of bad crops, or bad harvest which often occur, we shall always have a store for every emergency, without the aid of any foreign power to supply us. And however lukewarm many people may be about a revolution or change of government, arising solely from the oppression of tithes, if this odious tax could be removed, and an equivalent substituted, we may then bid defiance to Buonaparté and his subjugated vassals. Our churches will again be filled with thousands of absentees, religion will revive and prosper, and unanimity, cordiality, and brotherly love will be established between all ranks.-I am, Sir, &c.-J. F.D. Taunton, Jan. 8, 1808. TITHES. SIR;-Much has been written in your Register lately on the subject of tithes but amongst the different opinions which have been there advanced, nothing accordingto my apprehension has evinced either knowledge or ability -The learned and the unlearned, the landlord and the tenant; even the merchant, the tradesman and the mechanic, have raised their voices against tithes, as being oppressive: but it is to be doubted if a few of these rightly understand what they conside as obnoxious.-To shake the structure on which tithes are founded, needs more than common ingenuity; but to prove that the reasonings and assertions of those who try to raise a clamour against them, are fallacious and absurd, requires not splendid attainments, but simply a few facts that are growing a little antiquated and almost forgotten, through the supineness of the clergy. There is a monition (quoted by Lyndwood) from Winchelsey, Archbishop of Canterbury about the year 1300, to the clergy of his province, desiring them" to ad monish and induce their parishioners to pay fully and without diminution the "tithes of milk, &c. &c. &c. :" "but if they should fail to obey, let them (the clergy), compel them, &c. &c." This document sufficiently proves that the law of tithing existed, was recognized and acted upon in those days. Now, Sir, as Winchelsey was Archbishop some few years prior to the year 1300, I shall assume it, as being undeniably 500 years ago, and proceed to ask, whether the Howards, the Russells, the Greys, the Grenvilles of the present day have a more ancient, or can make out a more honorable and legal claim to their possessions than the parson to his tithes? I deny that they can. Then Mr. Cobbett what are those innovators and meddlers about, who wish to overturn this ancient law: Allow me to ask, that, when you are about to purchase a piece of ground, if you do not first of all consider that it is subject to a land tax and tithes? And if you do not pay accordingly? All records convince us that our ancestors did so. Do you think that any one of your corres pondents knows an instance, where a purchaser has been taken by surprise and has been really ignorant of the tithe laws.-You and I may as well say to the butcher of whom we buy a surloin of beef, that it is oppressive to make us pay 9d. a pound for the bone in it, as that a man should in these |