nions, and should have such franchises, as might suffice them. This may be considered, as one of the first statutes, which gave commercial efficacy to the mercantile system. Before this time, says De Wit, * when the tumults of the manufacturers in Flanders, obliged them to seek shelter in other countries, the English were little more than shepherds and wool-sellers. From that epoch, manufactures became often the objects of legislation; and the spirit of industry will be found, to have promoted greatly the state of population; and to have augmented considerably the opulence of every rank. The statutes of labourers of 1349 and 1350 demonstrate, that a considerable change had taken place, in the condition, and pursuits, of the most numerous classes. During several reigns, after the Conquest, men laboured, because they were slaves: For some years, before these regulations, of the price of work, men were engaged to labour, from a sense of their own freedom, and of their own wants. It was the statutes of labourers, † which, adding the compulsion of law to the calls of necessity, created oppression for ages, while they ought to have given relief. It is extremely difficult, *Interest of Holland. See the 12th Richard II. ch. 3, 4, 5, 6, 9. By these, no artificer, labourer, servant, or victualler, shall depart from one Hundred to another, without license under the king's seal. These laws, says Anderson, are sufficient proofs of the slavish condition of the common servants, in those times (1388). to ascertain the time, when villainage ceased in England, or even to trace its decline. The Edwards, during the pressure of their foreign conquests, certainly manumitted many of their villains, for money. Owing to the previous fewness of inhabitants, the numerous armies, which, for almost a century, desolated the nation, amidst our civil wars, must have been necessarily composed of the lower ranks and we may reasonably suppose, that the men, who had been brought, from the drudgeries of slavery, to contend as soldiers, for the honour of nobles, and the rights of kings, would not readily relinquish the honourable sword, for the meaner ploughshare. The church, even in the darkest ages, laudably remonstrated against the unchristian practice of holding fellow men in bondage. The courts of justice did not willingly enforce the master's claim, to the servitude of his villains, till, in the progress of knowledge, interest discovered, that the purchased labour of freemen was more productive, than the listless, and ignoble toil of slaves. Owing to those causes, there were certainly few villains in England, at the accession of Henry VII.; and the great body of the people, having thus gained greater freedom, and with it * * The statute of 23 Henry VI. chap. 12. mentions only servants, artificers, workmen, and labourers; and there is a distinction made between husbandry servants, and domestic servants. Yet, villains are spoken of, even in our courts of justice, though seldom, as late as the time of James I. greater comfort, henceforth acquired the numerous blessings, which every where result from an orderly administration of established govern ment. During almost a century, before the accession of Henry VII. in 1485, the manufacturers of wool, with their attendant artificers, had fixed the seats of their industry, in every county, in England. The principle of the act of navigation had been introduced into our legislation, as early as 1381, by the law declaring, "That none of the king's subjects shall carry forth, or bring in, merchan"dizes, but only in ships of the king's allegiance." The fisheries too had been encouraged. † Agriculture had been moreover promoted, by the law, which declared, "That all the king's subjects έσ * may carry corn out of the realm, when they " will." And guilds, fraternities, and other companies, having, soon after their creation, imposed monopolizing restraints, were corrected by a law of Henry VI.; though our legislators were not very steady, during an unenlightened age, in the application of so wise a policy. In reading the laws of Edward IV. we think ourselves in modern times, when the spirit of the mercantile system was in its full vigour, before it had been so perspicuously explained, and so ably * 5 Richard II. ch. 3.-6 Richard, ch. 8. 17 Richard II. ch. 7. 15 Henry VI. ch. 6. exploded.* It is, however, in the laws of Rit chard III. that we see more clearly the commercial state of England, during the long period, wherein the English people were unhappily too much engaged in king-making. In those inauspicious times, was the trade of England chiefly carried on, by Italians, at least by merchants, from the shores of the Mediterranean. The manufacturers were composed mostly of Flemings, who, under the encouragement of Edward III. had fled, from the distractions of the Netherlands, for repose, and employment, in England. And, the preamble of one of Richard's laws, I will furnish a convincing proof, that their numbers had given great discontent to the English people: "Moreover, a great number "of artificers, and other strangers, not born under "the king's obeisance, do daily resort to London, "and to other cities, boroughs, and towns, and "much more than they were wont to do, in times past, and inhabit, by themselves, in this realm, "with their wives, children, and household; and "will not take upon them any laborious occupa"tion, as going to plough, and cart, and other like “business, but use the making of cloth, and other "handicrafts, and easy occupations; and bring By Dr Smith's Essay on the Wealth of Nations. † 1. Richard III. ch. 6, 8, 9, 11, 12, 13. 1. Richard III. ch. 9. But, Henry VII. upon the supplication of the Italian merchants, repealed the greater part of this law, which imposed restraints on aliens; yet, retained the forfeitures incurred, in the true spirit of his avaricious government. "from the parts beyond the sea, great substance of "wares, and merchandizes, to fairs, and markets, "and other places, at their pleasure, to the impo"verishment of the king's subjects; and will only "take into their service, people born, in their own "countries; whereby the king's subjects, for lack "of occupation, fall into idleness and vicious living, "to the great perturbance of the realm. "-All this was directed, otherwise, by Henry VII, though probably without much success," upon the petition "made of the Commons of England. This sketch furnishes a very curious state of the commercial matters of England, during those times, before the spirit of industry, and commerce, had yet energized the spirited natives, who were then more addicted to warlike affairs. In the present times, it is, perhaps, the wisest policy, neither to encourage foreigners to come, nor to drive them away. When manufacturers have been thoroughly settled, nothing more is wanting, to promote the wealth, and populousness of a country, from their labour, than the protection of their property, and freedom, by the impartial administration of justice; while their frauds are repressed, and their combinations prevented, by doing equal right to every order, in the state. The policy of Henry VII. has been praised, by historians, fully equal to its worth. Anderson relates, that this prince, "finding the woollen ma * *Chron. Acc. of Com. v. i. p. 306. |