fixed property was trivial in quantity, and the people were un-* employed.

Concentration looks towards the development of the faculties of all thereby enabling each and all to become competitors for the purchase of the services of those around them. Centralization looks to increasing the power of the already rich, at the expense of those who are poor-thereby diminishing, instead of increasing, the competition for the laborer's services. The one tends, therefore, as naturally towards peace and freedom, as does the other towards slavery and war.

§ 10. Concentration tends towards promoting the rapidity of circulation, and thus developing the potential energies of man. Therefore is it, that it everywhere leads to development of the latent powers of the earth-the localization of capital-the creation of a scientific agriculture - the establishment of local schools and the creation, throughout a whole country, of smaller societies, in the bosom of which each and every man may find all the appliances required for enabling him to add to his means of production and enjoyment. More than any other countries of the world, Germany and Denmark are moving in this direction—the results being seen in a growth of wealth and freedom not exceeded any where.*

Centralization, on the contrary, tends towards destroying the circulation, and thus dwarfing the communities subjected to it. Trading centralization seeks the extension of these effects throughout the world. Therefore is it, that it everywhere tends towards rendering latent the powers of the earth towards the centralization of capital — the destruction of agriculture—the annihilation of local schools and colleges and the creation of large cities, in which, alone, instruction or amusement can be found. Absenteeism is its necessary consequence.

The Athenians, lords of a thousand cities, were, in effect, great absentee proprietors disposing, at their pleasure, of their sub* See ante, vol. i. chaps. xxii, and xxiv.

By far the largest number of the great men of Germany, especially in art and science, have sprung from the smaller cities, or have come from the country. The concentration of mind to one point, is what makes the great man; and this it will be difficult to find in the encyclopedial spirit of the great city."-RIEHL: Land und Leute.

This is equally true of all countries-large cities being the graves, and not the nurseries, of intellect.

jects' revenues. Temples were built, and theatres were supported, out of contributions thus obtained; but the larger the one, and the more attractive the other, the more pauperised were the people, and the weaker became the State.

In the early days of Roman history, absenteeism was a thing unknown. Cincinnatus left his little farm to take command of the forces of the State-returning to his work, when his public duties had been performed. Later, the banker becomes the ally of the warrior-the Rothschilds and Barings of their day,supplying the means by which the sovereignty of the world may be obtained. Land becoming consolidated, local attraction gradually ceases, and all who seek instruction or amusement—all who have fortunes to make or to spend—are forced to resort to Rome itself; and thus do absenteeism, pauperism, and weakness, grow together.

More than any other countries of the world, Great Britain and the United States devote themselves to the advancement of trade, at the expense of commerce. Centralization, therefore, grows with them; while concentration steadily advances in the despotic countries of Northern Europe. Annihilating the local legislatures of Scotland and of Ireland, the British Parliament now centralizes within itself those duties of legislation that should be performed by local bodies - the consequences being seen in the fact, that parliamentary agency has become one of the surest roads to fortune. The bank centralizes the money power in London; and there it is, that picture-galleries are created, and parks laid out-every step in that direction, tending to lessen the attraction of the other towns and cities of the empire, while increasing that of the great central city. Absenteeism, therefore, increases daily, with constantly growing necessity for substituting governmental commissions for that local action by which England was once so much distinguished.

So, too, is it in the United States-centralization and absenteeism growing there in the direct ratio of the dispersion of the people. Five-and-twenty years since, the public lands passed, almost without exception, directly from the government to the men who sought to cultivate it, free from charge for intermediate agency. Five years later, in the free-trade period of 1837, dispersion became the order of the day. Speculators

went ahead of settlers-accumulating large fortunes at the cost of those who were driven out from the older States. It is, however, within the last ten years, and since the final adoption of the free-trade and dispersive policy, that the management and control of the public lands has passed almost wholly into the hands of men, and companies of men, doing business in New York. *

The progress of man, whether upward or downward, is one of constant acceleration. The more the dispersion, the greater are the profits of speculators, and the greater is their power to procure, from needy members of Congress, further grants of the public domain, and further legislation tending to compel the closing of mills and furnaces-thus producing further dispersive tendencies, and larger profits. "The rate of profit does not, however," says Adam Smith, "rise with the prosperity, and fall with the declension, of society;" it being, on the contrary, "always highest in those countries which are going fastest to ruin." So is it here. The rate of profit has been, for years, higher than in any country of the world, and higher, perhaps, than it has ever been known even here- the corresponding tendency towards "ruin" being shown in a growth of centralization wholly without parallel, to have been accomplished in so brief a period. Half a century since, when it was deemed expedient to purchase Louisiana, Mr. Jefferson thought it necessary that Congress should " appeal to the nation for an additional article to the Constitution, approving and confirming an act which they must previously pass for its admission "- the Constitution, as it stood, having "made no provision for our holding foreign territory, still less for incorporating foreign nations into our Union." For Congress, alone, to do so, "would," as he thought, "make the Constitution blank paper by construction ;" and yet, in the last ten years, the whole energies of the Union have been turned in that direction-wars having been made, negotiations having been maintained, treaties having been concluded, and millions upon millions of dollars having been paid, for the sole and exclusive purpose of adding to a territory that was already large enough, under a different system, to enable ten times its popula

*The quantity of land granted to transporting companies, in the last ten years, exceeds 50,000,000 acres.

† Wealth of Nations, book 1, chap. xi.

tion to live in affluence. Trading centralization having brought with it executive and legislative usurpation, the latter is now followed by judicial usurpation, in the recent decision of the Supreme Court, denying the right of the whole people to manage and direct the public property, and annihilating rights of citizenship that, at the date of the Constitution, existed in most of the original thirteen States.

Progress towards wealth and freedom is marked by a diminution in the necessity for the services of the trader, the soldier, and the sailor. Progress towards poverty and slavery is marked by growing necessity for the services of those who stand between the men who produce and those who consume. In this latter direction, tend both Great Britain and the United States; and hence it is, that London and New York, Liverpool and Philadelphia, increase so rapidly, and that absentee proprietorship becomes so common. *

§ 11. The views here presented, on the subject of centralization, and its necessary attendant, absenteeism, differ totally from those of Mr. McCulloch-that gentleman being wholly unable to see that the people of Ireland could be "benefited in the least" by a domestic consumption of that portion of the produce of the soil, which goes to the landholder, as rent. "If," says he, "you have a certain value laid out against Irish commodities in the one case, you will have a certain value laid out against them in the other. The cattle are either exported to England, or they stay at home. If they are exported, the landlord will obtain au equivalent for them in English commodities; if they are not, he will obtain an equivalent for them in Irish commodities; so that, in both cases, the landlord lives on the cattle, or on the value of the cattle; and whether he lives in Ireland or in England, there is obviously just the very same amount of commodities for the people of Ireland to subsist upon."†

With these cattle, however, the landlord purchases services in

"Capitals are necessities; but, if the head grows too large, the body becomes apoplectic, and wastes away. What will the consequence be, if, by drawing all the talent of the kingdom to Paris, and leaving to the provincials no chance of reward, or motive for ambition, the latter are placed in a state of dependence, and converted into an inferior class of citizens?" -MIRABEAU: quoted by DE TOCQUEVILLE, L'Ancien Régime, chap. vi

† Examination before Committee on the State of Ireland, session of 1825.

Paris, Rome, or London-thus quickening the circulation in the city in which he resides, and thereby economising human force, which, of itself, is capital. By withdrawing the cattle from Ireland, he, in a corresponding degree, renders the Irish circulation more sluggish - thereby producing a waste of capital. Why, however, does absenteeism stand so conspicuous among the grievances of Ireland? Because political centralization has transferred to London the demand for mental force. Because trading centralization has transferred the demand for mental and physical force, to Lancashire and Yorkshire. Because the two have combined for the annihilation of that demand for the potential energies of man, without which, his faculties must remain undeveloped. Because they have combined, too, to augment the wasting tax of transportation-producing a necessity for exhausting the powers of the soil, and thus diminishing the produce, while lessening the price to be realised for the things produced.

The more perfect the diversification of employments, the greater is the tendency towards augmentation in the proportion of fixed capital-towards competition for the purchase of physical and mental services-and towards strength in the people and the State. The less that diversification, the greater is the tendency towards augmentation in the proportion of movable capitalthe greater is the competition for the sale of human powersand the greater is the weakness of both State and people. Concentration being attractive, brings with it combination, prompt demand for human powers, and rapidly augmenting force. Centralization, being repulsive, is found in company with consolidation of the land, dispersion of the people, sluggish demand for services, and declining force. Localization of the capitalist, and growing competition for the purchase of the laborer's services, attend the one; while consolidation of the land, absenteeism, and increasing competition for the sale of human service, attend the other.*

* Absenteeism was universal throughout France, except as regarded those provinces in which the people had retained the right to tax themselves. One of them, as the reader has seen, was Languedoc-that one in which the energies of the people were most directed towards relieving the farmer from the tax of transportation, and in which, consequently, fixed property had the largest value. How great was the strength thence resulting, may be inferred from the fact, that "the central government often applied to it for endorsements, and borrowed in the name of the province at lower rates than would have been charged to the crown."-DE TOCQUEVILLE, L'Ancien Régime, chap. xii.