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the commonwealth of oceana-第26部分

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et worse; forasmuch as the puppies are once drowned; whereas the children are left perpetually drowning。 Really; my lords; it is a flinty custom! and all this for his cruel ambition; that would raise himself a pillar a golden pillar for his monument; though he has children; his own reviving flesh; and a kind of immortality。 And this is that interest of a family; for which we are to think ill of a government that will not endure it。 But quiet ourselves; the land through which the river Nilus wanders in one stream; is barren; but where it parts into seven; it multiplies its fertile shores by distributing; yet keeping and improving; such a propriety and nutrition; as is a prudent agrarian to a well…ordered commonwealth。     〃Nor (to come to the fifth assertion) is a political body rendered any fitter for industry by having one gouty and another withered leg; than a natural。 It tends not to the improvement of merchandise that there be some who have no need of their trading; and others that are not able to follow it。 If confinement discourages industry; an estate in money is not confined; and lest industry should want whereupon to work; land is not engrossed or entailed upon any man; but remains at its devotion。 I wonder whence the computation can arise; that this should discourage industry。 Two thousand pounds a year a man may enjoy in Oceana; as much in Panopea; ?00 in Marpesia; there be other plantations; and the commonwealth will have more。 Who knows how far the arms of our agrarian may extend themselves? and whether he that might have left a pillar; may not leave a temple of many pillars to his more pious memory? Where there is some measure in riches; a man may be rich; but if you will have them to be infinite; there will be no end of starving himself; and wanting what he has: and what pains does such a one take to be poor Furthermore; if a man shall think that there may be an industry less greasy or more noble; and so cast his thoughts upon the commonwealth; he will have leisure for her and she riches and honors for him; his sweat shall smell like Alexander's。 My Lord Philautus is a young man who; enjoying his ?0;000 a year; may keep a noble house in the old way; and have homely guests; and having but two; by the means proposed; may take the upper hand of his great ancestors; with reverence to whom; I may say; there has not been one of them would have disputed his place with a Roman consul。     〃My lord; do not break my heart; the nobility shall go to no other ploughs than those which we call our consuls。 But; says he; it having been so with Lacedaemon; that neither the city nor the citizens were capable of increase; a blow was given by that agrarian; which ruined both。 And what are we concerned with that agrarian; or that blow while our citizens and our city (and that by our agrarian) are both capable of increase? The Spartan; if he made a conquest; had no citizens to hold it; the Oceaner will have enow。 The Spartan could have no trade; the Oceaner may have all。 The agrarian in Laconia; that it might bind on knapsacks; forbidding all other arts but that of war; could not make an army of above 30;000 citizens。 The agrarian in Oceana; without interruption of traffic; provides us in the fifth part of the youth an annual source or fresh spring of 100;000; besides our provincial auxiliaries; out of which to draw marching armies; and as many elders; not feeble; but men most of them in the flower of their age; and in arms for the defence of our territories。 The agrarian in Laconia banished money; this multiplies it; that allowed a matter of twenty or thirty acres to a man; this 2;000 or 3;000; there is no comparison between them。 And yet I differ so much from my lord; or his opinion that the agrarian was the ruin of Lacedaemon; that I hold it no less than demonstrable to have been her main support。 For if; banishing all other diversions; it could not make an army of above 30;000; then; letting in all other diversions; it must have broken that army。 Wherefore Lysander; bringing in the golden spoils of Athens; irrevocably ruined that commonwealth; and is a warning to us; that in giving encouragement to industry; we also remember that covetousness is the root of all evil。 And our agrarian can never be the cause of those seditions threatened by my lord; but is the proper cure of them; as Lucan notes well in the state of Rome before the civil wars; which happened through the want of such an antidote。     〃Why then are we mistaken; as if we intended not equal advantages in our commonwealth to either sex; because we would not have women's fortunes consist in that metal which exposes them to cutpurses? If a man cuts my purse I may have him by the heels or by the neck for it; whereas a man may cut a woman's purse; and have her for his pains in fetters。 How brutish; and much more than brutish; is that commonwealth which prefers the earth before the fruits of the womb? If the people be her treasure; the staff by which she is sustained and comforted; with what justice can she suffer them; by whom she is most enriched; to be for that cause the most impoverished? And yet we see the gifts of God; and the bounties of heaven in fruitful families; through this wretched custom of marrying for money; become their insupportable grief and poverty。 Nor falls this so heavy upon the lower sort; being better able to shift for themselves; as upon the nobility or gentry。 For what avails it in this case; from whence their veins have derived their blood; while they shall see the tallow of a chandler sooner converted into that beauty which is required in a bride? I appeal; whether my Lord Philautus or myself be the advocate of nobility; against which; in the case proposed by me; there would be nothing to hold the balance。 And why is a woman; if she may have but ?;500; undone? If she be unmarried; what nobleman allows his daughter in that case a greater revenue than so much money may command? And if she marry; no nobleman can give his daughter a greater portion than she has。 Who is hurt in this case?  nay; who is not benefited? If the agrarian gives us the sweat of our brows without diminution; if it prepares our table; if it makes our cup to overflow; and above all this; in providing for our children; anoints our heads with that oil which takes away the greatest of worldly cares; what man; that is not besotted with a covetousness as vain as endless; can imagine such a constitution to be his poverty? Seeing where no woman can be considerable for her portion; no portion will be considerable with a woman; and so his children will not only find better preferments without his brokage; but more freedom of their own affections。 〃We are wonderful severe in laws; that they shall not marry without our consent; as if it were care and tenderness over them; but is it not lest we should not have the other ?;000 with this son; or the other ?00 a year more in jointure for that daughter? These; when we are crossed in them; are the sins for which we water our couch with tears; but not of penitence。 Seeing whereas it is a mischief beyond any that we can do to our enemies; we persist to make nothing of breaking the affection of our children。 But there is in this agrarian a homage to pure and spotless love; the consequence whereof I will not give for all your romances。 An alderman makes not his daughter a countess till he has given her ?0;000; nor a romance a considerable mistress till she be a princess; these are characters of bastard love。 But if our agrarian excludes ambition and covetousness; we shall at length have the care of our own breed; in which we have been curious as to our dogs and horses。 The marriage…bed will be truly legitimate; and the race of the commonwealth not spurious。 〃But (impar magnanimis ausis; imparque dolori) I am hurled from all my hopes by my lord's last assertion of impossibility; that the root from whence we imagine these fruits should be planted or thrive in this soil。 And why? Because of the mixture of estates and variety of tenures。 Nevertheless; there is yet extant in the Exchequer an old survey of the whole nation; wherefore such a thing is not impossible。 Now if a new survey were taken at the present rates; and the law made that no man should hold hereafter above so much land as is valued therein at ?;000 a year; it would amount to a good and sufficient agrarian。 It is true that there would remain some difficulty in the different kind of rents; and that it is a matter requiring not only more leisure than we have; but an authority which may be better able to bow men to a more general consent than is to be wrought out of them by such as are in our capacity。 Wherefore as to the manner; it is necessary that we refer it to the Parliament; but as to the matter; they cannot otherwise fix their government upon the right balance。     〃I shall conclude with a few words to some parts of the order; which my lord has omitted。 As first to the consequences of the agrarian to be settled in Marpesia; which irreparably breaks the aristocracy of that nation; being of such a nature; as standing; it is not possible that you should govern。 For while the people of that country are little better than the cattle of the nobility; you must not wonder if; according as these can make t
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