the more productive a mode of cultivation is, UN more advances does it need to have committed to the ground. Tithes, which are but the seventh or eighth part of the revenue in a pasturage, become the fifth in a field of corn, the third in a vineyard, the half in a hop yard or in a field of hemp, and the whole in a garden. Thus whilst the national interest incessantly requires the raw produce to be incessantly increased by committing larger advances to the ground—tithes instruct the cultivator in cessantly to diminish his advances, and follow that species of culture which gives back least to the nation, but which also least exposes him who undertakes it to be punished for his industry.
The land tax has not the same inconveniences ; it af fects only the net revenue; it is enabled to reach it witls equality enough, and above all, with a regularity which screens the contributor from every' arbitrary proceeding, and which, therefore, is to him more precious than justice itself. On being established, it strips the proprietor of a considerable portion of his fortune, for he loses all at once a part of the very capital whose rent alone must pay the tax ; but this loss, after having struck him, is never repeat ed. From that time he no longer looks upon this capital as belonging to him ; a new purchaser, on buying the land, does not pay him any price for this portion; the state has become thenceforth its true proprietor. On the othe• hand, this territorial impost often requires money from such as have none ; it forces them to sell their cotnmodi ties to obtain the quantity wanted, perhaps at the most un favourable moment ; and it thus contributes to cause a glut in the market at the moment of harvest, and a scarcity at the year's end. Besides, if too heavy, it discourages the proprietor from laying out new advances upon land which he looks upon as scarcely any longer his.
If the capitalist could as easily be come at as the pro prietor of land, it would be quite as just to tax hint directly for the support of a government which guards his proper ty. The interest of money would he a taxable material, fully as suitable as the rent of land. But the capitalist's wealth cannot be known without a vexatious inquest, which, in trading countries, would be destructive to credit. Ca pitals, moreover, are not attached to the soil, and if loaded with imposts, the capitalist would be induced to transmit them into other countries, often without emigrating him self. He would thus deprive his country of all the labour which those capitals would support ; he would diminish the national revenues in a proportion immensely superior to the advantages which the treasury could expect from the new tax.
Other species of revenue escape still • more easily from direct contribution. A considerable revenue in the state, for example, is the profit of trade and that of manufac ture; but, on being directly taxed, it is almost sure to be annihilated. Another very considerable revenue is that of workmen, who gain but a mere wage; the great num be• of those who enjoy it, makes up for the slenderness of the portion belonging to each. Such also are the revenues of all those classes whose labours leave no products which are substantial and capable of accumulation. Most men who live by those different means, do not even know the extent of their revenue; because, receiving it day by day, and expending it in the sante manner, they think they have nothing when their labour is all that remains. They form the poorest class of society, but also the most numerous; and, if we acid up the annual consumption of all the clay labourers, it is greatly superior in value to that of all the rich.
But before we think of taxing this revenue, we must re member, that nothing can be more absurd, as well as cruel, than to take away a part of the necessary emolument of productive workmen; for, either it must actually be id by them, in which case they would suffer, languish, and at last die of penury. and with them would also be destroyed the national revenue, which should spring from their la bour; or else they would succeed in obtaining reimburse ment for their contribution. either on the class which em ploys them, or on that of consumers. For this purpose, they would raise either all their wages, or the price of all their produce. Thus they would raise manufactures. or, at least, shut foreign markets; and, by a circuit a little long er, they would equally arrest production, and destroy the national revenue. No operation, however, could be more difficult than to separate, in a poor man's revenue, the ne cessary front the superfluous, which alone can he taxed. By ides, such a tax would be to fix contribution on labour and industry; or, in some degree, to inflict a penalty on those qualities which it is the most essential to encourage; it would be to arrest, at their source, the wealth and pros perity of states. Such are the motives which have gene rally prevented a universal tax on income ; or, at least, have prevented it from reaching the industrious classes completely enough to become productive.