Читать книгу The Fable of the Bees - Bernard Mandeville - Страница 14

Line 163. And virtue, who from politics

Has learn’d a thousand cunning tricks,

Was, by their happy influence,

Made friends with vice.——

It may be said, that virtue is made friends with vice, when industrious good people, who maintain their families, and bring up their children handsomely, pay taxes, and are several ways useful members of the society, get a livelihood by something that chiefly depends on, or is very much influenced by the vices of others, without being themselves guilty of, or accessary to them, any otherwise than by way of trade, as a druggist may be to poisoning, or a sword-cutler to blood-shed.

Thus the merchant, that sends corn or cloth into foreign parts to purchase wines and brandies, encourages the growth or manufactory of his own country; he is a benefactor to navigation, increases the customs, and is many ways beneficial to the public; yet it is not to be denied, but that his greatest dependence is lavishness and drunkenness: For, if none were to drink wine but such only as stand in need of it, nor any body more than his health required, that multitude of wine-merchants, vintners, coopers, &c. that make such a considerable show in this flourishing city, would be in a miserable condition. The same may be said not only of card and dice-makers, that are the immediate ministers to a legion of vices; but that of mercers, upholsterers, tailors, and many others, that would be starved in half a year’s time, if pride and luxury were at once to be banished the nation.