Читать книгу Notes and Queries, Number 185, May 14, 1853 - Various - Страница 2

Of this pamphlet, originally published in 1701, 8vo., under the title of Considerations upon the East India Trade, and afterwards in 1720, 8vo., with a new title-page, The Advantages of the East India Trade to England considered, containing 128 pages, inclusive of Preface, the author never yet been ascertained.

Mr. M^cCulloch accords to it, and very deservedly, the highest praise. He styles it (Literature of Political Economy, p. 100.) "a profound, able, and most ingenious tract;" and observes that he has "set the powerful influence of the division of labour in the most striking point of view, and has illustrated it with a skill and felicity which even Smith has not surpassed, but by which he most probably profited." Addison's admirable paper in The Spectator (No. 69.) on the advantages of commerce, is only an expansion of some of the paragraphs in this pamphlet. In some parts I think he has scarcely equalled the force of his original. Take, for instance, the following sentences, which admit of fair comparison:

"We taste the spices of Arabia, yet never feel the scorching sun which brings them forth; we shine in silks which our hands have never wrought; we drink of vineyards which we never planted; the treasures of those mines are ours which we have never digged; we only plough the deep, and reap the harvest of every country in the world."—Advantages of East India Trade, p. 59.

"Whilst we enjoy the remotest products of the north and south, we are free from those extremities of weather which give them birth; our eyes are refreshed with the green fields of Britain, at the same time that our palates are feasted with fruits that rise between the tropics."—Spectator, No. 69.

Mr. M^cCulloch makes no conjecture as to the probable author of this very able tract; but it appears to me that it may on good grounds be ascribed to Henry Martyn, who afterwards—not certainly in accordance with the enlightened principles he lays down in this pamphlet—took an active part in opposing the treaty of commerce with France, and was rewarded by the appointment of Inspector-General of the exports and imports of the customs. (See an account of him in Ward's Lives of Gresham Professors, p. 332.) He was a contributor to The Spectator, and Nos. 180. 200. and 232. have been attributed to him; and the matter of Sir Andrew Freeport's speculations appears to have been furnished by him as Addison and Steele's oracle on trade and commerce. It will be seen that in No. 232. he makes exactly the same use of Sir William Petty's example of the watch as is done in the tract (p.69.), and the coincidence seems to point out one common author of both compositions. But, without placing too much stress on this similarity, I find, that Collins's Catalogue, which was compiled with great care, and where it mentions the authors of anonymous works may always be relied upon, attributes this tract to Martyn (Collins's Cat. 1730-1, 8vo., Part I., No. 3130.). I have a copy of the edition of 1701, in the original binding and lettering—lettered "Martyn on the East India Trade "—and copies of the edition of 1720 in two separate collections of tracts; one of which belonged to A. Chamier, and the other to George Chalmers; in both of which the name of Martyn is written as its author on the title-page, and in the latter in Chalmers's handwriting. I think therefore we may conclude that this tract, which well deserves being more generally known than it is at present, was written by Henry Martyn.

Jas. Crossley.