confined entirely to one people, as might naturally at first be dreaded from the advantages of an established commerce. Where one nation has got the start of another in trade it is very difficult for the latter to regain the ground it has lost, because of the superior industry and skill of the former, and the greater stocks of which its merchants are possessed, and which enable them to trade for so much smaller profits. But these advantages are compensated, in some measure, by the low price of labour in every nation which has not an extensive commerce, and does not very much abound in gold and silver. Manufactures, therefore, gradually shift their places, leaving those countries and provinces which they have already enriched, and flying to others, whither they are allured by the cheapness of provisions and labour, till they have enriched these also and are again banished by the same causes. And, in general, we may observe that the dearness of everything, from plenty of money, is a disadvantage which attends an established commerce, and sets bounds to it in every country by enabling the poorer states to under-sell the richer in all foreign markets. {p29}
This has made me entertain a great doubt concerning the benefit of banks and paper-credit, which are so generally esteemed advantageous to every nation. That provisions and labour should become dear by the increase of trade and money is, in many respects, an inconvenience; but an inconvenience that is unavoidable, and the effect of that public wealth and prosperity which are the end of all our wishes. It is compensated by the advantages which we reap from the possession of these precious metals, and the weight which they give the nation in all foreign wars and negotiations. But there appears no reason for increasing that inconvenience by a counterfeit money, which foreigners will not accept in any payment, and which any great disorder in the state will reduce to nothing. There are, it is true, many people in every rich state who, having large sums of money, would prefer paper with good security, as being of more easy transport and more safe custody. If the public provide not a bank, private bankers will take advantage of this circumstance; as the