But it
must be owned, that as the materials of commerce may continue to be
accumulated without any determinate limit, so the arts which are applied to
improve them, may admit of perpetual refinements. No measure of fortune, or
degree of skill, is found to diminish the supposed necessities of human
life; refinement and plenty foster new desires, while they furnish the
means, or practise the methods, to gratify them.
In the result of commercial arts, inequalities of fortune are greatly
increased, and the majority, of every people are obliged by necessity, or
at least strongly incited by ambition and avarice; to employ every talent
they possess. After a history of some thousand years employed in
manufacture and commerce, the inhabitants of China are still the most
laborious and industrious of any people on earth.
Some part of this observation may be extended to the elegant and literary
arts. They too have their materials which cannot be exhausted, and proceed
from desires which cannot be satiated. But the respect paid to literary
merit is fluctuating, and matter of transient fashion.
Pages:
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398
399
400
401
402
403
404