As PROPOSALS FOR

manufactures, and commerce, on a firm basis,—rooting them in the soil,—and in- terweaving them with each other;

thereby uniting in one interest the inha- bitants of a country.

This is the broad and firm basis of POLITICAL ECONOMY;—the only perma- nent foundation of civilized nature,—and that on which the Chinese nation have rested many thousand years, in, perhaps, as high a state of civilization and pros- perity, as permanently belongs to human nature. A nation, who proceed under the guidance of this principle, are treading the firm ground of their own country; and continue to increase in population, until its full extent of produce be attained.

On the contrary, whenever a nation, negligent of their own territory, have given way to the lust of conquest, and the colonization of distant countries, and, under the pretexts of commerce, have become freebooters, and dealers in every thing that debases the human charac-