§ 23 

Behold! Here is the key to diligence and benefit. If the door is opened to gain by freedom of trade and sale, then everybody will be fully occupied within a few years; but if that is not done, the Nation will certainly remain yawning, as before, and sleepy in broad daylight, in spite of all other measures.

"Freedom," my Reader will think, "there certainly should be, but not without order. One must distinguish strictly between the trade of the Towns and of the Country and not allow Farmers to busy themselves with anything else, so that farming may not be neglected." Very well said, especially to the taste of the day! But there is one reservation I should like to make most respectfully, namely, that whoever undertakes this Despotic Protectorship over the farmer, and thus binds him to the soil exclusively, should, when farming can no longer support him and his children, like a real paterfamilias see to it that the farmer does not perish of starvation. If that cannot be done, I think it wiser to turn the beast of burden out to grass to seek its food itself rather than to tether it to a post and leave it there for some weeks without taking care of it; for it is too late to learn a handicraft when there is no food left.

To prevent trade in the countryside is to check the growth of the population and of all cultivation, and to prohibit handicrafts and trade is to reduce the business of old towns and the foundation of new ones.

An experienced Tanner settled in the country several miles from the town and served the Peasantry and Gentry by supplying them with well curried leather. He was forbidden by the nearest town to carry on this trade there and was ordered to move into the town. The order was good, but the man, who had thriven in the country, became a miserable creature in town, and more than one thousand hides were now spoilt every year owing to bad treatment. There you see how the National gain is increased.