Page:Life of Sir William Petty 1623 – 1687.djvu/305

 evil thing to unite Ireland with England, it seems a good thing to colonize even England itself into many small kingdomkins as heretofore, and now in America and Africa, though nominally under one monarch. That this Union must be first transacted in the Parliament of England before it can be stirred elsewhere, and to be reckoned amongst the fundamentals of settlement and common peace. That a Union would ipso facto put an end to several dangerous and new questions depending between the rights of England and Ireland, to the disquiet of many of both nations, and which none dare determine. That poor and decaying persons of England always went for Ireland, and that the rich of Ireland always spent their estates in England. That the price of land hath fallen in England, even since the prohibition of Irish cattle, but will more probably rise upon the Union. That this Union is a probable means to get the real sovereignty of the seas, and to undermine the Hollanders trade at sea, and both without war and bloodshed. That if either nation did or should lose by the Union, yet even the loser, in justice, equity, honour and conscience, ought to promote and accept it from the other. That the late usurper and his party did hope to strengthen themselves by it.'

He also recognised the growth of a set of Imperial questions, created by the rise of the colonies and dependencies, for which the established constitution hardly as yet seemed to provide any adequate answer; and in order to solve them he proposed 'a grand National Council consisting of six hundred persons (being the greatest number that can hear one another speak), propounded not to be a Parliament nor to make laws, but to give his Majesty advice and information only, concerning husbandry, buildings, manufacture, money, navigation, foreign commerce, American colonies, and the natural recolte and consumption of the people. This Council,' he said, 'might consist of two hundred persons to be chosen by his Majesty as the very best landed men in England, and who receive the greatest yearly rent out of their lands, over