Page:The Present State of Peru.djvu/106

 PART IV.

COMMERCE.

HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL DISSERTATION ON THE COMMERCE OF PERU.

TO have a just idea of a country, it is necessary to know, analytically, what are the resources which may constitute its felicity. The intellectual faculties, the police, the fashions, the warlike energies even, and the mode of thinking, are elevated or depressed in proportion to the degrees of the industry and opulence of nations. According to the universal system of social and political relations, modern nations cannot flourish without a well-regulated system of commerce. To the perfect comprehension of this branch of knowledge, and to its skilful combination, Holland has been indebted for her riches and support, if we may judge from the disadvantageous site of her steril, and, in a manner, submerged territory. By the same principle she was, in former times, crowned with martial laurels, and enabled, whether in peace or in war, to dictate laws to Europe. Unless for that commerce which is studiously cultivated by all the ranks of her inhabitants. Great Britain would be the slave of the ocean, the empire of which she so proudly maintains. Peru having given a decided, and, indeed, almost exclusive preference to the working of her mines, has not deemed the limits of the commerce in which she is engaged, to be worthy of her profound meditations. Custom, imitation,