Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 4.djvu/155

Rh country. Sometimes a nation is invaded, and subdued; and the conquerors seize the lands and make the natives their under tenants or servants. Colonies have been always planted where the natives were driven out or destroyed, or the land uncultivated and waste. In those countries, where the lord of the soil is master of the labour and liberty of his tenants, or of slaves bought by his money, men's riches are reckoned by the number of their vassals. And sometimes, in governments newly instituted, where there are not people to till the ground, many laws have been made to encourage and allure numbers from the neighbouring countries. And in all these cases, the new comers have either lands allotted them, or are slaves to the proprietors. But to invite helpless families, by thousands, into a kingdom inhabited like ours, without lands to give them, and where the laws will not allow that they should be part of the property as servants, is a wrong application of the maxim; and the same thing, in great, as infants dropped at the doors, which are only a burden and charge to the parish. The true way of multiplying mankind to publick advantage, in such a country as England, is, to invite from abroad only able handicraftsmen and artificers, or such who bring over a sufficient share of property to secure them from want; to enact and enforce sumptuary laws against luxury, and all excesses in clothing, furniture, and the like; to encourage matrimony, and reward, as the Romans did, those who have a certain number of children. Whether bringing over the Palatines were a mere consequence of this law for a general naturalization; or whether, as Rh