And it is well known how Lords Castlereagh and Liverpool adducedproof in Parliament, that without protection it was impossible forthe Irish linen manufactures to sustain competition with those ofGermany.At present, however, we see how the English threaten tomonopolise the linen manufacture of the whole of Europe, inconsequence of their inventions, notwithstanding that they were fora hundred years the worst manufacturers of linen in all Europe,just as they have monopolised for the last fifty years the cottonmarkets of the East Indies, notwithstanding that one hundred yearspreviously they could not even compete in their own market with theIndian cotton manufacturers.At this moment it is a matter ofdispute in France how it happens that England has lately made suchimmense progress in the manufacture of linen, although Napoleon wasthe first who offered such a great reward for the invention of amachine for spinning cotton, and that the French machinists andmanufacturers had been engaged in this trade before the English.
The inquiry is made whether the English or the French possessedmore mechanical talent.All kinds of explanations are offeredexcept the true and the natural one.It is absurd to attributespecially to the English greater mechanical talent, or greaterskill and perseverance in industry, than to the Germans or to theFrench.Before the time of Edward III the English were the greatestbullies and good-for-nothing characters in Europe; certainly itnever occurred to them to compare themselves with the Italians andBelgians or with the Germans in respect to mechanical talent orindustrial skill; but since then their Government has taken theireducation in hand, and thus they have by degrees made such progressthat they can dispute the palm of industrial skill with theirinstructors.If the English in the last twenty years have made morerapid progress in machinery for linen manufacture than othernations, and especially the French, have done, this has onlyoccurred because, firstly, they had attained greater eminence inmechanical skill; secondly, that they were further advanced inmachinery for spinning and weaving cotton, which is so similar tothat for spinning and weaving linen; thirdly, that in consequenceof their previous commercial policy, they had become possessed ofmore capital than the French; fourthly, that in consequence of thatcommercial policy their home market for linen goods was far moreextensive than that of the French; and lastly that their protectiveduties, combined with the circumstances above named, afforded tothe mechanical talent of the nation greater stimulus and more meansto devote itself to perfecting this branch of industry.
The English have thus given a striking confirmation of theopinions which we in another place have propounded and explained --that all individual branches of industry have the closestreciprocal effect on one another; that the perfecting of one branchprepares and promotes the perfecting of all others; that no one ofthem can be neglected without the effects of that neglect beingfelt by all; that, in short, the whole manufacturing power of anation constitutes an inseparable whole.Of these opinions theyhave by their latest achievements in the linen industry offered astriking confirmation.
NOTES:
1.Even a part of the production of wool in England is due to theobservance of this maxim.Edward IV imported under specialprivileges 3,000 head of sheep from Spain (where the export ofsheep was prohibited), and distributed them among various parishes,with a command that for seven years none were to be slaughtered orcastrated.(Essai sur le Commerce d'Angleterre, tome i.p.379.) Assoon as the object of these measures had been attained, Englandrewarded the Spanish Government for the special privileges grantedby the latter, by prohibiting the import of Spanish wool.Theefficacy of this prohibition (however unjust it may be deemed) canas little be denied as that of the prohibitions of the import ofwool by Charles II (1672 and 1674).