Part 2 on Superphysics

Commerce

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

General vs Specific Principles

People may be divided into two:

Shallow thinkers who fall short of the truth
Abstruse thinkers, who go beyond it. This is the most rare and by far the most useful and valuable.

Abstruse thinkers suggest hints. Sometimes, they start difficulties if they lack the skill to pursue an idea. At worst, abstruse thinkers say uncommon things, which are hard to understand but at least are new. An author has less value if he tells us things that we can learn from coffee-house conversations.

What is Luxury?

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Luxury is an ambiguous word used both in a good and a bad sense. In general, it means great refinement in the gratification of the senses.

Any degree of it may be innocent or blameable, according to the age, country, or condition of the person. Its virtue and vice cannot here be exactly fixed, more than in other moral subjects.

Money

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Money is not a subject of commerce. It is only the instrument which men have agreed upon to facilitate the exchange of one commodity for another.

Money is not the wheel of trade. It is the oil which renders the motion of the wheels more smooth and easy.

Interest

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The lowness of interest is the most certain sign of a nation’s prosperity. Lowness of interest is generally ascribed to plenty of money.

Interest Rates are Not Caused by Money Supply

But this is not true since the only effect of the plenty of money is to raise the price of labour. Silver is more common than gold. You receive more of it for the same commodities. But do you pay less interest for it?

The Balance Of Trade

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Export Bans

Nations who are ignorant of the nature of commerce usually prohibit the exports of valuable and useful commodities.

They do not consider that:

this prohibition acts directly contrary to their intention.
the more they export, the more will be raised at home, of which they themselves wil l always have the first offer

The ancient laws of Athens criminalized the exportation of figs. They deemed it too delicious for the palate of any foreigner. This ridiculous prohibition led to the word sycophants to mean spies from two GREEK words figs and discoverer.

The Jealousy of Trade

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

It is very common for commercial states to:

The Balance Of Power

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Is the idea of the balance of power created by modern policy? Or is it a new invention?

Xenophon’s Institution of Cyrus writes about the combination of the Asiatic powers from a jealousy of the encreasing force of the Medes and Persians. This proves that the balance of power was a prevailing notion in the ancient times.

Taxes

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

There is a prevailing maxim that:

every new tax creates a new ability in the subject to bear it
each encrease of public burdens proportionally encreases the people’s industry

This maxim is most likely to be abused. It is so much more dangerous, because it cannot be denied. It has some foundation in reason and experience when kept within certain bounds.

Public Credit

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

In ancient times, the common practice was to hoard up treasures during peacetime for paying conquest or defence during wartime. They did not resort to taxation or borrowing in times of disorder and confusion.

Some Remarkable Customs

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Three remarkable customs in three celebrated governments prove:

that all general maxims in politics should be established with great caution
that irregular and extraordinary appearances are frequently discovered in the moral and physical world

1. We think that all the members of a supreme council should have freedom of speech. After a motion has been voted and approved by that assembly, its proposer must forever be exempted from future trial or enquiry.

But these axioms have all failed in the Athenian government.

The Populousness Of Ancient Nations

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The world is not eternal nor incorruptible.

The following prove the mortality of this world, its passage, by corruption or dissolution, from one state or order to another:

the continual and rapid motion of matter,
the violent revolutions with which every part is agitated,
the changes remarked in the heavens,
the plain traces as well as tradition of an universal deluge, or
general convulsion of the elements

Society must therefore have its infancy, youth, manhood, and old age, similar to that each individual form which it contains. Man has these variations equally with every animal and plant.

Convents and Orphanages as Population Control

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Convents and Orphanages as Population Control

Modern convents are bad institutions. These are popish institutions which should be condemned as:

nurseries of superstition,
burdensome to the public, and
oppressive to their poor prisoners

Do they reduce a state’s population size?

War Prevented Ancient Populousness

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

There are commonly compensations in every human condition. These are not always perfectly equal, yet they restrain the prevailing principle.

The ancient republics were almost in perpetual war. It was a natural effect of:

Leniency and Inequality Leading to Disorder and Decline of Commerce

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The Leniency of the Romans

The refined Greeks were violent, so it means that the barbarous commonwealths of Africa, Spain, and Gaul were so much more.

Faulty Ancient Records

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Upon comparing the whole, it is impossible why the world should have been more populous in ancient than in modern times.

The equality of property among the ancients, liberty, and the small divisions of their states, were favourable to their population growth. But:

The Populousness Of Ancient Nations

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

What is the population size of particular cities in antiquity, omitting Nineveh, Babylon, and the Egyptian Thebes?

The more I look into this, the more I doubt the great populousness of the ancient times.

Ancient Food Policy

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Food Policy

We allow Vossius to read the famous passage of the elder Pliny his own way, without admitting the extravagant consequences which he draws from it.

The number of citizens who received grain by the public distribution in the time of Augustus was 200,000.

Global Warming

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Global warming

L’Abbe du Bos observes that modern Italy is warmer than ancient Italy:

“In 480 AD, the winter was so severe that it destroyed the trees. The Tyber froze in Rome and the ground was covered with snow for 40 days. When Juvenal describes a superstitious woman, he represents her as breaking the ice of the Tyber to perform her ablutions. It speaks of that river’s freezing as a common event. Many passages of Horace suppose the streets of Rome full of snow and ice. But their writers give us information that the winters are now much more temperate at Rome than before. At present, the Tiber no more freezes at Rome than the Nile at Cairo. The Romans esteem the winters very rigorously – if the snow lies two days, and if one sees icicles hang from a fountain that has a north exposure for 48 hours.”

The Population of Ancient Rome and Italy

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Ancient Housing

Halicarnassæus says that:

The ancient walls of Rome were nearly of the same compass with those of Athens, but that the suburbs ran out to a great extent. It was difficult to tell, where the town ended or the country began.

The Original Contract

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

No party in the present age can support itself without philosophical principles annexed to its political or practical one.

Thus all factions in England have thought of speculative principles to protect and cover their scheme of actions.

Passive Obedience

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

What are the practical consequences, deduced by each party, with regard to obedience to sovereigns?

The Coalition Of Parties

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

In a free government, the abolition of all distinctions of party may not be practicable, perhaps not desirable.

The only dangerous parties are those that aim to change the:

essentials of government,
succession of the crown, or
considerable privileges of several members of the constitution

They prefer violence over compromise.

The Protestant Succession

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

When the Protestant Succession was still uncertain during the reign of Queen Anne, A member of parliament asked which party he would choose.

He would easily perceive the great advantage resulting from the restoration of the Stuart family; by which we should preserve the succession clear and undisputed, free from a pretender, with such a specious title as that of blood, which, with the multitude, is always the claim, the strongest and most easily comprehended.

The Ideal System of Government

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Great Britain and Ireland, or any territory of equal extent would be divided into 100 counties. Each county has 100 districts, leading to 10,000 districts.

The Importance of the Bicameral system

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The lower sort of people and small proprietors can properly judge their peers who are close in rank or residence.

They will probably choose the best representative in their parochial meetings.

Labor Theory of Value

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Superphysics Note!

These are mirrored by Book 1 Chapter 5 and Book 3 of The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith

Everything in the world is purchased by labour. The only cause of our labour are our passions. When a nation abounds in manufactures and mechanic arts, the proprietors of land and the farmers study agriculture as a science. They redouble their industry and attention.