different states of society. Some unexpected solace
arises to alleviate the severest calamity. Wonderful is the power of
custom, in making the hardest condition tolerable; the most generally
wretched life has circumstances of mitigation, and moments of vivid
enjoyment, of which the more seemingly happy can scarcely conceive;
though the lives of individuals be shortened, the aggregate of existence
is increased; even the various forms of death accelerated by want,
familiarized to the contemplation, like death to the soldier on the
field of battle, may become scarcely more formidable than what we are
accustomed to regard as nature's ordinary outlets of existence. If we
could perfectly analyze the enjoyments and sufferings of the most happy,
and the most miserable man, we should perhaps be startled to find the
difference so much less than our previous impressions had led us to
conceive. But it is not for us to assume the province of omniscience.
The particular theory of the author quoted, seems to be founded on an
assumption of this sort--that there is a certain stage in the progress,
when there is a certain balance between the demand for labor, and the
supply of it, which is more desirable than any other--when the territory
is so thickly peopled that all can not own land and cultivate the soil
for themselves, but a portion will be compelled to sell their labor to
others; still leaving, however, the wages of labor high, and the laborer
independent. It is plain, however, that this would in like manner
partake of the good and the evil of other states of society. There would
be less of equality and less rudeness, than in the early stages; less
civilization, and less suffering, than in the latter.

It is the competition for employment, which is the source of this misery
of society, that gives rise to all excellence in art and knowledge. When
the demand for labor exceeds the supply, the services of the most
ordinarily qualified laborer will be eagerly retained. When the supply
begins to exceed, and competition is established, higher and higher
qualifications will be required, until at length when it becomes very
intense, none but the most consummately skillful can be sure to be
employed. Nothing but necessity can drive men to the exertions which are
necessary so to qualify themselves. But it is not in arts, merely
mechanical alone, that this superior excellence will be required. It
will be extended to every intellectual employmen