hat time from
what cause.
I did not meet with this treatment in 1770, twenty nine years after, at
Bosworth, where I accompanied a gentleman, with no other intent, than to
view the field celebrated for the fall of Richard the third. The
inhabitants enjoyed the cruel satisfaction of setting their dogs at us
in the street, merely because we were strangers. Human figures, not
their own, are seldom seen in those inhospitable regions: Surrounded
with impassable roads, no intercourse with man to humanise the mind, no
commerce to smooth their rugged manners, they continue the boors
of nature.
Thus it appears, that characters are influenced by profession. That the
great advantage of private fortune, and the greater to society, of
softening and forming the mind, are the result of trade. But these are
not the only benefits that flow from this desirable spring. It opens the
hand of charity to the assistance of distress; witness the Hospital and
the two Charity Schools, supported by annual donation: It adds to the
national security, by supplying the taxes for internal use, and, for
the prosecution of war. It adds to that security, by furnishing the
inhabitants with riches, which they are ever anxious to preserve, even
at the risk of their lives; for the preservation of private wealth,
tends to the preservation of the state.
It augments the value of landed property, by multiplying the number of
purchasers: It produces money to improve that land into a higher state
of cultivation, which ultimately redounds to the general benefit, by
affording plenty.
It unites bodies of men in social compact, for their mutual interest: It
adds to the credit and pleasure of individuals, by enabling them to
purchase entertainment and improvement, both of the corporeal and
intellectual kind.
It finds employment for the hand that would otherwise be found in
mischief: And it elevates the character of a nation in the scale of
government.
Birmingham, by her commercial consequence, has, of late, justly assumed
the liberty of nominating one of the representatives for the county;
and, to her honor, the elective body never regretted her choice.
In that memorable contest of 1774, we were almost to a man of one mind:
if an _odd dozen_ among us, of a different _mould_, did not assimulate
with the rest, they were treated, as men of free judgment should ever be
treated, _with civility_, and the line of harmony was not broken.
If this little treatis
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