s the
proportion. It would likewise appear, that that new species of poverty

---
{76} The Poor's Rate, and regulations respecting that augmenting
class of persons, are treated in a chapter by itself.

{77} For this see the chapter on the Poor, in which the subject is
investigated at considerable length. At present, it is only mentioned by
way of illustrating the effect of wealth on the manners of the people;
and to prove, that it is not confined to the capital alone, but is general
all over the country of England.
-=-

[end of page #88]

is occasioned by the general wealth, since it increases in proportion to
it.

If we find, then, that the increase of wealth renders the descendants of
a particular family helpless, and unable to maintain their place in
society; if we find, also, that it gives those portions of a country,
which are the least advanced, an advantage over those which are the
most advanced; and, if we find that the number of indigent increase
most where the wealth is greatest, we surely must allow, that there is a
strong tendency to decay that accompanies the acquisition of wealth.
The same revolutions that arise amongst the rich and poor inhabitants
of a country, who change places gradually, and without noise, must
naturally take place between the inhabitants of rich and poor
countries, upon a larger scale and in a more permanent manner. {78}
Such changes are generally attended with, or, at least, productive of,
violent commotions. Nations are not subservient to laws like
individuals, but make forcible use of the means of which they are
possessed, to obtain the ends which they have in view.

As this tendency is uniformly felt by a number of individuals over the
whole of a country, when it advances in wealth, and over whole
districts that are more advanced than the others, it must operate, in
length of time, in producing the decline of a whole nation, as well as it
does of a certain portion of its people at all times.

Changes, in the interior of a nation, take place by piece-meal or by
degrees; the whole mass sees nothing of it, and, indeed, it is not felt.
{79} But it is vain to think, that the same cause that gives the poorer
inhabitants of a nation an advantage over the richer, will not likewise

---
{78} As we find that wealth seldom goes amongst people of business
past the second, and almost never past the third generation, families
that rise so high as to be partners in profit, and not in