The most respectable of the nobility or gentry will conceal a
contraband article, or one on which there is a heavy duty, on their
return from abroad: and what is more, if detected, they are more
ashamed, on account of their want of address, than on account of the
crime; for such it is, whatever custom may have taught us to think.

A man who is rigorously treated, by what is commonly called a lawful
creditor, whom he would never attempt to defraud must naturally feel
doubly incensed, when still more rigorously treated by one whom he
would think it very little harm, and no disgrace, to defraud. It is then
very clear, that, the common habits of thinking on the subject of debts
due to the king, is such as does not favour taxation, or incline people
to submit willingly to rigorous modes of recovery.

All taxes raise the prices of the articles taxed, but those are most felt
and most obnoxious which fall on personal property, or on persons
themselves.

All taxes, then, when they pass a certain point, have a tendency to
send away persons, and property, and trade, from a country, which, if
they do, its decline is inevitable. The extent, however, of that effect
must depend on a great variety of circumstances, such as the
comparative situation of other nations, their distance, the difficulty of
removing, &c.

If America were as near to England as France is, the industrious class
would emigrate in multitudes; and, if in France, property and persons
were as safe and free as in England, part of both would go there; but,
as matters are, to the former it is impossible to remove, and, to the
latter, the risk surpasses the advantage.

An increase of taxation tends to raise the wages of labour, and, where
it does so in due proportion, the labourer pays almost nothing; he still
for all that seems to pay, and he has the same disagreeable feeling
[end of page #105] as if he did pay. No feeling is more disagreeable
than that of being obliged, after earning money that can ill be spared,
to pay it away to a surly tax-gatherer, who treats a man and his family
with insolence, while he receives the money that should purchase
them bread. Besides this, though the prices of many articles keep pace
with the wages of labour, yet many others do not. Thus, in a country
where wages are rapidly altering, though some are bettered by it,
penury is entailed on others, who have not the means of raising their
prices.

If heavy taxes are levied on a f