书城外语The Querist
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第3章

62 Whether a country inhabited by people well fed, clothed and lodged would not become every day more populous? And whether a numerous stock of people in such circumstances would? and how far the product of not constitute a flourishing nation; our own country may suffice for the compassing of this end?

63 Whether a people who had provided themselves with the necessaries of life in good plenty would not soon extend their industry to new arts and new branches of commerce?

64 Whether those same manufactures which England imports from other countries may not be admitted from Ireland? And, if so, whether lace, carpets, and tapestry, three considerable articles of English importation, might not find encouragement in Ireland?

And whether an academy for design might not greatly conduce to the perfecting those manufactures among us?

65 Whether France and Flanders could have drawn so much money from England for figured silks, lace, and tapestry, if they had not had academies for designing?

66 Whether, when a room was once prepared, and models in plaster of Paris, the annual expense of such an academy need stand the pubic in above two hundred pounds a year?

67 Whether our linen-manufacture would not find the benefit of this institution? And whether there be anything that makes us fall short of the Dutch in damasks, diapers, and printed linen, but our ignorance in design?

68 Whether those who may slight this affair as notional have sufficiently considered the extensive use of the art of design, and its influence in most trades and manufactures, wherein the forms of things are often more regarded than the materials?

69 Whether there be any art sooner learned than that of ****** carpets? And whether our women, with little time and pains, may not make more beautiful carpets than those imported from Turkey?

And whether this branch of the woollen manufacture be not open to us?

70 Whether human industry can produce, from such cheap materials, a manufacture of so great value by any other art as by those of sculpture and painting?

71 Whether pictures and statues are not in fact so much treasure?

And whether Rome and Florence would not be poor towns without them?

72 Whether they do not bring ready money as well as jewels?

Whether in Italy debts are not paid, and children portioned with them, as with gold and silver?

73 Whether it would not be more prudent, to strike out and exert ourselves in permitted branches of trade, than to fold our hands, and repine that we are not allowed the woollen?

74 Whether it be true that two millions are yearly expended by England in foreign lace and linen?

75 Whether immense sums are not drawn yearly into the Northern countries, for supplying the British navy with hempen manufactures?

76 Whether there be anything more profitable than. hemp? And whether there should not be great premiums for encouraging our hempen trade? What advantages may not Great Britain make of a country where land and labour are so cheap?

77 Whether Ireland alone might not raise hemp sufficient for the British navy? And whether it would not be vain to expect this from the British Colonies in America, where hands are so scarce, and labour so excessively dear?

78 Whether, if our own people want will or capacity for such an attempt, it might not be worth while for some undertaking spirits in England to make settlements, and raise hemp in the counties of Clare and Limerick, than which, perhaps, there is not fitter land in the world for that purpose? And whether both nations would not find their advantage therein?

79 Whether if all the idle hands in this kingdom were employed on hemp and flax, we might not find sufficient vent for these manufactures?

80 How far it may be in our own power to better our affairs, without interfering with our neighbours?

81 Whether the prohibition of our woollen trade ought not naturally to put us on other methods which give no jealousy?

82 Whether paper be not a valuable article of commerce? And whether it be not true that one single bookseller in London yearly expended above four thousand pounds in that foreign commodity?

83 How it comes to pass that the Venetians and Genoese, who wear so much less linen, and so much worse than we do, should yet make very good paper, and in great quantity, while we make very little?

84 How long it will be before my countrymen find out that it is worth while to spend a penny in order to get a groat?

85 If all the land were tilled that is fit for tillage, and all that sowed with hemp and flax that is fit for raising them, whether we should have much sheep-walk beyond what was sufficient to supply the necessities of the kingdom?

86 Whether other countries have not flourished without the woollen trade?

87 Whether it be not a sure sign or effect of a country's inhabitants? And, thriving, to see it well cultivated and full of; if so, whether a great quantity of sheep-walk be not ruinous to a country, rendering it waste and thinly inhabited?

88 Whether the employing so much of our land under sheep be not in fact an Irish blunder?

89 Whether our hankering after our woollen trade be not the true and only reason which hath created a jealousy in England towards Ireland? And whether anything can hurt us more than such jealousy?

90 Whether it be not the true interest of both nations to become one people? And whether either be sufficiently apprised of this?

91 Whether the upper part of this people are not truly English, by blood, language, religion, manners, inclination, and interest?

92 Whether we are not as much Englishmen as the children of old Romans, born in Britain, were still Romans?

93 Whether it be not our true interest not to interfere with them; and, in every other case, whether it be not their true interest to befriend us?

94 Whether a mint in Ireland might not be of great convenience to the kingdom; and whether it could be attended with any possible inconvenience to Great Britain? And whether there were not mints in Naples and Sicily, when those kingdoms were provinces to Spain or the house of Austria?