Governments which persuade themselves that nothing good can be done but through their instrumentality, refuse to acknowledge this harmonic law. ‹Exchange develops itself› «NATURALLY» ‹until it becomes more onerous than useful, and at that point it› «NATURALLY» ‹stops›. In consequence, we find governments everywhere busying themselves in favouring or restraining trade. In order to carry it ‹beyond› its natural limits, they set to conquering colonies and opening new markets. In order to confine it ‹within› its natural bounds, they invent all sorts of restrictions and fetters. This intervention of Force in human transactions is the source of innumerable evils. The Increase of this force itself is an evil to begin with; for it is very evident that the State cannot make conquests, retain distant countries under its rule, or divert the natural course of trade by the action of tariffs, without greatly increasing the number of its agents. The Diversion of the public Force from its legitimate functions is an evil still greater than its Increase. Its rational mission was to protect Liberty and Property; and here you have it violating Liberty and Property. All just notions and principles are thus effaced from men’s minds. The moment you admit that Oppression and Spoliation are legitimate, provided they are legal—provided they interfere only by means of the Law or public Force, you find by degrees each class of citizens demanding that the interest of every other class should be sacrificed to it. This intervention of Force in the business of Exchanges, whether it succeeds in promoting or in restraining them, cannot fail to occasion both the Loss and Displacement of labour and capital, and, of consequence, a disturbance of the natural distribution of the population. On one side, natural interests disappear, on the other, artificial interests are created, and men are forced to follow the course of these interests. It is thus we see important branches of industry established where they ought not to be. France makes sugar; England spins cotton, brought from the plains of India. Centuries of war, torrents of blood, the dissipation of vast treasures, have brought about these results, and the effect has been to substitute in Europe sickly and precarious for sound and healthy enterprises, and to open the door to commercial crises, to stoppages, to instability, and finally to Pauperism. But I find I am anticipating. What we ought first to do is to [p116] acquaint ourselves with the free and natural development of human societies, and then investigate the Disturbances.