There is no term in political philosophy more ambiguous and lax in its meaning than Luxury. In Ireland, salt with a potato is, by the peasant, placed in this category. Among the Cossacks, a clean shirt is more than a luxury--it is an effeminacy; and a Scotch nobleman is reported to have declared, that the act of scratching one's self is a luxury too great for any thing under royalty. The Russians (there is no disputing on tastes) hold train-oil to be a prime luxury; and I remember seeing a group of them following an exciseman on the quays at Dover to plunder the oil casks, as they were successively opened for his operations. A poor Finland woman, who for her sins had married an Englishman and followed him to this country, was very glad to avail herself of her husband's death to leave a land where the people were so unhappy as to be without a regular supply of seal's flesh for their dinner. While the good man lived, her affection for him somewhat balanced her hankering after this native luxury; but no sooner was the husband dead, than her lawyer-like propensity re-assumed its full force, and, like Proteus released from his chains, she abandoned civilized life to get back to her favourite shores, to liberty, and the animals of her predilection. "If I were rich," said a poor farmer's boy, "I would eat fat pudding, and ride all day on a gate;" which was evidently his highest idea of human luxury. But it is less with the quality of our indulgences, than their extent, that I have now to treat. Diogenes, who prided himself on cutting his coat according to his cloth, and thought himself a greater man, in proportion as he diminished his wants, placed his luxuries in idleness and sunshine, and seems to have relished these enjoyments with as much sensuality as Plato did his fine house and delicate fare. Even he was more reasonable than those sectarians, who have prevailed in almost all religions, and who, believing that the Deity created man for the express purpose of inflicting upon him every species of torture, have inveighed against the most innocent gratifications, and have erected luxury into a deadly sin. These theologians will not allow a man to eat his breakfast with a relish; and impute it as a vice if he smacks his lips, though it be but after a draught of water. Nay, there have been some who have thought good roots and Adam's ale too great luxuries for a Christian lawfully to indulge in; and they have purposely ill-cooked their vegetables, and mixed them with ashes, and even more disgusting things, to mortify the flesh, as they called it--i.e. to offer a sacrifice of their natural feelings to the demon of which they have made a god.