and then the Publick ought only to be taxed to make good the Deficiency.  If this Rule was strictly observed, we should see every where such a Multitude of new Labourers, as would in all probability reduce the Prices of all our Manufactures.  It is the very Life of Merchandise to buy cheap and sell dear.  The Merchant ought to make his Outset as cheap as possible, that he may find the greater Profit upon his Returns; and nothing will enable him to do this like the Reduction of the Price of Labour upon all our Manufactures.  This too would be the ready Way to increase the Number of our Foreign Markets:  The Abatement of the Price of the Manufacture would pay for the Carriage of it to more distant Countries; and this Consequence would be equally beneficial both to the Landed and Trading Interests.  As so great an Addition of labouring Hands would produce this happy Consequence both to the Merchant and the Gentle man; our Liberality to common Beggars, and every other Obstruction to the Increase of Labourers, must be equally pernicious to both.

Sir Andrew then went on to affirm, That the Reduction of the Prices of our Manufactures by the Addition of so many new Hands, would be no Inconvenience to any Man:  But observing I was something startled at the Assertion, he made a short Pause, and then resumed the Discourse.

It may seem, says he, a Paradox, that the Price of Labour should be reduced without an Abatement of Wages, or that Wages can be abated without any Inconvenience to the Labourer, and yet nothing is more certain than that both those Things may happen.  The Wages of the Labourers make the greatest Part of the Price of every Thing that is useful; and if in Proportion with the Wages the Prices of all other Things should be abated, every Labourer with less Wages would be still able to purchase as many Necessaries of Life; where then would be the Inconvenience?  But the Price of Labour may be reduced by the Addition of more Hands to a Manufacture, and yet the Wages of Persons remain as high as ever.  The admirable Sir William Petty [2] has given Examples of this in some of his Writings:  One of them, as I remember, is that of a Watch, which I shall endeavour to explain so as shall suit my present Purpose.  It is certain that a single Watch could not be made so cheap in Proportion by one only Man, as a hundred Watches by a hundred; for as there is vast Variety in the Work, no one Person could equally suit himself to all the Parts of it; the Manufacture would be tedious, and at last but clumsily performed:  But if an hundred Watches were to be made by a hundred Men, the Cases may be assigned to one, the Dials to another, the Wheels to another, the Springs to another, and every other Part to a proper Artist; as there would be no need of perplexing any one Person with too much Variety, every one would be able to perform his single Part with greater Skill and Expedition; and the hundred Watches would be finished in one