Wesley Corpus

By reducing the number of horses. And may not this be effectually done, (without affecting the ploughman, the waggoner, or any of those who keep horses for common work,) (1.) By laying a tax of ten pounds on every horse exported to France, for which (notwithstanding an artful paragraph in a late public paper) there is as great a demand as ever? (2.) By laying an additional tax on gentlemen’s carriages? Not so much on every wheel, (barefaced, shameless partiality !) but five pounds yearly upon every horse. And would not these two taxes alone supply near as much as is now paid for leave to poison His Majesty’s liege subjects? 5. How can the price of beef and mutton be reduced ? By increasing the breed of sheep and horned cattle. And this would soon be increased sevenfold, if the price of horses was reduced; which it surely would be, half in half, by the method above mentioned. 6. How can the price of pork and poultry be reduced ? Whether it ever will, is another question. But it can be done, (1.) By letting no farms of above an hundred pounds a year: (2.) By repressing luxury; whether by laws, by example, or by both. I had almost said, by the grace of God; but to mention this has been long out of fashion. 7. How may the price of land be reduced? By all the methods above-named, as each tends to lessen the expense of housekeeping: But especially the last; by restraining luxury, which is the grand and general source of want. 8. How may the taxes be reduced? (1.) By discharging half the national debt, and so saving, by this single means, above two millions a year. (2.) By abolishing all useless pensions, as fast as those who now enjoy them die: Espe cially those ridiculous ones given to some hundreds of idle men, as Governors of forts or castles; which forts have answered no end for above these hundred years, unless to ThouGHTS UPON SLAVERY. 50 shelter jackdaws and crows. Might not good part of a million more be saved in this very article? But will this ever be done?