a great deal wasted and abused. But if the expence of this
entertainment had been employed in setting to work masons,
carpenters, upholsterers, mechanics, &c. a quantity of pro-
visions, of equal value, would have been distributed among a
still greater number of people, who would have bought them
in penny-worths and pound weights, and not have lost or
thrown away a single ounce of them. In the one way, be-
sides, this expence maintains productive, in the other unpro-
ductive hands. In the one way, therefore, it increases, in
the other, it does not increase, the exchangeable value of
the annual produce of the land and labour of the country.

I would not, however, by all this be understood to mean,
that the one species of expence always betokens a more
liberal or generous spirit than the other. When a man of
fortune spends his revenue chiefly in hospitality, he shares
the greater part of it with his friends and companions; but
when he employs it in purchasing such durable commodities,
he often spends the whole upon his own person, and gives
nothing to any body without an equivalent. The latter
species of expence, therefore, especially when directed
towards frivolous objects, the little ornaments of dress and
furniture, jewels, trinkets, gewgaws, frequently indicates,
not only a trifling, but a base and selfish disposition. All
that I mean is, that the one sort of expence, as it always
occasions some accumulation of valuable commodities, as it
is more favourable to private frugality, and, consequently,
to the increase of the public capital, and as it maintains pro-
ductive, rather than unproductive hands, conduces more than
the other to the growth of public opulence.

-290-