raised than can be received by the ordinary taxes, it ought ever to be done with equality to avoid the hate of the people, who are never pleased except their contributions be granted by general consent: for which purpose the invention of Parliaments is an excellent policie of Government.'
In chapter xix. he deplores the neglect of the English fishing trade and the encroachments thereon by the Dutch, denounces his countrymen's habits of 'besotting themselves with pipe and pot' (p. 179), refers with approval (p. 186) to Captain Robert Hitchcock, author of 'A Political Plat for the Honour of the Prince' (1580), and to Tobias Gentleman [q. v.], author of 'England's Way to win Wealth,' (1614); and (p. 188) alludes to Grotius's 'Mare Liberum,' in questioning the right of the Dutch 'to fish in His Majesties Seas.'
Mun amassed great wealth as a merchant, and, besides inheriting lands at Mereworth, &c., in Kent, acquired the estate of Otteridge, at Bearsted, in the same county (Hasted, ii. 488). In May 1640, when a forced loan of 200,000l. was demanded by Charles I of the city of London, to assist him in his war in Scotland, he was reported, in the aldermen's returns to the privy council, as able to lend money to the king (cf. Return, ed. W. J. Harvey, 1886), but the citizens finally refused the loan. Mun died in 1641 at the age of seventy, and was buried in the chancel of his parish church, St. Helen's, Bishopsgate, on 21 July. His widow, Ursula, was buried there 11 Sept. 1655. His will was proved in P. C. C., Evelyn, 92. A stone monument mentioned in the register of St. Helen's has disappeared.
His son John, in his dedication of his father's 'Forralgn Trade' (1664) to Thomas, earl of Southampton, lord high treasurer, described Mun as 'in his time famous among Merchants, and well known to most men of business, for his general Experience in Affairs, and notable Insight into Trade; neither was he less observed for his Integrity to his Prince, and Zeal to the Common-wealth.' 'England's Treasure by Forraign Trade' reached its 2nd edit. in 1669; the era in 1698; the 4th in 1700, printed in one volume with Lewis Roberts's 'Merchant's Map of Commerce;' the 5th in 1713, at the time of the treaty of Utrecht; the 6th in 1755. The title of this hook ('England's Treasure by Forraign Trade') became, in Adam Smith's words, 'a fundamental maxim in the political economy not of England only, but of all other commercial countries.' It gave Mun his claim to the title of founder of the mercantile system of political economy (Hallam; cf. article 'Primitive Political Economy of England' in Edinburgh Review for April 1847). Mun's writings are quoted in Roger Coke's 'Discourse of Trade,' 1670, p. 37, where he is called 'a man of excellent knowledge and experience in Trade;' and in the same author's 'Treatise wherein is demonstrated that the Church and State of England are in equal danger with the Trade of it,' 1671, pp. 72, 75; they are also cited in two anonymous treatises on trade, viz. England's Great Happiness, or a Dialogue beween Content and Complaint' (1677), and 'Britannia Languens' (1680), both of which were reprinted in the collection published by the Political Economy Club in 1856; as well as in Nicholas Barbon's 'Discourse of Trade,' 1690, Preface.
Mun had, besides his son John, two daughters: Anne (1613-1687), who married in 1639 Sir Robert Austen, bart., of Hall Place, Bexley, and high sheriff of Kent, on whose monument in Bexley Church the political economist is mentioned as 'Thomas Muns, Esq., Merchant' (Halsted, i. 161, and Thorpe, Reg. Roffense, p. 925) (their eldest son, Sir John Austen, was a commissioner of customs in 1697-9); and Mary (1618-1685), who married Edward Napper, merchant, of Allhallows, Lombard Street, London, of the ancient family of the Nappers or Napiers of Puncknoll, Dorset (Hutchins, Dorset, i. 560-4).
The son, John Mun (1615-1670), appears to have been admitted a member of the Mercers' Company in 1632; inherited Otteridge, in Bearsted, and in 1659 purchased Aldington Court, in the adjoining parish of Thurnham (Halsted, ii. 497); and was buried at Bearsted 30 Nov. 1670 (will, P. C. C., Duke, 146). He had by hls wife Elizabeth (d. 1695) daughter of Walter Harlackenden of Woodchurch and Hollingborne, Kent (Top. and Gen., i. 231-2, iii. 215-23), eight children. The eldest, Thomas Mun (d. 1692), inherited Snailham in Icklesham, Sussex (Horsfield, i. 473), was M.P. for Hastings in the last parliament of Charles II, held at Oxford in 1681, and again in the Convention parliament, 1689 (ib., ii. App. pp. 60, 63; Oldfield, Representative History, v. 375, 880). As one of the barons of the Cinque ports he also represented Hastings at the coronations of James II, 1685, and of William and Mary, 1689 (Sussex Arch. Coll. xv. 193, 209). In May 1689 he, with the Hon. Sir Vere Fane, K.B. (afterwards fourth earl of Westmorland, of Mereworth Castle, Kent), and John Farthing, esq., petitioned the king for an improvement in the management of the excise (Redington, Calendars of Treasury Papers, 1556-7-1696, iii. 41, iv. 47, v. 69). Thomas Mun, M.P., was buried at Bearsted
