able project of Thomas Spence can be put into practice, and thus prevent the terrible rise in rent which Professor Marshall forsees? Spence's proposal, put forward more than a hundred years ago, at once suggests how to secure the desired end. Here it is:—
"Then you may behold the rent which the people have paid into the parish treasuries employed by each parish in paying the Government its share of the sum which the Parliament or National Congress at any time grants; in maintaining and relieving its own poor and people out of work; in paying the necessary officers their salaries; in building, repairing, and adorning its houses, bridges, and other structures; in making and maintaining convenient and delightful streets, highways, and passages, both for foot and carriages; in making and maintaining canals and other conveniences for trade and navigation; in planting and taking in waste grounds; in premiums for the encouragement of agriculture or anything else thought worthy of encouragement; and, in a word, in doing whatever the people think proper, and not, as formerly, to support and spread luxury, pride, and all manner of vice. … There are no tolls or taxes of any kind paid among them by native or foreigner but the aforesaid rent, which every person pays to the parish, according to the quantity, quality, and conveniences of the land … he occupies in it. The government, poor, roads, etc., … are all maintained with the rent, on which account all wares, manufactures, allowable trade employments or actions are entirely duty-free."—From a lecture read at the Philosophical Society in Newcastle, on November 8th, 1775, for printing which the Society did the author the honour to expel him.
