JAMES WILSON — NATION BUILDER States, Mr. Justice Iredell. He had ex changed circuits with the latter to escape the importunities of avaricious creditors pressing claims, — debts, which Wilson him self said "were originally none of mine." He had lost his fortune through the fail ure of many of the same enterprises which wrecked Robert Morris, the financier of the Revolution, and sent that great patriot to a debtors' prison, imprisonment for debt not yet having been abolished in Pennsylvania. The evident fact is that Wilson had such faith in the future development of America, and so keen a desire to hasten it that he put his money, as did many of the great statesmen of the time, into wild land,1, buying more than he could carry, and all his available assets were swept away. That Wilson was prompted to make these investments mainly as the result of an earnest desire to help the development of his country, rather than from purely mer cenary motives, none can doubt who ex amine his papers, study his views, and grasp the trend of his mind. Of property he declared : "Property is not an end, but a means. How miserable, and how contemptible is that man who inverts the order of nature and makes his property, not a means, but an end." Referring to the future of America, con cerning agriculture, he asserted: "Our strength will be exerted in the cultivation of all the arts of peace. Of these the first is agriculture. . . . On agri culture, therefore, the wealth of nations is founded. Whether we consult the obser vations that reason will suggest, or attend to the information that history will give, we shall, in each case, be satisfied of the 1 An anonymous attack upon the memories of James Wilson and Patrick Henry, extensively printed some months ago, deserves no further notice than this comment. It was traced to its source, and authorities for the assertions de manded, and such as were finally furnished, after repeated demands, not only completely vindi cated Patrick Henry, but failed in any way even to implicate James Wilson.
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influence of government, good or bad, upon the state of agriculture." Again he said : "The wise and virtuous Numa was the patron of agriculture. He distributed the Romans into pagi or villages, and over each placed a superintendent to prevail with them, by every motive, to improve the practice of husbandry." Still again: "Let us attend a moment to the situa tion of this country; it is a maxim of every government, and it ought to be a maxim with us, that the increase of numbers in creases the dignity, the security, and the respectability of all governments; it is the first command given by the Deity to man, increase and multiply; this applies with peculiar force to this country, the smaller part of whose territory is yet inhabited. We are representatives, Sir, not merely of the present age, but of future times; not merely of the territory along the sea coast, but of regions immensely extended westward. We should fill, as fast as pos sible, this extensive country, with men who shall live happy, free, and secure. To accomplish this great end ought to be the leading view of all our patriots and states men." With Wilson holding such views as these, we can understand why, as early as 1785, he endeavored to interest financiers in The Netherlands in the development of the vast, unpopulated regions of the United States; and why he himself came to acquire large interests in land companies, and endeavored to promote colonization on a most extensive scale. The men of his time did not have his far-reaching vision, and it is doubtful if they altogether understood his motives. Among the Wilsonia in the His torical Society of Pennsylvania, is a holo graphic manuscript, thirty-five legal pages in length, containing "notes on cultivation of unused land in the United States" and a "Prospectus of an Association for the Pro motion of Immigration from Europe." But James Wilson was too far in advance of his time, and through the treachery of supposed friends and through circumstances
