whole fourscore millions of acres will yield to the king twelve hundred millions of livres a year, or four hundred millions of crowns.
The Man of Forty Crowns.—That appears to me impracticable and impossible.
The Geometrician.—And very much you are in the right to think so; and this impossibility is a geometrical demonstration that there is a fundamental defect in the calculation of our new ministers.
The Man of Forty Crowns.—Is not there also demonstrably a prodigious injustice in taking from me the half of my corn, of my hemp, of the wool of my sheep, etc., and at the same time to require no aid from those who shall have gained ten, twenty, or thirty thousand livres a year, by my hemp, of which they will have made linen; by my wool, of which they will have made cloth; by my corn, which they will have sold at so much more than it cost them?
The Geometrician.—The injustice of this administration is as evident as its calculation is erroneous. It is right to favor industry, but opulent industry ought to contribute to support the state. This industry will have certainly taken from you a part of your one hundred and twenty livres, and appropriated that part to itself, in selling you your shirts and your coat twenty times dearer than they would have cost you if you had made them yourself. The manufacturer who shall have en-
