These things among us are sure enough to be censured, but not know the nature of a commonwealth; that they are free, and yet to curb the genius in a lawful recreation to which they are naturally is to tell a tale of a tub. I have heard the Protestant ministers in France, by men that were wise and of their own profession, much blamed in that they forbade dancing, a recreation to which the genius of that air is so inclining that they lost many who would not lose that: nor do they less than blame the former determination of rashness, who now gently connive at that which they had so roughly forbidden. These sports in Oceana are so governed, that they are pleasing for private diversion, and profitable to the public: for the theatres soon defrayed their own charge, and now bring in a good revenue. All this is so far from the detriment of virtue, that it is to the improvement of it, seeing women that heretofore made havoc of their honor that they might have their pleasures are now incapable of their pleasures if they lose their honor.
About the one-and-fortieth year of the commonwealth, the censors, according to their annual custom, reported the pillar of Nilus, by which it was found that the people were increased very near one-third. Whereupon the Council of War was appointed by the Senate to bring in a state of war, and the treasurers the state of the Treasury. The state of war, or the pay and charge of an army, was soon after exhibited by the Council in this account:
THE FIELD PAY OF A PARLIAMENTARY ARMY
The lord strategus, marching ?0,000Polemarches--
General of the horse... 2,000Lieutenant-general... 2,000General of the artillery.... 1,000Commissary-general... 1,000Major-general.... 1,000Quartermaster-general... 1,000Two adjutants to the major-general... 1,000Forty colonels..... 40,000100 captains of horse, at ?00 a man... 50,000300 captains of foot, at ?00 a man... 90,000100 cornets, at ?00 a man.... 10,000300 ensigns, at ?0 a man.... 15,000800 Quartermasters, Sergeants, Trumpeters, Drummers, 20,00010,000 horse, at 2s 6d per day each... 470,00030,000 foot, at 1s per day each.... 500,000Chirurgeons... 40040,000 auxiliaries, amounting to within a little as much... 1,100,000The charge of mounting 20,000 horse.. 300,000The train of artillery, holding a 3d to the whole 900,000Sum total ?,514,400
Arms and ammunition are not reckoned, as those which are furnished out of the store or arsenal of Emporium: nor wastage, as that which goes upon the account of the fleet, maintained by the customs; which customs, through the care of the Council for Trade and growth of traffic, were long since improved to about ?,000,000 revenue. The house being thus informed of a state of war, the commissioners brought in --THE STATE OF THE TREASURY THIS PRESENT YEAR, BEING THEONE-AND-FORTIETH OF THE COMMONWEALTH
Received from the one-and-twentieth of the commonwealth:
By ?00,000 a year in bank, with the product of the sum rising..............
?6,000,000
Expended from the one-and-twentieth of this commonwealth:
Imprimis, for the addition of arms for 100,000 men to the arsenal, or tower of Emporium.........
?,000,000
For the storing of the same with artillery...
300,000
For the storing of the same with ammunition...
200,000
For beautifying the cities, parks, gardens, public walks, and places for recreation of Emporium and Hiera, with public buildings, aqueducts, statues, and fountains, etc......
1,500,000
Extraordinary embassies...
150,000
Sum........
?,150,000
Remaining in the Treasury, the salaries of the Exchequer being defalked.......
?2,000,000
By comparison of which accounts if a war with an army of 80,000 men were to be made by the penny, yet was the commonwealth able to maintain such a one above three years without levying a tax. But it is against all experience, sense, and reason that such an army should not be soon broken, or make a great progress;in either of which cases, the charge ceases; or rather if a right course be taken in the latter, profit comes in: for the Romans had no other considerable way but victory whereby to fill their treasury, which nevertheless was seldom empty. Alexander did not consult his purse upon his design for Persia: it is observed by Machiavel, that Livy, arguing what the event in reason must have been had that King invaded Rome, and diligently measuring what on each side was necessary to such a war, never speaks a word of money. No man imagines that the Gauls, Goths, Vandals, Huns, Lombards, Saxons, Normans, made their inroads or conquests by the strength of the purse; and if it be thought enough, according to the dialect of our age, to say in answer to these things that those times are past and gone: what money did the late Gustavus, the most victorious of modern princes, bring out of Sweden with him into Germany? An army that goes upon a golden leg will be as lame as if it were a wooden one; but proper forces have nerves and muscles in them, such for which, having ?,000,000 or ?,000,000, a sum easy enough, with a revenue like this of Oceana, to be had at any time in readiness, you need never, or very rarely, charge the people with taxes. What influence the commonwealth by such arms has had upon the world, I leave to historians, whose custom it has been of old to be as diligent observers of foreign actions as careless of those domestic revolutions which (less pleasant it may be, as not partaking so much of the romance) are to statesmen of far greater profit; and this fault, if it be not mine, is so much more frequent with modern writers, as has caused me to undertake this work; on which to give my own judgment, it is performed as much above the time Ihave been about it, as below the dignity of the matter.
But I cannot depart out of this country till I have taken leave of my Lord Archon, a prince of immense felicity who having built as high with his counsels as he digged deep with his sword, had now seen fifty years measured with his own unerring orbs.
