With us of modern times, when population greatly outruns the
demand for labor, whether it be under the stimulus of upright government,
and just laws, justly administered, in combination with the manufacturing
system (as in England,) or (as in Ireland) under the stimulus of idle
habits, cheap subsistence, and a low standard of comfort--we think it much
if we can keep down insurrection by the bayonet and the sabre. _Lucro
ponamus_ is our cry, if we can effect even thus much; whereas Rome, in her
simplest and pastoral days, converted this menacing danger and standing
opprobrium of modern statesmanship to her own immense benefit. Not
satisfied merely to have neutralized it, she drew from it the vital
resources of her martial aggrandizement. For, _Fifthly_, these colonies
were in two ways made the corner-stones of her martial policy: 1st, They
were looked to as nurseries of their armies; during one generation the
original colonists, already trained to military habits, were themselves
disposable for this purpose on any great emergency; these men transmitted
heroic traditions to their posterity; and, at all events, a more robust
population was always at hand in agricultural colonies than could be had
in the metropolis.
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