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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A32839	A treatise wherein is demonstrated, I. That the East-India trade is the most national of all foreign trades, II. That the clamors, aspersions, and objections made against the present East-India company, are sinister, selfish, or groundless, III. That since the discovery of the East-Indies, the dominion of the sea depends much upon the wane or increase of that trade, and consequently the security of the liberty, property, and protestant religion of this kingdom, IV. That the trade of the East-Indies cannot be carried on to national advantage, in any other way than by a general joynt stock, V. That the East-India trade is more profitable and necessary to the kingdom of England, than to any other kingdom or nation in Europe by Philopatris.	Child, Josiah, Sir, 1630-1699.	1681 (1681)	Wing C3866; ESTC R19413	24,211	48

A TREATISE Wherein is Demonstrated I. That the East-India Trade is the most National of all Foreign Trades II. That the Clamors Aspersions and Objections made against the present East-India Company are Sinister Selfish or Groundless III. That since the discovery of the East-Indies the Dominion of the Sea depends much upon the Wane or Increase of that Trade and consequently the Security of the Liberty Property and Protestant Religion of this Kingdom IV. That the Trade of the East-Indies cannot be carried on to National advantage in any other way than by a General Joynt-Stock V. That the East-India Trade is more profitable and necessary to the Kingdom of England than to any other Kingdom or Nation in Europe By 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 LONDON Printed by T. I. for Robert Boulton at the Turks Head in Cor●●● 1681. A TREATISE Concerning the East-India Trade BEfore I enter upon the particular proof of the Propositions in the Frontispiece I shall desire the Readers leave to mention some few general Opinions of my own concerning Trade which I have long since entertained and the older I grow in Experience the more I am confirmed in them 1. That Trading Merchants while they are in the busie and eager prosecution of their particular Trades although they be very wise and good Men are not always the best Judges of Trade as it relates to the Profit or Power of a Kingdom The reason may be because their Eyes are so continually fixt and their Minds intent upon what makes for their pecuiiar Gain or Loss that they have not leasure to expatiate or turn their thoughts to what is most Advantageous to the Kingdom in general This I am told was the Opinion anciently of M. T. Cicero and also Boden that learned French Author and lately of the Lord Chief Justice St. John who was a principal Engineer in the first Act of Navigation But whether it was their Opinion or not I am sure it 's true by manifold Experience of which I could give pregnant Instances in the Age we live in and former Councils of Trade since his Majesties happy Restauration but that I design brevity and to avoid all Personal reflections The like may be said of all Shopkeepers Artificers Clothiers and other Manufacturers until they leave off their Trades and being Rich by the purchase of Lands become of the same common Interest with most of their Countrey-men 2. And upon the same reason I am of Opinion and have found by Experience that a mixt Assembly of Noblemen Gentlemen and Merchants are the best Constitution that can be established for the making Rules Orders and By-Laws for the carrying on any Trade for the publick Utility of the Kingdom 3. That all Domestick or Foreign Trade to any Place or Countrey that doth not in the Result and Consequences of it increase the value of our English Lands the good plight whereof is the main Basis of our Wealth Freedom and Safety ought not only to be discouraged but totally rejected 4. That all Monopolies of what Nature or Kind soever are Destructive to Trade and consequently Obstructive to the increase of the value of our Lands and that therefore if there be any thing in the East-India Company 's Charter or any Charter of Incorporated Merchants that hinders any of his Majesties Subjects of England Scotland or Ireland from coming into that Trade upon as good Terms as others of his Majesties Subjects did or yet may it would tend to the general good of the Kingdom that such Barrs or Hinderances were removed 5. I am clearly of opinion be it said without offence that if all Strangers inhabiting in any of his Majesties Kingdoms so they be not suffered to be of Government had as free liberty to enter into any of our Incorporated Foreign Trades as any of his Majesties Native Subjects as is practiced in the United Netherlands it would greatly encrease the Trade of England and improve the value of Land 6. That those narrow Clauses in the Turkey Companies and other Charters which limit the Traders to be Freemen of London and not to be Shop-keepers or other than such as they call Legitimate Merchants as also the practice of admitting no Man to be free of the Turkey Company under 25 l. if he be under 25 years of Age or 50 l. if above are to the prejudice of the Nation in general tho they may be for the advantage of the particular Traders for which I suppose they were calculated 7. I am of Opinion the Dutch Nationally speaking are the wisest People now extant for the contriving and carrying on their Trades for the publick advantage of their Countrey If any shall here object that if it be so I am mistaken in my former Notion That Merchants are not always the best Judges of Trade for the Dutch have most Merchants in their Councils The Honourable Sir William Temple hath already answered for me that their Councils are made up of very few or no trading Merchants but of Civilians or Sons of Merchants that have long since lest off their active Trades and have only now Stocks in their East and West India Companies or in their Banks and Cantores or other publick Fonds 8. That tho the Dominion of the Sea may be obtained by Arms and fortunate Battels at Sea it can never be retained preserved and maintained but by the Excess and Predominancy of Forreign Trade 9. That Domestick and Foreign Trade do as we vulgarly say of Twins but more truly of Trade wax and wain together and if it were not an impropriety of Speech Land might be coupled with them 10. I am of Opinion that Silver and Gold coined or uncoined tho they are used for a Measure of all other things are no less a Commodity than Wine Oyl Tobacco Cloth or Stuffs and may in many Cases be exported as much to National Advantage as any other Commodity 11. That no Nation ever was or will be considerable in Trade that prohibits the Exportation of Bullion 12. That though it may be best to be left free and indifferent it is more for the publick advantage to export Gold or Silver coined than uncoined By the former we gain the Manufacture and something of Honour and Magnificence it is to have his Majesties Royal Stamp pass current in all parts of the World 13. I am confident whatever Nation hath the lowest Interest will certainly have their Lands in highest esteem and price and that no Nation shall ever over-match the Dutch in Trade till they mate them in the rate of Interest of Money 14. That the Dutch gain much more by Bullion and Foreign Commodities exported from their Provinces of which the chief are Wines East-India Goods English Herrings Greenland Oyl and Fins than by all their own native Productions and Manufactures 15. That it is as probable an attempt to wash a Blackamore White as to hope that ever we can cope with the Dutch in White Herrring Fishing Salt-droaging from St. Uvals to

Loss which they did and do continue notwithstanding out of a Zeal they have to promote the Consumption of our Woollen Manufactures in a Climate not altogether so hot as most parts of India are Which probably may in some time turn to the publick advantage of this Kingdom when those raging and bloody Wars are ended between the Chineses and Tartars II. That the Clamors Aspersions and Objections made against the present East-India Company are sinister selfish or groundless BEfore I engage into the Discourse of Objections against the present East-India Company I shall not stick to declare though it be against the Sense of most of the now Adventurers that in my judgment I am for a New Stock provided we can come honestly by it that is without Injustice to the now Adventurers who will be found to have deserved worthily of their Countrey when their Actions and Themselves shall come to be impartially considered and without Detriment to the Kingdom in general Which notwithstanding is a Matter of great difficulty it being in Trade as with Trees great care is to be taken in removing an old one least upon the removal it die or at least suffer a shrewd stunt Yet if the Wisdom of our Nation in that august Assembly of Parliament now convened shall incline to any a teration of the present Constitution I think this time may be as opportune as any 1st Because our Neighbours are not now at leasure the French being very low in India and the Dutch not altogether so Rampant as formerly to make their Advantage of our Unsettlement during the Transition from one Stock to another 2ly Because the Profits of the East-India Trade were never so much cried up as now they are So that I hope the Subscriptions may prove the larger to the ensuing Stock And yet I must desire to be excused if I think those that complain most of the Old will not be found the forwardest Subscribers to a New Stock 3ly Because when we tell Gentlemen or others they may buy Stock and come into the Company when they please They presently reply They know that but then they must pay 280 l. for 100 l. And when we say the intrinsic Value is worth so much which is as true as 2 and 2 makes 4 yet it is not so soon Demonstrated to their apprehensions notwithstanding it is no hard task to make out that the quick Stock of the English East-India Company is at this time more than the Dutch quick Stock proportionable to their respective first Subscriptions and yet their Actions now are currant at 440 l. or 450 l. per Cent. In truth I that have reason to inspect and know as much of it as any Man had rather buy in this Stock now it is at 300 l. for 100 l. then come into any New Stock at even Money Therefore for general satisfaction I could wish the Experiment of a New Subscription were tried 4ly If a New Stock were now establish'd to please the Generality of the Kingdom I should not despair but that such New Stock would have a Parliamentary Sanction which this only wants to be as strong in its Foundation as it is in all other Nations and which being obtained I am persuaded would in less than an Age render his Majesty as indubitably Sovereign of the Ocean as he is now of Great Britain and Ireland and the Seas adjacent 5ly If an English Company were settled upon such a Foundation there would be more Encouragement to maintain and defend some Trades by Arms which cannot otherwise be enjoyed or secured Which no Company built upon an uncertain Basis can be supposed to adventure the Charge or Hazard of while they are not sure to enjoy their Acquests in case of Success But to return to my Theme and muster up all the Objections I can remember to have heard against the present Company Object 1. The first that comes to my Mind is that of some of the Turkey Merchants They say The bringing in of so much Silk and so cheap is a publick Nusance and destroys their Trade which depends wholly upon the Exportation of Woollen Manufacture whereas the East-India Company send out little Manufacture and much Bullion c. Answ. 1. Lanswer First That it 's strange Doctrine to any sort of Men skill'd in the Political part of Trade That the making of a Material cheap that is to be Manufactured at Home or Exported again into Foreign Countreys should be to the publick Damage of any Countrey 2. That the Turkey Merchants do Ship out much Cloth I deny not but as true it is that they have Shipt out more Yearly since the great encrease of the East-India Trade and since themselves have made this Complaint than they did in former Years So that in Fact it doth not follow that the encrease of the East-India Trade and particularly of their Importation of Silk doth hinder or diminish the Exportation of Cloth to Turkey but rather the contrary 3. The question is not now Which Company sends out most Woollen Manufactures but which is the most profitable Trade to the Nation Which I hope I have proved the East-India Trade to be especially if the before-mentioned Consideration be taken in that what English Commodities the East-India Company exports would not be exported at all if the English had no Trade thither Because other Nations that Trade thither are under Joynt-Stocks and Political Councils and consequently would send none of our Manufactures But as long as there is a Market for our English Cloth in Turkey if the English did not send it thither the Dutch would because in Holland there is no Turkey Company but any Man Native or Foreigner may send what Commodities and when they please for Turkey except they be staied for Convoy by some Act of State And where all Men have liberty to Trade at Discretion they will naturally deal in those Commodities they can get most by be they Foreign or Domestick 4. If Bullion be exported and that hinder not the exportation of our English Manufactures as in fact doth appear And if for every 10 s. value sent out 30 s. be brought in Bullion at the long run which is most evident in the course of the East-India Trade who can doubt but the exportation of Bullion in such a Trade is a real and great advantage to the Kingdom 5. Besides their Cloth the Turkey Merchants do send out a great deal of Bullion themselves as appears by their Entries at the Custom-House In which they do well for themselves and their Countrey but not well in complaining of others at the same time for the same thing 6. The truth of the Case at bottom is but this The Importation of better and cheaper Raw Silk from India may probably touch some Turkey Merchants profit at present though it doth benefit the Kingdom and not hinder the exportation of Cloth What then Must one Trade be interrupted because it works upon another At that rate

it be said Where shall they have Men I answer If they have Trade and Money enough they cannot want Men. Seamen are Inhabitants of the Universe and where ever they are bred will resort to the best Pay and most constant Employment especially in a Countrey where they cannot be prest or compelled into any Service against their Wills But it must be further considered That all other Foreign Trade in Europe doth greatly depend upon East-India Commodities and if we lose the Importation of them into Europe we shall soon abate in all our other Foreign Trade and Navigation and the Dutch will more than proportionably increase theirs The proportion of our Decay and their Increase in such a Case would indeed be exactly the same but that the excess of price which they would make the European World pay for East-India Commodities more than now they do would cause a disproportionable and greater increase of their Riches The augmentation whereof would further enable them to overballance us and all others in Trade as well as in Naval strength If it shall be said Admit all that is writ upon this Head to be probable is not the Consequence viz. the security of the Liberty Property and Protestant Religion of this Kingdom far fetcht and brought in as popular phrases to gain and please a Party as the Clothiers and Artificers Petition was formerly on the other side I answer I cannot hinder Men from thinking their own way but God Almighty that knows my Heart knows that I scorn to use any such sacred terms to or for any such sinister or selfish respect or to please any sort of Men living All that I have or shall write in this Treatise is what I do really and stedfastly believe upon very long and serious Meditation and many Years conference with almost all sorts of Men English and Strangers And if notwithstanding I do err in some things as humanum est it is for want of better understanding But to return to the Matter Can any man that looks abroad into the World doubt of the truth of that Observation viz. That Trade never thrives in any Countrey that is not Protestant though not in all that are so for reasons which I could offer but that they are not necessary here Is it not obvious to every Man's understanding that since Queen Elizabeth's time our Customs are encreased from 14000 l. per Annum to above 700000 l. per Annum Is it not evident that the People of the United Netherlands since their being Protestant are increased more in Trade and Wealth in 100 Years than the ancient and fortunate Romans did in 400 Years after the foundation of their flourishing Commonwealth Have not the French since they were but Partie par paile part Protestants and part Papists increased more in Trade and Shipping in 100 Years then they did in 500 Years before I once discoursed a Popish Lord soon after his Majestie 's happy Restauration who is since dead who told me it was never well in England nor would be while we kept such a stir about promoting of Trade I confess I liked his Lordship the worse for that expression but I thought the better of his Parts A Naval Power never affrights us Seamen never did nor ever will destroy the Liberty of their own Countrey They naturally hate Slavery because they see so much of the misery of it in other Countreys All Tyrannies in the World are supported by Land-Armies No absolute Princes have great Navies or great Trades very few of them though they have large Territories can match that little Town of Hamburgh in Shipping The Kingdom of France is powerful and populous and is arrived to the height of Military Vertue by which they are become formidable to us as well as to our Neighbours Who do we fear may destroy our Liberty Property and Religion which three are one in substance but the Papists and the French which likewise are two names for one thing and so we should have found it if God Almighty had not disappointed them Now under God's Providence what can best secure us from them but our Naval Strength and what doth especially increase and support that but our East-India Trade which I think I have sufficiently proved to the conviction of every impartial and unbiassed Englishman And if so the Consequence in this Proposition is most natural and irrefragable But if notwithstanding it shall be replied upon me that in the former part of the Discourse on this Inference I say That Trade thrives in Protestant Countries therefore the Protestant Religion is the cause of our so great increase in Trade and Navigation and not the Trade of the East-Indies I answer First That the great increase of Trade is not a constant and infallible consequence of the Protestant Religion because it proves not so in all Protestant Countreys But whatever Nation increaseth in the East-India Trade never fails proportionably to increase in other Foreign Trade and Navigation Secondly Admit that our Reformation to the Protestant Religion were one principal cause at first of our advance in Trade and Navigation yet now it is manifest that the increase of our Trade and Navigation is a great means under God to secure and preserve our Protestant Religion Foreign Trade produceth Riches Riches Power Power preserves our Trade and Religion they mutually work one upon and for the preservation of each other As was well said by the late learned Lord Bacon though in a different Case in his History of Henry the 7th That that Kings Fortune work'd upon his Nature and his Nature upon his Fortune IV. That the Trade of the East-Indies cannot be carried on to National Advantage by a Regulated Company or in any other way than by a Joynt Stock BEfore I ingage in this Argument it will be necessary to explain What 's the Constitution of a Regulated Trade such as the Turkey Company and other like Companies of Merchants of London are 2ly What a Company United in a Joynt-Stock is To begin with the first A Regulated Company is hard to define and harder to resemble It s the Confinement of a Trade to a certain number of the People exclusive to above 99 parts of 100 with power in the major part to hinder the lesser from shipping out any Goods but when the greater number think fit and to levy a Tax upon the Trade at the discretion of the greater number of Votes In brief it is a Heteroclite unto which out of England there is nothing now in the World like in any other Kingdom or Commonwealth whatsoever that ever I could read or hear of All those Trades that are regulated and confined to certain Persons in England being open and free to all People in all other Kingdoms and States Their Courts are perfect Democracies where one that trades but for 100 l. per Annum hath as good a Vote as another that trades for 20000 l. per Annum In those Courts they appoint the time

of Shipping choose their Embassador and two Consuls settle a Tax which they call Leviations upon the Trade And although I have a profound veneration for all things then settled in Church and State and for those wise and worthy Councellors that assisted Queen Elizabeth in those infant times of our Reformation and Trade and am apt to think when those Constitutions were made they were useful and proper to that time Yet I must acknowledge that in my opinion if all those Trades that are Regulated that is Confined to certain Persons only were free and open to all the King's Subjects as they are in Holland and all other places it would be infinitely more for the general good of the Kingdom Neither do I see any reason why the Trades of Turkey Hamburgh East-land Russia and Greenland which in England are Limited or Regulated as they call it should need such Limitation or Regulation more in England than they do in other parts of the World or more than other Trades to Italy France Spain or any other part of the World And if something might be alledged for a Regulation what can be said why it is not for the publick Utility that all the King's Subjects might Trade to any Countrey if they please whether they be Noblemen Gentlemen Men of the Gown Shop-keepers or whatever they be the more the better for the Common Good To enforce which much more might be said but that 's not my Business now A Company in Joynt-Stock are a Corporation by Charter and if it were by Act of Parliament it would be much better for the Kingdom in general as hath been said into which Stock all the King's Subjects of what condition soever have at the foundation of it liberty to Adventure what sum of Money they please The Stock and Trade is managed by a Select Council or Committee consisting of a Governor Deputy and 24 Committees chosen annually by the Generality in which every Adventurer doth not Vote a like but proportionably to his Stock viz. Every 250 l. Original Stock hath one Vote 500 l. paid in hath two Votes c. After the first Stock is settled no Man can come in but by Purchase which every Englishman hath an equal liberty to do and for which he pays nothing if he be a Freeman if unfree never above 5 l. In England the Company hath by reason of our late Civil Wars and Confusions been interrupted several times and there have been new Subscriptions But in Holland since the first settlement thereof in Anno 1602 there has been no interruption or breaking up of the Stock or new Subscription and such continuance is certainly best for the Publick Having described the nature of these two sorts of Companies of Merchants I shall now descend to the proof of the Proposition viz. That a United Stock is absolutely necessary to the carrying on the East-India Trade to National Advantage Arg. 1. My first Argument I shall draw from the Practice and Experience of all other Nations Certainly all the World are not weak in their Intellects whatever those Gentlemen think that complain of the East-India Company If any shall tell me this Argument will not hold universally for the Portugals have a Trade for East-India and yet have no Joynt-Stock I answer under those Gentlemens favour I know there is a Joynt-Stock for this Trade in Portugal or else there could have been no Trade worth speaking of But true it is that Joynt-Stock in Portugal is the King's Exchequer who reserves Pepper Diamonds Silk Callicoes and all other considerable India Commodities to himself and leaves only some few Toys and trivial Commodities to his Subjects and yet for want of a more perfect National Constitution we have seen how the Portugal Trade in India notwithstanding the great Roots it had drawn in a long uninterrupted course of time dwindled to nothing when it came to be confronted and out-done by the more National and better constituted Joynt Stocks of England and Holland The French Nation peradventure were never governed by wiser Counsels for their own good than under the present King They were some years past zealously set upon the East-India Trade and I am assured spared for neither pains nor cost to arrive at the best method but gave immense rewards to any that could give them any rational light or information to lay such a foundation of Trade as might be proper for those Eastern Countreys See what how and why they did resolve at last by the printed Translation of the French Treatise relating to that settlement which will save me the labour of inlarging upon this Argument Arg. 2. The English East-India Company have now as every body knows their money at 3 per Cent. interest Every English Man that trades in an open or regulated Trade must value his own money at 6 per Cent. at least or pay so much if he takes up money because he can gain so much by it sleeping or playing Those that work or run hazards hope to do better Now if the Company with their united Stock and Counsels and money at 3 per Cent have much a do to hold up against the subtil Dutch what shall poor private Merchants of divided various and contrary interests do with their little separate Stocks at 6 per Cent. per Anuum Arg. 3. Suppose the Trade of India might be carried on in an open or regulated way if other Nations did so which is never to be granted yet in regard that all other European Nations do at this time trade there in Joynt Stocks is it not as great madness to enter raw and private Persons against such compacted and united Constitutious of experienced Councellors as to fight a disordered undisciplined multitude against a well governed Veteran Army supported with an inexhaustible Treasure or as it is to imagine as some men fondly do that we can maintain and defend our Protestant Religion against the Church of Rome without a National Church in England Arg. 4. If the Company should be destroyed and the Trade left open the Companies Priviledges and Immunities in East-India would be lost which have cost this Company as well as their Predecessors vast sums of money to maintain and retrieve after they were almost ruined in the late three years open Trade If I am asked what those Priviledges and Immunities are They are so many and so great as is scarce credible to any not acquainted with the Trade of India For publick satisfaction I shall mention some few of them all would burden me to write as well as the Reader We have the liberty of Coining Money for our selves and all other Nations which passeth currant in all the King of Gulconda's Countreys We are Custom-free in almost all places and in some where the Dutch and all other Nations pay a constant Custom particularly in all places of the Bay of Bengall and up the great River of Ganges At Fort St. George and Bombay we have a right and do