[8] King John, Act II. Scene 1.
[9] King Richard II., Act II. Scene 1.
[10] Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. Edited by J.E. Thorold Rogers. Oxford, 1880, pp. 35-38. In a subsequent passage (p. 178), Smith seems disposed somewhat to qualify the positive assertion here quoted, on the ground that the Navigation Act had not had time to exert much effect, at the period when some of the most decisive successes over the Dutch were won. It is to be observed, however, that a vigorous military government, such as Cromwell's was, can assert itself in the fleet as well as in the army, creating an effective organization out of scanty materials, especially when at war with a commercial state of weak military constitution, like Holland. It was the story of Rome and Carthage repeated. Louis XIV. for a while accomplished the same. But under the laxity of a liberal popular government, which England increasingly enjoyed after the Restoration, naval power could be based securely only upon a strong, available, and permanent maritime element in the civil body politic; that is, on a mercantile marine.
As regards the working of the Navigation Act to this end, whatever may be argued as to the economical expediency of protecting a particular industry, there is no possible doubt that such an industry can be built up, to huge proportions, by sagacious protection consistently enforced. The whole history of protection demonstrates this, and the Navigation Act did in its day. It created the British carrying trade, and in it provided for the Royal Navy an abundant and accessible reserve of raw material, capable of being rapidly manufactured into naval seamen in an hour of emergency.
[11] Works of John Adams, vol. viii. pp. 389-390.
[12] This primary meaning of the word "staple" seems to have disappeared from common use, in which it is now applied to the commercial articles, the concentration of which at a particular port made that port a "staple."
[13] Bryan Edwards, West Indies, vol. ii. p. 448.
[14] Macpherson, Annals of Commerce, vol. ii. p. 443.
[15] Reeves, History of the Law of Navigation, Dublin, 1792, p. 37.
[16] Macpherson, vol. ii. p. 444.