[229] Cf. Mantoux, op. cit., pp. 65-66. This work gives most interesting details bearing upon all the points mentioned here. Internal restrictions are criticised by Smith in the second part of chap. 10 of Book I.
[230] “Each of those different branches of trade, however, is not only advantageous, but necessary and unavoidable, when the course of things, without any constraint or violence, naturally introduces it,” says he, after giving an exposition of the respective advantages of the various forms of economic activity. (Wealth of Nations, Book II, chap. 5; Cannan, vol. i, p. 352.)
[231] Wealth of Nations, Book IV, chap. 2; Cannan, vol. i, p. 419.
[232] Ibid., Book IV, chap. 1; vol. i, p. 422.
[233] Ibid., Book IV, chap. 3, part ii; vol. i, pp. 457-458.
[234] Principles of Political Economy, Book III, chap. 17.
[235] Wealth of Nations, Book IV, chap. 8; Cannan, vol. ii, p. 159.
[236] It is true that in Book IV, chap. 3, part 2, he declares: “In every country it always is and must be the interest of the great body of the people to buy whatever they want of those who sell it cheapest. The proposition is so very manifest, that it seems ridiculous to take any pains to prove it.” (Cannan, vol. i, p. 458.)
[237] Speaking of duties on corn, he writes: “To prohibit by a perpetual law the importation of foreign corn and cattle, is in reality to enact, that the population and industry of the country shall at no time exceed what the true produce of its own soil can maintain.” (Ibid., Book IV, chap. 2; vol. i, p. 427.) He always views the question from the standpoint of increased population and labour, and not from that of the consumer.
[238] Ibid., Book II, chap. 5. Cf. Book IV, chap. 1.