Hume's Political Discourses

by David Hume

The question, therefore, concerning the populousness of ancient and modern times being allowed of great importance, it will be requisite, if we would bring it to some determination, to compare both the domestic and political situation of these two periods, in order to judge of the facts by their moral causes, which is the first view in which we proposed to consider them.

The chief difference between the domestic economy of the ancients and that of the moderns consists in the practice of slavery which prevailed among the former, and which has been abolished for some centuries throughout the greater part of Europe. Some passionate admirers of {p111} the ancients and zealous partisans of civil liberty (for these sentiments, as they are both of them in the main extremely just, are found to be almost inseparable) cannot forbear regretting the loss of this institution; and whilst they brand all submission to the government of a single person with the harsh denomination of slavery, they would gladly reduce the greatest part of mankind to real slavery and subjection. But to one who considers coolly on the subject it will appear that human nature in general really enjoys more liberty at present, in the most arbitrary governments of Europe, than it ever did during the most flourishing period of ancient times. As much as submission to a petty prince, whose dominions extend not beyond a single city, is more grievous than obedience to a great monarch, so much is domestic slavery more cruel and oppressive than any civil subjection whatsoever. The more the master is removed from us in place and rank the greater liberty we enjoy, the less are our actions inspected and controlled, and the fainter that cruel comparison becomes between our own subjection and the freedom and even dominion of another. The remains that are found of slavery in the American colonies and among some European nations would never surely create a desire of rendering it more universal. The little humanity commonly observed in persons accustomed from their infancy to exercise so great authority over their fellow-creatures and to trample upon human nature were sufficient alone to disgust us with that authority. Nor can a more probable reason be given for the severe, I might say barbarous manners of ancient times, than the practice of domestic slavery, by which every man of rank was rendered a petty tyrant and educated amidst the flattery, submission, and low debasement of his slaves.

According to the ancient practice, all checks were on the inferior, to restrain him to the duty of submission; none on the superior, to engage him to the reciprocal duties of gentleness and humanity. In modern times a bad servant finds not easily a good master, nor a bad master a good servant, and the checks are mutual, {p112} suitable to the inviolable and eternal laws of reason and equity.

The custom of exposing old, useless, or sick slaves in an island of the Tiber, there to starve, seems to have been pretty common in Rome, and whoever recovered after having been so exposed had his liberty given him by an edict of the Emperor Claudius, where it was likewise forbid to kill any slave merely for old age or sickness. But supposing that this edict was strictly obeyed, would it better the domestic treatment of slaves or render their lives much more comfortable? We may imagine what others would practise when it was the professed maxim of the elder Cato to sell his superannuated slaves for any price rather than maintain what he esteemed a useless burden.

The ergastula, or dungeons, where slaves in chains were forced to work, were very common all over Italy. Columella advises that they be always built under ground, and recommends it as the duty of a careful overseer to call over every day the names of these slaves, like the mustering of a regiment or ship’s company, in order to know presently when any of them had deserted. A proof of the frequency of these ergastula and of the great number of slaves usually confined in them.

A chained slave for a porter was usual in Rome, as appears from Ovid and other authors. Had not these people shaken off all sense of compassion towards that unhappy part of their species, would they have presented all their friends at the first entrance with such an image of the severity of the master and misery of the slave?

Nothing so common in all trials, even of civil causes, as to call for the evidence of slaves, which was always extorted by the most exquisite torments. Demosthenes says that where it was possible to produce for the same fact either freemen or slaves as witnesses, the judges always preferred the torturing of slaves as a more certain and infallible evidence.​[42] {p113}

Seneca draws a picture of that disorderly luxury which changes day into night and night into day, and inverts every stated hour of every office in life. Among other circumstances, such as displacing the meals and times of bathing, he mentions that regularly about the third hour of the night the neighbours of one who indulges this false refinement hear the noise of whips and lashes, and upon inquiry find that he is then taking an account of the conduct of his servants and giving them due correction and discipline. This is not remarked as an instance of cruelty, but only of disorder, which, even in actions the most usual and methodical, changes the fixed hours that an established custom had assigned them.​[43]

But our present business is only to consider the influence of slavery on the populousness of a state. It is pretended that in this particular the ancient practice had infinitely the advantage, and was the chief cause of that extreme populousness which is supposed in those times. At present all masters discourage the marrying of their male servants, and admit not by any means the marriage of the female, who are then supposed altogether incapacitated for their service; but where the property of the servants is lodged in the master, their marriage and fertility form his riches, and bring him a succession of slaves that supply the {p114} place of those whom age and infirmity have disabled. He encourages, therefore, their propagation as much as that of his cattle, rears the young with the same care, and educates them to some art or calling, which may render them more useful or valuable to him. The opulent are, by this policy, interested in the being at least, though not the well-being of the poor; and enrich themselves by increasing the number and industry of those who are subjected to them. Each man, being a sovereign in his own family, has the same interest with regard to it as the prince with regard to the state; and has not, like the prince, any opposite motive of ambition or vainglory which may lead him to depopulate his little sovereignty. All of it is, at all times, under his eye, and he has leisure to inspect the most minute detail of the marriage and education of his subjects.​[44]

Such are the consequences of domestic slavery, according to the first aspect and appearance of things; but if we enter more deeply into the subject, we shall perhaps find reason to retract our hasty determinations. The comparison is shocking between the management of human creatures and that of cattle; but being extremely just when applied to the present subject, it may be proper to trace the consequences of it. At the capital, near all great cities, in all populous, rich, industrious provinces, few cattle are bred. Provisions, lodging, attendance, labour are there dear, and men find better their account in buying the cattle, after they come to a certain age, from the remoter and cheaper countries. These are consequently the only breeding countries for cattle; and by a parity of reason, for men too, when the latter are put on the same footing with the {p115} former. To rear a child in London till he could be serviceable would cost much dearer than to buy one of the same age from Scotland or Ireland, where he had been raised in a cottage, covered with rags, and fed on oatmeal or potatoes. Those who had slaves, therefore, in all the richer or more populous countries would discourage the pregnancy of the females, and either prevent or destroy the birth. The human species would perish in those places where it ought to increase the fastest, and a perpetual recruit be needed from all the poorer and more desert provinces. Such a continued drain would tend mightily to depopulate the state, and render great cities ten times more destructive than with us, where every man is master of himself, and provides for his children from the powerful instinct of nature—not the calculations of sordid interest. If London at present, without increasing, needs a yearly recruit from the country of 5000 people, as is commonly computed, what must it require if the greatest part of the tradesmen and common people were slaves, and were hindered from breeding by their avaricious masters?