Reply: "The profit is ours, who buy corn free from such charges."
If they tell you that the serfs of Poland work without wages,
Reply: "The misfortune is theirs and the profit is ours, since their labour does not enter into the price of the corn which their masters sell us."
Finally, if they tell you that other nations have many advantages over us,
Reply: "By means of exchange, they are forced to allow us to participate in these advantages."
If they tell you that under free-trade we are about to be inundated with bread, bouf à la mode, coal, and winter clothing, Reply: "In that case we shall be neither hungry nor thirsty."
If they ask how we are to pay for these things?
Reply: "Don't let that disquiet you. If we are inundated, it is a sign we have the means of paying for the inundation; and if we have not the means of paying, we shall not be inundated."
If any one says: I should approve of free-trade, if the foreigner, in sending us his products, would take our products in exchange; but he carries off our money,
Reply: "Neither money nor coffee grows in the fields of Beauce, nor are they turned out by the workshops of Elbeuf. So far as we are concerned, to pay the foreigner with money is the same thing as paying him with coffee."