But as to the class of land proprietors, that is to say, the more wealthy inhabitants, who live upon a revenue already made, the impropriety of cumulative taxes is much less. They are however burdensome, and disagreeable in all cases, and ought to be dispensed with, when the necessary supplies can be made out by proportional taxes, without raising the prices of labour too high for the prosperity of foreign trade.

From the examples I have given of this branch of taxation, I hope the nature of it may be fully understood, and that for the future no inconvenience will arise from my employing the term of cumulative tax. I shall now subjoin its definition.

A cumulative tax, is the accumulation of that return which every individual, who enjoys any superfluity, owes daily to the state, for the advantages he receives by living in the society. As this definition would not have been understood at setting out, I thought it proper, first, to explain the nature of the thing to be defined.

CHAP. V.
Of the Inconveniences which proceed from proportional Taxes, and of the Methods of removing them.

A proportional tax, as I have said, is that which is levied upon the idle consumer, at the time he buys the commodity; and while, by consuming it, the balance of wealth is turning against him, in favour of the seller. This tax is consolidated as it were with the price of the commodity, and must of necessity raise it.

I say, it is levied at the time of buying, and affects the buyer, in consequence of his consumption; because we have seen, that when the commodity is not consumed by the purchaser, then upon a subsequent alienation he is refunded all he paid. I consider him therefore, in that case, not as paying, but as advancing it for another; and while any part of the commodity remains unconsumed, there still remains the equivalent of a proportional part of the tax in the hands of him who advanced it.

I shall now proceed, as in the former chapter, by giving some examples of such impositions; and in examining them, endeavour to shew their nature and consequences.

The most familiar to an Englishman are, excises, customs, malt-tax, stamp-duties, and the like.

To a Frenchman the gabelle, the traittes, the aides, tobacco, &c.[[41]]