With individuals, nature has given very powerful auxiliaries to necessity, which strengthen and prolong its operation, but which do not operate equally on nations.
Habit or custom is the one auxiliary, and ambition or avarice is the other.
Habit, in all cases, diminishes the reluctance to labour, which is inherent in the most part of mankind, and sometimes entirely overcomes it. {68} Ambition, which appears under many different forms, renders labour absolutely an enjoyment. Sometimes ambition is merely a desire of amassing property, an avaricious disposition: sometimes it is a desire to create a family; and even, sometimes, the vain and delusive idea of retiring from business, and becoming happy in a state of total idleness, spurs a man on to labour. It is a very curious, but well-known fact, that, after necessity has entirely ceased to promote industry, the love of complete idleness, and the hope of enjoying it at some distant date, leads the wealthy man on, to his last hour, in a train of augmented industry. Thus has nature most wisely counteracted
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{68} There are many instances where habit has rendered a particular sort of labour absolutely a want. It has become a necessary,-- a means of enjoyment without which life has become a burthen.
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the disposition of man to idleness; by making the very propensity to it, after a certain time, active in promoting industry.
But this can never be the case with a race of men: {69} and, as a nation consists of a greater number of individuals, so, also, its existence consists of successive generations.
There is a difference between idleness and inaction. It is the natural propensity of man to be idle, but not to be inactive. Enjoyment is his aim, after he has secured the means of existence. Enjoyment and idleness are supposed, in many cases, to go hand in hand; at any rate, they can be reconciled, whereas inaction and enjoyment are irreconcilable. {70}