A Commentary and Review of Montesquieu's "Spirit of Laws"

Consequences of the Different Principles of the Three Forms of Government, Relative to Sumptuary Laws, to Luxury, and to the Condition of Women.

Book VII

I regret the necessity of being so frequently opposed to the opinions of a man whom I respect; but this necessity has been the cause of the present undertaking, and it is this opposition to opinions, which I deem erroneous, and consequently injurious, which I conceive will constitute the usefulness of my work; consequently, my determinations are already made, and I have resolved not to avoid the danger of a collision with a writer so justly celebrated, but to advance my opinions with the boldness of conscious truth, leaving it to the reader to form his own judgment upon the several subjects.

Helvetius, with reason, reproaches Montesquieu, for not having clearly defined luxury; and consequently for treating the subject in a vague and unsatisfactory manner: it therefore becomes necessary in the first place, to determine with precision, the signification of the term luxury, so much abused. Luxury, properly consists in expenditures, which are non-productive, whatever the expenditures may be: as a proof that the nature of the expence is not involved in the question, a jeweller may employ one hundred thousand dollars in cutting a diamond and fabricating other jewels, without any act of luxury on his part, because he calculates on disposing of them with a profit; but if a man purchases a snuff box or a ring for fifty eagles, for his personal use, this to him is a luxurious expenditure. A farmer, a jockey, a waggoner, may keep two hundred horses, without any act of luxury, because they are the tools of their trade; but if an idle person keeps two horses for no purpose but riding for his pleasure, this is luxury. If an owner of a mine or a manufactory, causes a steam engine to be constructed for use, this is an expenditure of economy; but if a person fond of gardening, should cause a steam engine to be erected, merely for the purpose of watering his garden, this would be a luxurious expenditure: no man expends more on fashionable apparel than a taylor, but the luxury is not with him, but with those who wear them.

Without multiplying examples, we may perceive that what really constitutes luxurious expenditures, is their unprofitable nature: however, as we cannot provide for our wants, nor procure any enjoyments, but by expenditures, from which no profits in kind are derived; and as we must subsist, and even obtain enjoyments to a certain extent, which is in truth the object of all our labors, of society itself, and of all its institutions, those expences only can be considered luxurious, which are neither necessary nor profitable; otherwise consumption and luxury would be confounded and mistaken for the same thing.

But absolute necessity has no very definite limits; it is susceptible of extension and restriction; it varies according to climate, season, strength, age, and even according to educated habits, which are a second nature. A man placed in a severe climate, in a sterile district, or who is either sickly or old, is subjected to a greater portion of wants, than a young Indian in good health who can go almost naked, lie down under a palm tree and nourish himself with its fruit. In the same climate, the objects of real necessity are more extensive, when you refer to a man brought up in ease, who has had little occasion to exercise his bodily strength, and has exercised his intellectual faculties a great deal, than for one who has been brought up in poverty and passed his youth in the exercise of some laborious trade.

There is, moreover, among a civilized people, a sort of conventional necessity, which, though much exaggerated, is not imaginary, but founded on reason: it is in fact of the same nature as the expenditure of a workman for the tools necessary to his trade, for they belong to the profession exercised. The long and warm garment of studious persons, would not suit a herdsman, a hunter, a waggoner, or an artisan, for these it would be a luxury and inconvenience; in the same manner as the cuiras of the ancient soldier, or the pompous costume of the tragic actor would be to the lawyer. A man whose vocation requires of him to receive a great many people, and cannot go to see them, must be better lodged than the one who can traverse the town; he whose business obliges him to become acquainted with a great many people, to see them, hear them, speak to them, and act with or for them, should be enabled to receive them in his house, and consequently be at more expence than a man without connexions. This is the situation of many public officers. Even a person who does not exercise any public function, but whose fortune is ample, should expend more liberally and give greater activity to consumption, in order that he may not, however benevolent, be reputed parsimonious, or too selfish; because it is a matter of real necessity, for every man to possess the esteem that justly belongs to him, and particularly when it does not mislead him to do what is unjust; such expences are only an employment of means, in a manner somewhat less useful than they might have been. I am aware to what extent vanity, which desires to appear what it is not; and rapacity, which takes possession of what does not belong to it; have often abused considerations like these to color their excesses: but it is nevertheless true, that the empire of necessity has not any very certain bounds, and that luxury, properly so called, only commences where necessity terminates.

The essential character of luxury, is expenditures which are neither necessary nor productive: which is sufficient to shew the absurdity of those who pretend that the encrease of luxury enriches a nation: it is as if a merchant were advised to encrease his household expences, in order to render his affairs more prosperous; such expences might be indeed a sign, though a very uncertain sign, of his wealth, but it could in no manner be the means of enriching him. It must be evident, that a tradesman by reducing the expences of his business, obtains a greater profit, if the same quantity of merchandize equally good be produced; yet it is said that the more a nation expends, the more opulent it must be: this is most preposterous. But it is said, that luxury encourages commerce and industry, by causing money to circulate rapidly: does it not rather change the wholesome current of circulation, and render it less useful, without at all augmenting it. Let us make a calculation.

My property consists of land, and I have besides a sum of an hundred thousand dollars arising from the produce of those lands. This sum is certainly the product of the labor and skill of those who superintended my farms, who raised produce equal to that value, over and above the expences of their own subsistence and all their workmen, and the just profit of each; certainly this amount produced from the estate is not the fruit of expence, but of economy; for if the farmers and their assistants, had consumed as much as they had produced, nothing would have accrued to me: the same might be said, if the same amount had been produced by commerce, manufactures, or any other useful employment in society; and had it been expended as it accrued, nothing necessarily could have remained.

I now employ this sum in useless expenditures, and consume it all on myself; I have scattered it abroad; it has passed through numerous hands, who have worked for me; several people have been supported therewith, and this is the amount of the expenditure, for their work is thrown away and nothing remains; it produced me some temporary satisfaction of the same nature, as if the people had been employed in amusing me with fireworks or other spectacles: if, on the contrary, I had employed this sum in useful objects, the money would have been no doubt scattered abroad also, and a like number of men supported from it, but their work would have produced something of permanent utility. The improvement of the soil would ensure a more considerable revenue in future; a house built would receive a tenant; a road opened, a bridge constructed, would encrease the value of the adjoining lands, and open new sources of intercourse, consumption, and commerce, which, by a fair interest, would produce advantage to me, or to the public. Merchandize bought or fabricated, not for my consumption, but for sale, or even distributed to the indigent, would either produce a profit to me, or aid to sustain many who might otherwise have perished through want. This is an exact comparison of the two methods of expending.

If we should suppose, that instead of employing my money in one of those ways, I have lent it, the operation is only indirect, it is not changed; it only requires to be known, how the person who has borrowed employs it, and what use I make of the interest accruing therefrom, and according to that use, it will produce one of the two effects which we have treated of. It is exactly the same in effect, as if I had bought with my hundred thousand dollars, more ground, producing a certain additional revenue.

If we suppose again, that instead of employing or lending my capital, I have buried it, this is the only case wherein it can be supposed that it would have been better had I expended it even fruitlessly, because then some one might have profited by my extravagance.

But here I must observe, first: that this is not a rational course of conduct, but direct folly; and the more so because it affects most the person who acts so absurdly; and it is a course evidently such as can have no influence on the rich generally, nor is it so often met with in countries where the spirit of economy prevails, as in those where luxury predominates; for the productive nature of capital, and the manner of employing it, is there better known.

Secondly: this folly, of so little importance as scarcely to merit our attention, is yet less hurtful than is generally imagined; for it is not goods that are buried but precious metals, and the merchandize which procured it, has been carried into the general consumption, and fulfilled its purposes in society: it is therefore only a quantity of bullion that has been withdrawn from general use; and if it were possible for the quantity to be perceptible, the result would only be…. that what remains in circulation would possess a proportionately greater value, and represent more of merchandize and the products of industry; and consequently their use would be the same. If any inconvenience could arise from this incident, it would be in relation to foreign commerce, for foreigners might then obtain the products of the country at a lower price, and yet the country would be compensated, in some measure, by the advantage arising to its manufacturers, in enabling them to sell at a lower price than the manufacturers of other countries, which is well understood to be a great principle of superiority in political economy; and this superiority, nations rich in metals cannot counterbalance but by greater skill in fabricating, and greater talents in speculations; capacities which they sometimes possess, not because they are rich, but because such qualifications belong to the long established habits of the nation, and have enriched it: but this is pursuing ultimate consequences to an extreme which they can never reach.

Consequently, I think it may be concluded that luxury relative to economy, is always an evil, a continual cause of misery and weakness; it constantly debilitates by the excessive consumption of some, and the destruction of the produce of labor and industry of others; and these effects are so powerful, though not often understood, that so soon as it ceases for a short space in a country where there is little activity, there is directly perceived an encrease of riches and strength really prodigious.

What is here deduced from reason, history sustains by facts: Holland was capable of efforts almost incredible, when her admirals lived like sailors, and when all her citizens were employed in enriching or defending the state, and in raising tulips and collecting pictures: all subsequent political and commercial events have tended towards its decay: it has preserved the spirit of economy, and yet possesses considerable riches, in a country where other people could scarcely live.

Now let us suppose Amsterdam to be the residence of a splendid and magnificent court, its ships exchanged for embroidered garments, and its magazines converted into assembly rooms; in a few years it would scarcely be able to defend itself against the irruptions of the sea. When was it that England, notwithstanding all her misfortunes and faults, made the most prodigious efforts…. Was it under Cromwell or Charles II.? I am sensible that moral causes have a greater effect, than economical calculations: but these moral causes only augment resources, by directing all our efforts towards solid objects; which is the reason, that treasures are not wanting, either to the state or individuals, for great undertakings, because they have not been employed uselessly.

From what cause is it that the United States of America, in their agriculture, industry, commerce, wealth, population, have doubled in less than twenty-five years: it is because, they produce more than they consume. That their position is favorable, and their productions immense, I agree; but if their consumption were greater than their production, they would impoverish themselves, they would languish, and become as miserable as the Spaniards, notwithstanding all the advantages they possess.

Let us resort to a still more striking example: France, under its old government, was not so miserable as it has been represented by many Frenchmen; nevertheless, it was far from flourishing; its population and agriculture were not retrograding, but remained apparently stationary; and if in any particular circumstance the French made some progress, it was less than several neighboring nations, and consequently not in proportion with the progress of general information: it had no credit, and was constantly in need of funds to defray useful expences; its financial resources were inadequate to the common charges of government, still less to support any great external efforts; and notwithstanding the genius, numbers, and activity of its people, the fertility and extent of its soil, and the advantages of a long peace, its rank among its rivals was sustained with difficulty, and had ceased to be respected by foreign nations.

The French revolution commenced, and the nation suffered every evil of which society is susceptible; it was torn to pieces by wars, alternately civil and foreign: several of its provinces were laid waste, and their towns destroyed by flames; every village and hamlet pillaged by lawless banditti or military commissaries; its external commerce was annihilated; its fleets wholly destroyed, though subsequently partially recovered; the colonies, which were held to be essential to its prosperity, were torn from it; and with the additional aggravation that all the men and treasure expended in establishing and conquering them were lost irretrieveably; its specie had disappeared with the emigrants. By the enormous creation of paper money, at a period of internal famine France maintained fourteen armies on her frontiers; yet with all these calamities combined, it is now well known that its population and agriculture have augmented considerably in a few years, and now (1806), without any change in her favor in relation to external commerce, to which so much importance had been generally attended; without having had a single moment of peace to recruit its losses, France at this moment supplies immense funds from taxes, expends vast sums in public works, and can accomplish all this without borrowing; such is her power on the continent of Europe, that nothing can resist it; and were it not for the British navy, France might subdue the universe. To what causes are we to attribute these extraordinary effects? The change of a single circumstance in the state of society, has been competent to effect it all.