The Practice of some Countries in Italy.
THEY have made laws in some part of Italy to prevent subjects from selling their lands, in order to remove their specie into foreign countries. These laws may be good, when the riches of a state are so connected with the country itself, that there would be great difficulty in transferring them to another. But since, by the course of exchange, riches are in some degree independent on any particular state, and since they may with so much ease be conveyed from one country to another; that must be a bad law which will not permit persons for their own interest to dispose of their lands, while they can dispose of their money. It is a bad law, because it gives an advantage to moveable effects, in prejudice to the land; because it deters strangers from settling in the country; and, in short, because it may be eluded.