Because the hard work of the peasant is the essential means to promote farming as the first source of national wealth, and because states are only fortunate insofar as they are inhabited by a quantity of hardworking citizens, so the ruler's care should be directed so that the hard work of the peasant is not stifled, but rather always invigorated.
Since this is best achieved when the peasant finds a good and adequate market for this natural production, one of the most effective means of improvement is to promote industry in the cities by improving the situation of craftsmen, artisans, factories, and manufacturers. Thereby many people are provided with their livelihood and the peasant is provided the opportunity to sell his natural products.
In this regard, industry is indeed to be counted among the most effective means of enrichment. Even if the dictum, which has been argued for and against, that the foundation of real wealth is only to be increased through nature, not through industrial products, since these [industries] actually bring forth no new entity, but rather only aim to change or process or transform, and produce only the value of the raw materials that they process, as well as the value of the natural products that the factories consume in their work, there is no doubt that without strong consumption, without swift processing and without good prices, it would be virtually impossible to bring agriculture to its greatest blossoming. [ . . . ]
However, in order to not only increase the good commerce, but also to maintain it in its steady bloom, no fancy measures are necessary on the part of the Landesfürst, but rather only the following general and natural means. That is, namely: a) handle justice seriously, b) infringe on the freedom of the people and especially the merchant class no more than necessary, c) provide this class with every protection, d) most carefully maintain the public credit, and e) introduce and supervise a good law enforcement. [ . . . ]
Nor can I go into an elaborate statement here about what kind of useful ways and means are to be used to enable the prosperity of the entire state; that the landlords grant their subjects the ownership of the occupied land, abolish most of their farms [Meyerhöfe], turn over the land to their subjects at reasonable interest rates, and reach a reasonable agreement with them regarding the conversion of labor dues into payments in money or in kind. [ . . . ]
2do Not even the financiers will be able to cast doubt on the fact that free trade and traffic energize and enrich a state, and that nothing stands in the way more than constraints and prohibitions. So freedom is to be seen as the rule and its limitation as the exception, but here we have changed the exception into the rule and spread regulations so far that most wares are covered by them, regardless that the fewest are produced in the hereditary lands.
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