22.15. 15. 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
of 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 movable effects, in prejudice to the land; because it
deters strangers from settling in the country; and, in short, because it
may be eluded.
