BETHEL, Slingsby.

£750 · Offered by Peter Harrington · No longer available

An Account of the French Usurpation upon the Trade of England, First edition of this pamphlet by the republican merchant Slingsby Bethel (1617-1697), warning of the French threat to English trade. "Bethel appeared in print again in 1679-80, as the Popish Plot allegations toppled the regime of the earl of Danby and produced a crisis for the Restoration regime. In his Account of the French Usurpation upon the Trade of England (1679), he gave voice to the capitalist spirit of the city's trading men and to the Francophobia that fuelled urban anti-Catholicism. 'Money is the primum mobile which moves the Spheres, which are the hearts and hands of men' he observed. But, given the astute commercial policies of Louis XIV, 'all the moneys of Europe' were likely to be drawn to France, leaving English traders as 'Higlers and petty Chapmen' (pp. 2-4). He advocated such immediate remedies as the limitation of French imports, the encouragement of immigration, the establishment of free ports, and the reduction of customs duties" (ODNB).

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