The  powers  of  man  are  progressive  in  their  nature ;  and  pro-
gress is  necessary  to  our  well-being.  The  arts  and  processes
which  our  forefathers  thought  the  summit  of  human  skill,  their
more  expert  descendants  find  to  be  but  the  rude  efibrts  of  a
comparatively  barbarous  age ;  and  those  which  we,  in  the  pre-
sent day,  admire  as  perfect,  our  successors  will  doubtless  here-
after consider  equally  rude  with  what  they  will  be  capable  of
producing.  To  fix,  therefore,  at  any  point  a  rule,  as  perfect,
to  be  for  ever  after  followed  without  deviation,  would  be  patting
a  bar  in  the  way  of  improvement  from  the  advancement  of
knowledge,  and  would  be  an  attempt  to  chain  down  after-ages


ON    THE    FREEDOM    OF    INDUSTRY.  241

to  OUT  own  limited  conceptions.  Established  regulations  hitherto
have  been  fundamentally  wrong,  both  from  having  originated  in
error,  and  from  not  having  been  adapted  to  changes  of  circum-
stances. Consequently,  they  have  done  mischief  by  wholesale,
as  well  in  the  times  of  their  first  introduction,  as  in  all  suc-
ceeding periods.
