Also read Start a Business Great Discoveries It is not meant, by any means, to enter into an inquiry, much less controversy, respecting the antiquity of mankind; but it is very clear that the knowledge of arts and sciences can be traced to an infant state about two thousand years before the Christian aera. If ever the nations of the world come to a state of permanence, (which in all probability will never be the case,) it must be when population is nearly proportioned to the means of subsistence in different parts; when knowledge is nearly equally distributed and when no great discoveries remain to be made either in arts, science, or geography. While the causes from which wealth and power rise in a superior degree, are liable to change from one nation to another, wealth and power must be liable to the same alterations and changes of place; so long any equal balance among nations must be artificial. But when circumstances become similar, and when the pressure becomes equal on all sides, then nations, like the particles of a fluid, though free to move, having lost their impulse, will remain at rest. If such a state of things should ever arrive, then the wealth and power would be only real, not comparative. The whole might be very rich, very affluent, and possess great abundance of every thing, either for enjoyment or for defence, without one nation having an advantage over another: they would be on an equality. But this state of things is far from being likely soon to take place. Population is far from come to its equilibrium, and knowledge is farther distant still. Russia and America, in particular, are both behind in population, and the inhabitants of the latter country are far from being on a par in knowledge with the rest of Europe; when they become so, the balance will be overturned, and must be re-established anew. The great discoveries that have taken place in knowledge and geography have been connected. While navigation was little understood, the borders of the Mediterranean Sea, and the islands in it, were naturally the first places for wealth and commerce. The discovery of the compass, and others that followed, rendered the navigation of the open ocean, more easy and safe than that of the circumscribed seas. This laid a great foundation for change and discovery; it brought Britain into importance, ruined Italy, Genoa, Venice, &c. and has laid the foundation for further changes still. By knowledge is only meant the knowledge of the arts that make men useful, such as agriculture, manufactures, legislation, &c. As for discoveries in arts, it would be bold and presumptuous indeed to attempt to set any bounds to them. Discoveries, however, that alter the relations of mankind very materially, are probably near at an end. In arts they give only a temporary preference. If a method should be discovered to cultivate a field with half the trouble, and to double the produce, which seems very possible, it would be a great discovery, and alter the general state of mankind considerably; but it would soon be extended to all nations, as the use of gunpowder has been. New produce, or means of procuring the old more easily, are the things chiefly sought after. Potatoes, coffee, tea, sugar, cotton, silk, distilled spirits, are new productions, unknown to the Romans. Glass, gunpowder, printing, windmills, watermills, steam-engines, and the most part of spinning and weaving machines, are new inventions, but they can be extended to all countries. The mariners compass changed the relative position of places, and no new invention of the same importance, as to its effects on nations, probably can take place. Navigation does not admit of a similar improvement to that which it has received. If goods could be conveyed for a quarter of the present price it would not produce the same sort of effect. To render navigating the ocean practicable was a greater thing than any possible improvement on that practicability.