greatest proportion of the circulating medium, the real wealth. (we prefume he means the other parts of wealth) is equally dif fufed over the whole community; while, in the country where the money is diftributed with much lefs inequality, the real wealth is confined to the clafs poffeffing the greater proportional share of the circulating medium. It will follow, according to M. Tou longeon, that, in the ftate where the diftribution of the money is moft difproportionate, the clafs which poffeffes the greater share will feel money to conftitute their whole force, will draw the reft to them, and will rapidly deprefs the other claffes more and more by this means. But, in the country where the money is lefs unequally diftributed, the clafs which poffeffes the greatest share, poffelling alfo moft real wealth, will perceive that real wealth is only ufeful to them when employed; whereas money, being the reprefentative of all things, is valuable in itself-it gives them a command over every other commodity. They will therefore render their real wealth as like their circulating medium as poffible, by means of credit, which will enable them, as it were, to coin every part of their poffeffions, to form a paper money that may be received, from the confidence repofed in their wealth and integrity, and may reprefent both their fpecie and their goods. Thus the rich will augment their own ftock by the amount of the paper which they circulate; the goods, on the credit of which it is emitted, remain; the fpecie becomes the medium of exchange in the retail trade, and confequently is transferred to the hands of the poor; the community benefits by the whole amount of the paper money on the one hand, for this is clear gain, not accompanied with any loss of goods; and by the accommodation given to the poor on the other, for they are excluded from a fhare in the paper circulation, the nature of which confines it to wholefale dealings, and they receive the fpecie itfelf. Hence our author deduces the main principle of his strange theory, that the public good requires fuch an arrangement as may throw the fpecie of the country into the hands of the people, while the paper money, that is, confidence and credit, conftitute the circulating medium of the rich.

Nor are thefe direct benefits the only ones which arife from a tolerably equal diftribution of the fpecie. The effects of that confidence to which fuch an arrangement gives rife, are of themfelves highly important. Confidence promotes honesty, knowledge, order and lays the foundation of all the domeftic virtues. The diftribution of comforts among the inferior orders, our au thor obferves, is the beft fecurity for their virtues and regular conduct; a remark to which we cheerfully fubfcribe, and which we willingly quote as in reality the only truth we have met with through the whole courfe of the tract. It is introduced with

Ha

fome

fome obfervations in M. Toulongeon's own inimitable manner, upon the beauty of feeing wealth equally divided; of a community in which on ne voit pas la maigreur à coté de l'enflure, et l'embonpoint fe remarque partout.'

In a financial point of view, equal advantages refult from leav ing the money in the hands of the people: For, is it not plain, fays our author, that a hundred proprietors of a thousand a year each, can more eafily afford to contribute two hundred, than a fingle proprietor of a hundred thoufand can to contribute twenty thoufand? As there is no anfwering this, he only remarks, in an eafy way, that the reafon of the difference is the greater profit which the induftry of the fmall proprietors (i. e. annuitants) derives from their revenues; thereby curioufly confounding income with capital.

M. Toulongeon now fets no bounds to his eulogies upon credit. It is the money of great towns, coined by a single dafh from the pen of a banker or a merchant; it fhould be kept facred to grand affairs, while cafh ought to be fcattered among the petty dealers and day-labourers. It multiplies great capitals by reprefenting them; it multiplies money alfo, which it reprefents as money reprefents goods. And all this, and a vast deal more of the fame kind, is delivered with as much confidence, and as much affectation of the precife language of demonftration, as if the author had really annexed fome meaning to it.

But the confidence with which he afferts, as facts, conclufions which he draws from his theory, and which are directly the reverfe of the truth, deferves fome notice. Credit, according to him, depending entirely upon the confidence repofed in the folvency and character of private individuals, banks can only be established on the fame bafis; and all fuch fchemes of banking as derive their origin and fupport from government, or from the union of many individuals, with a joint ftock, wuft want credit. No confidence, fays he, can ever be repofed in the government, which is above all law; it can, therefore, have no credit. No confidence can be given to ideal bodies or corporations, unlefs the members are each liable for the whole engagements of thecompany. It is to fingle perfons, therefore, and not to bodies, that an individual always looks for his fecurity. To read fuch extravagant affertions, one would think that the author's knowlege extended, literally, no farther than the pages of his own theory; that he had never heard of any one public banking company; that he was utterly ignorant of the credit given to government paper in almost every part of Europe. The prejudice in favour of a fyftem, seems to resemble the inftinctive affection of the lower animals for their offspring; the more deformed and fickly the production is, the more obiti

nately

nately do the parents clofe their eyes upon its defects, perfifting in the belief, that all around is in harmony and concord with the puny object of their care, which, in every limb perhaps, forms an exception to the reft of the creation. Had Citizen Toulongeon conceived an opinion, that walking upon the head is preferable to the other mode, and, in fupport of this idea, appealed to the practice of all able-bodied perfons and quick walkers, he would fearce ly have produced more than a fair parallel to his doctrine of credit, as applied to the history of banking companies and government

paper.

The next effect of a fyflem which is to throw the fpecie into the hands of the lower people (uniformly confounded by our author with the retail traders, as if the rich did not participate ftill more than the poor in the benefits of this trade), is the prevention of hoarding. As foon as a paper money is eftablished, which can take the place of cafh in great tranfactions, all hoards of the precious metals will be laid open, and the only caufe of the prefent high rate of intereft in France will be removed. M. Toulongeon,' it may be obferved, is quite ignorant of the nature of intereft, which he denominates the price of money, and never once fufpects to be the rent paid for all forts of ftock. But one kind of argument ufed on this head is extremely amufing, and, we will venture to fay, of as univerfal application as any rule in logic. In order to fhew that the high price of money in France is no proof of its scarcity (always conceiving high rate of intereft, and high price of money to be fynonymous), he fays the argument may be retorted, and made to cut the other way; for, if money is borrowed at a high price, it is clear that there are people who can afford to pay that price, and who have, therefore, plenty of money. Thus the higher the price of any commodity is, the greater its plenty, fince every high fale infers a high purchase.

And here it is neceffary that we fhould let the author fpeak for himfelf. The last benefit to be derived from his diftribution of. fpecie is of fo extraordinary a nature, and delivered in fuch a ftrange language, that no abftract could do it justice.

On a beau abufer d'une verité, rien ne peut faire qu'elle ceffe d'être une verité; comme Dieu, la verité n'a ni commencement ni fin; et comme la lumiere du foleil, elle peut être voilée mais non obfcurcie : elle refte et reparoit, telle qu'elle fût d'abord. Parce qu'on a horriblement abufé du mot peuple et du mot pouvoir, il n'en retera pas moins eternellement vrai que le peuple eft la portion la plus utile ou plutôt la plus neceffaire à la chofe publique, et que le pouvoir qui la regit tendra toujours à la maîtrifer: or la richeffe eft un pouvoir le plus fort de tous, parce qu'en changeant de main, il ne change pas de nature; l'efprit de corps s'y conferve et s'y remplace: c'eft le bataillon que l'on appeloit

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dea

des Immortels, parce que les places vides n'y reflorent jamais vacantes. L'or de toutes les matieres la plus denfe, n'a qu'un contrepoids, c'eft Jui-même; fi le peuple n'en poffede pas une grande partie, il fera bientôt affervi, parce qu'il n'y aura plus d'equilibre entre l'or qui attaque et l'or qui fe defend, Le maître le plus imperieux, c'eft le befoin, et les befoins du peuple font toujours des befoins de premiere neceffité qui commandent plus imperieufement. Si peuple ne peut connoître l'u fage d'aucune autre richeffe que de l'argent monnoyé, Les pierreries, les productions de l'Inde, les meubles de prix, les chefs-d'œuvre de l'art, les effets au porteur, tout cela n'eft pas à la portée du peuple; fa richeffe doit courir les rues, et celle-la, en bonne police, doit lui être refervée celle-la defend de la domination des autres, et lui ôte l'envie d'attaquer leur inevitable prééminence. L'indigence affaiblie fent tout le poids de fes fers; elle en eft accablée, parce qu'elle n'a pas la force de les porter, jufqu'à ce que l'indignation lui donne un moment la force de les foulever; mais cette crife n'eft qu'un delire d'accès, funefte pour elle-même. Les fouffrances du besoin ont fait plus de revolutions politiques que les opinions. L'etat actuel de la France eft precisement tel qu'on peut le fouhaiter,' &c,

Is it too much to denominate this the most incoherent piece of writing which has appeared in political science? We are far from infinuating any resemblance between the two authors; but it is curious to obferve, that the groffeft abfurdity of this whole paffage is founded upon Lord Lauderdale's famous miftake of scarcity for value. Citizen Toulongeon conceives the people incapable of uf ing any other riches than fpecie; and clearly fhews that he holds riches only to confist in objects which are fcarce, fuch as colonial produce, bills, fine furniture, and the like; juft as Lord Lauderdale excludes from his lift of valuable articles, all that are indefinitely abundant,

It is now time, however, that we fhould mention the great plan by which a fyftem of folid finance is to be laid, and the various advantages fecured, which refult from the fpecie circulating among the poorer claffes of the people. The unexampled obscurity with with which this fcheme is defcribed, muft be our excufe if we have not been able to feize a very diftinct view of all its parts. The funding fyftem, according to Citizen Toulongeon, ought to be abandoned, as being an expedient rather than a refource, and as impofing the neceflity of finding means to pay what has been previously borrowed during the emergency of affairs. But the difficulty is to find a fubftitute for this policy; and he recommends, that, instead of always borrowing, a great and wealthy state fhould fo arrange matters as always to lend. In his way of viewing the fubject, nothing can be more easy. The nation has only to lend its domains to fuch perfons as can prove that their privatė fortunes are equal in value to the capital which they obtain from

the

the public, and can thus give good fecurity for the payment of intereft or rent, as well as for the payment of the value of the principal itself, when the exigencies of the state may demand its restoration. Thus, if a war breaks out, the nation has occafion for a confiderable proportion of the whole capital, and demands an equal fhare from each debtor, or draws a bill upon him. This every one will receive, from knowing that all the public debtors have property to at leaf double the amount of the greatest fum for which the government can iffue drafts upon them. The expences of a war do not require very great fums immediately on its breaking out; the debtors will, therefore, have warning to raise the money required of them, even fhould payment of the bills be demanded. But our author holds it to be clear, that the public confidence in the goodness of thofe bills, will circulate them for fo long a period, that, before any payments can be demanded, the operations of finking funds, &c. will have enabled government to retire all the paper. Such is the fubftance of the fcheme in fo far as we have been lucky enough to unravel it; and its fundamental poftulate--the affumption, that government fets out with a clear lift and a capital in national property, equal to the whole expences of the most difficult emergency, is a fufficient excufe for our paffing over the details without any further remark.

It is by the wonderful paper system which fuch a plan must create, that our author expects the great object will be accomplifhed, of banifhing fpecie money from the dealings of the wealthy claffes, and confining it to the hands of the common people. Government will only have to admit paper money in the payment of the revenue, both in delivery of the ultimate produce by the general tax-gatherers, and in the first payments made by the partial tax-gatherers, and then all will arrange itself as the theory of citizen Toulongeon requires; the paper money will never reach the small tranfactions of the common people; they will be obliged to have fpecie, or to want money altogether; and they will be enabled to retain what they get; because, only paying it as tax-money to perfons who can pay in paper to the central bureaus, they will immediately receive it again in circulation.

The thoughtlessness of all the parts of this reafoning, is, we believe, entirely without parallel in the most unthinking political pamphlet that ever called itself a plan. Affuredly, the author has complied in all strictnefs with the principle which he lays down for the fcience of finance- Qu'elle ne doit pas s'elever plus haut que celle des quatre regles de l'arithmetique.' He has made fure of not going beyond thofe rules, by taking care not to reach

them.