by the application of industry, talent, and capital, to make the most of them for its own consumption, leaving at the same time the greatest possible remainder or surplus, to be given in exchange for any other commodities produced more easily, more abundantly, or of better quality, in other districts of the world. It is thus that a country is enriched by commerce. Apply this doctrine to Britain. Much is required for the subsistence, comfort, enjoyment, and luxury of her people. If she could not or would not procure salt meat from Ireland, in which, say, from its superior pasture one acre will feed as many cattle as two acres will feed in England, it is evident that if the same quantity of meat be consumed, a larger portion of the soil must be allotted to pasture, and consequently less of corn, hops, or some other article of present growth would be raised. So if Britain resolve, instead of importing sugar, to make it from beet root, sweet maple-tree, or any other vegetables which could be raised at home, she must allot a great portion of her soil to their growth, and after all have very little sugar, and much less of other produce which she now has, with an abundant supply of sugar. The same observation will apply to hemp, or to any other article principally imported from other countries. Every addition to the productions of a country, whether ultimately consumed at home or not, adds equally to its means of commercial exchange with other countries. To improve agriculture therefore is to extend commerce, and every new channel opened to commerce affords additional encouragement to agriculture. It is thus that they both contribute to the wealth of a country, and the improvement of that wealth is most effectually consulted by leaving every part of the world at liberty to raise those productions, for which its soil and climate are best adapted.

"Yet such is the barbarian ignorance or detestable

policy, which presides in the councils of France, and sways those of Continental Europe, that we are boastingly told of whole districts in Italy and Provence, naturally fertile in other rich productions, being devoted to raising at a vast expense a little very bad cotton. We hear of princes in Germany devising wretched substitutes for coffee, or planting forests of sweet-maple, and sinking great capitals in the erection of works for the manufacturing of sugar; and all this, at the same time that the natural productions of their agriculture, those best suited to their soil and climate, in exchange for which sugar and coffee might be procured in abundance, are rotting in the fields for want of a market. If it were in the nature of violent passions and headstrong power to take lessons from experience, Buonaparte would perhaps begin to perceive that the mercantile superiority, for which he envies and hates Britain, grows, not so much out of her commercial regulations, as of her system of Laws, which affords perfect protection to property, admits of no degrading distinctions in society, encourages industry, fosters genius, and excites emulation; and is supported by that moral, manly, and national character of her people, which is only another of the many advantages derived from that system; that the wealth which is employed in commerce is the result of long accumulation uninterrupted by popular violence or arbitrary exactions; that so long as these blessings are continued to her on the one hand, and as on the other his warlike pursuits abroad and capricious regulations at home, conspire to drive commerce from Continental Europe, the capitals engaged in trade must seek protection and employment in England; and that whilst he is thus engaged in adding incalculably to the misery of Europe, by debarring it more and more from the benefits and enjoyments which commercial intercourse affords to mankind, the blow aimed at Britain is coun

teracted by the course which he pursues; and her national capital and resources are upon the whole increased by the very system on which he has founded the vain hope of reducing her either to submission or to ruin."

In this manner does Mr. Huskisson's pamphlet "prove that the French decrees have already destroyed Britain;" and we shall see that in the same way her unfavorable balance of trade and course of exchange, and her recent mercantile failures, "are brought forward as demonstrations of her universal ruin." On the subject of the depressed rate of exchange, as proceeding from the depreciation of Bank of England paper owing to its excessive issues, Mr. Huskisson's remarks are peculiarly important and interesting.

2d. See the pamphlet, preface, pp. xvii. xviii. and the body of the work, pp. 1, 11, 13, 24, 29, 47, 80, 124, 126, for the following extracts: "When the great fall in foreign exchanges first took place, I imputed it to the violent political and commercial measures on the European continent, and the suspension of commercial intercourse with the United States. But the continuance of that fall convinced me that it was caused by the Bank of England too much extending its issues of paper; the exchanges growing worse and the price of gold rising in England, although her expedition to Continental Europe was ended, and her subsidies to Austria discontinued. The proofs of the position, that the low rate of foreign exchange is occasioned by the depreciation of Bank of England paper, owing to its excessive issues, shall be given at full, and in detail.

Money is sometimes called the representative of all commodities; sometimes the common measure of them: neither of these definitions is correct. Money possesses intrinsic value. The quality of representing commodities does not necessarily imply intrinsic va

lue; because that quality may be given by confidence or authority. The quality of being a common measure does not necessarily imply intrinsic value, any more than the possession of a foot-rule implies the power of acquiring what it can measure. Money, or a given quantity of gold or silver, is not only the common measure and common representative of all other commodities; but also the common and universal equivalent. Paper currency has no intrinsic value. A promissory note represents value only as it is an undertaking to pay in money the sum for which it is issued. The money, or coin of a country, is so much of its capital; paper-money is no part of its capital: it is so much of its circulating credit. Whoever buys gives, whoever sells receives such a quantity of pure gold or silver as is equivalent to the article bought or sold; or if he gives or receives paper instead of money, he gives or receives that which is valuable only as it stipulates the payment of a given quantity of gold or silver. So long as this engagement is punctually fulfilled, paper will pass current with the coin for which it is constantly exchangeable. Both money, and paper promissory of money, are common measures, and representatives of the value of all commodities. But money alone is the universal equivalent; paper currency is the representative of that money. There are two sorts of paper-currency; one resting on confidence, the other on authority. Paper resting on confidence is circulating credit, and consists in engagements for the payments on demand, of any given sums of money; which engagements, from a general trust in the issuers of such paper, they are enabled to substitute for money in the transactions of the community. Paper resting on authority is called paper-money, and consists in engagements issued and circulated under the sanction and by the immediate power of the government. Paper, such as alone used to be current in Britain before the

bank-restriction-act in 1797, was circulating credit. The paper current in Austria, Prussia, France, &c. is paper-money. Price is the value of any given article in the currency, by reference to which that article is measured; and must of course be varied by any variation in the quantity of gold or silver contained in such currency; the changes in the size, alloy, stamp, &c. of the coin, not affecting the relation which the value of the bullion contained in the coin bears to that of other commodities; all of which are measured in value by the quantity of bullion, whether in coin or not, for which they are exchangeable. There being no difference between any given coin and an uncoined piece of the same metal of equal weight and fineness; except that the quantity of bullion contained in the coin is ascertained, and proclaimed to the world by the stamp of coinage. In Britain gold is the scale to which all prices are referred; and by 39th Geo. 3d. the only legal tender, except for payments under £25. A pound weight of gold of English standard is coined into 444 guineas; any one may at the king's mint procure any quantity of gold to be so coined, free of expense; the officers of the mint being obliged to return in coin the same quantity of bullion which had been deposited with them, without making any charge for converting it into money. By law, these guineas, which when fresh from the mint weigh 5 dwts. 939 grs. each, cease to be a legal tender when reduced below 5 dwts. 8 grs. a diminution in their value of a little more than one per cent. Hence before 1797, the law secured in the payment of all legal debts, that no one could be compelled to take less than 5 dwts. 8 grs. of gold of standard fineness for every guinea; and of course, that he should not be compelled to receive as the representative of a guinea, or a guinea's worth, any article which would not purchase that quantity of gold. In 1797, the Bank of England was