ness.

Credit, Gold and Silver.

SYSTEM OF FINANCE.

Cash and Credit are two main ingredients of commercial busiCash is essential when there is no faith. Credit is employed when ability and integrity are acknowledged. The proportion of cash and of credit that is requisite at any time or place to do a judicious business, depends upon the degree of faith in the ability and integrity of the party asking for credit, to perform the promise of payment in cash at maturity.

Standing on the position of first principles, it is plainly seen that the wants of a civil community are supplied by various agents, that of money having no part or lot in the matter. The first wants are food, clothing and shelter. Food is obtained by agriculture, clothing by manufacture, and shelter by mechanic arts. Industry in each one of these spheres supplies the wants in each other, by the primitive mode of commerce-the exchange of the superabundance of food for sufficient clothing and shelter; the superabundance of clothing for sufficient food and shelter; and superabundance of shelter for sufficient food and clothing.

Exchange then was, and it still is the medium principle on which business transactions were and are conducted. This medium principle sprang into being through the co-operation of two laws : credit and necessity-credit given by the farmer to the mechanic, for the food of which the mechanic was in absolute want; credit given by the mechanic to the farmer for clothing and shelter, of which the farmer was in absolute want.

But after the primitive wants of food, clothing and shelter were supplied, and a superabundance of all these products were obtained, a passion for luxurious superfluities arose, a demand was made for spices and perfumes, "purple and fine linen," marble and mahagony, and also for gold and silver. These luxurious superfluities were considered a secondary necessity to those who became habituated to them, and who were able from the superabundance of their houses, lands and products, to exchange their sur plus proceeds, for supplies of these articles, including gold and silver; and here again credit co operated with the new necessity to bring about an exchange of food, machinery, &c., for gold, silver, &c.

Yet gold and silver were not good to eat, even for Midas whose food, as every thing he touched turned into gold, with which wonderful fortune he died a miserable death by starvation.

Gold and silver clothing would be more endurable than gold and silver food, though at best inconvenient and uncomfortable.

Houses full of gold and silver were suggested by the Simon mixed Balaam of old, who tried to use the Holy Spirit as an agent in obtaining for himself pecuniary glory, but the nearest practical approach that gold and silver have made to food, clothing and shelter, is as articles to eat with, as ornaments on tables, persons and houses.

Still gold and silver please the eye, and as their greatest virtue is their good looks, they were sent out by their owners for the purpose of circulating as mediums through whose instrumentality articles of more importance could be obtained. They gained credit, were acknowledged as having great extrinsic if not intrinsic merit. The fashion of society stamped them with peculiar value, and raised them as standards. They became objects of idolatry, the dual God of this world-the almighty dollar.

Credit for food, for clothing, and for shelter, could not then be gained without the intercession of this omnipotent though spiritless dust. The heart of man was set on an ornamental mineral. He who carried not the ornament, was compelled to bear disgrace. Honesty and genius were forced to die in want at the door of the rich and soulless Dives. Faith in industry, talent and integrity, were lost under the dominion of Mexican gold and silver, as in Spain. The tyranny of money enslaved the liberty of credit. civil war for the freedom of the poor against the oppressions of the rich arose, and this struggle, renewed through centuries with varying fortunes, unto the present day, is still maintained by the necessity and spirit of the people.

A

A few years ago, the people of Missouri felt the necessity of Railroad improvements to develop their resources, and gave evidence of a spirited determination to realize their wishes; but they had gold and silver enough only to start the enterprise. They called upon the State for credit. They felt the full force of their necessities, and displayed an indomitable spirit to supply them. The State yielded to their demand, and granted them $8,250,000 of credit, to aid them in their Railroad improvements. This was a triumph of an oppressed people struggling with a rich State,

and the State did great honor to itself in granting credit to its people. This policy was both liberal and judicious. It gave freedom to the enterprising energy of the people, and stimulated them in the career of independence, while it made a profitable investment for the interests, and secured the faith of the State.

Now the question arises how shall this State credit be employed, in order to realize the greatest immediate profit, and at the same time to insure the firmest ultimate credit among the people?

The constitution of the State prohibits the incorporation of more than one Banking Company. The statute of the State prohibits Individual Banking, and also prohibits the circulation within the State of Bank notes of other States.

But the people want good notes, and so great is this want that they daily violate the law to obtain even those that are not good. This law has, in this respect, become a dead letter. The bad notes of other States come to Msssouri, and take away the gold and silver from the people, while the private Banking prohibition is enforced. By which means the people risk the evils, and lose the profits of the system. While these unfortunate results are springing from commercial necessities under the present law; why may not the law be modified so as to avoid the evils, and realize the profits of an ordinary system of finance? Why may not good notes, protected by State security, private responsibility, and a certain safe proportion of gold and silver, be issued by individual citizens and private partnerships in the State, with authority of law? Since the present law has lost all force against foreign interests, why should it be maintained against domestic interests? Why should the capite lists of Missouri be prevented from furnishing the people with a sound currency, when the same people are daily dependent on foreign capitalists, whose currency is below par, because it is foreign.

Let the present statute be modified to suit the wants of the people; then they would realize the greatest immediate profit from the State credit; the State would raise the credit of the people, while securing additional value to its own; the notes of other States would be returned home, and the gold and silver, which they have taken from, would be returned to Missouri; money would become safe and plenty; manufactures would arise; business be more and more active; farmers would increase their fortunes; and Railroad enterprises, which above all others need this aid, would be

driven on with redoubled force. The system of finance here suggested may be easily realized.

Let the constitution of Missouri be maintained, and the statute only amended, granting the privilege of individual banking with a certain safe proportion of public securities, private responsibilities and gold and silver. Let the capitalists of Missouri issue notes protected by this three-fold security, that by these notes the credit of the State and its gold and silver may come home to and co-operate with the credit of the people; and, together with the establishment of such a system, let the absolute law of interest be repealed, and the cause of manufactures promoted; then credit, gold and silver will all be realized in more abundance by all the people of the State, and every germ of their prosperity grow with new impulses of life.

These are intended only as general suggestions of relief arising from the oppressive wants of the people. This subject will be discussed pro and con more thoroughly in some future number of the JOURNAL.

ARTICLE VI.

Manufacture of Stone.

BY LOUIS S. ROBBINS, ESQ., OF NEW YORK.

The preparation of stone for building houses and other elegant and substantial structures, has for ages been both a difficulty and a desideratum.

Stone is the most natural and the most endurable material for architecture.

The temples and the pyramids of Egypt are venerable witnesses of the superiority of this material over wood or clay, corroborating by their testimony, what the common sense of mankind freely acknowledges.

But the mechanic arts of the Egyptians were more mysterious than their hieroglyphics. Their writings have been deciphered,

but their science in architecture remains inscrutable.

The principles on which they prepared, and especially by which they raised the solid rock of obelisk, like a tower piercing the clouds, and by which they built the mountain like monuments of their splendor, were lost with the people who employed them, and

have not yet been re-discovered, even among the astonishing inventions of modern civilization.

The spirit of discovery in the present age has been directed to the invention of machinery to meet present wants. Thoughts of the distant future, of the erection of material monuments, which will tell throughout all ages with a single glance the condition of refinement in society at the present time these thoughts are all overclouded by the passion for immediate gain and amusement. But the time has come when more liberal and enlightened views should be taken, when at least future good should be considered in intimate connection with present gain, when firm stability should be appreciated as strongly as fair appearance, when the principles of solidity and grandeur should be exemplified in architecture as well as in intelligence, at the expense both of affectation and of

stucco.

Stucco in architecture and affectation in intelligence are both ephemeral; they cannot stand the test of time, and although they are tinsel ornaments, they are at the same time indications of a dawning taste for a more brilliant and substantial refinement, as the first faint rays of the morning give promise of the glorious day approaching.

The day has now dawned when stucco in architecture must fade away in the broad light of brilliant and substantial stone structures. In fact brick itself, with or without stucco, must yield the palm to

stone.

Within the fire limits of cities, wood is already superceded. Brick and stone are, by virtue of law, arising from the danger of wood, left as the sole rival building materials. On account of the primary cheapness of brick, and the passion for the highest immediate income from buildings, brick has heretofore been almost universally employed and stone neglected in architecture. But a greater foresight is now being awakened, a better feeling is now being cultivated, a stronger regard for ultimate profit, and a finer taste for elegant stability is now really entertained; and, with all these evidences of progress in the Fine Art of Architecture, cheapness of price in the preparation of stone for building purposes,. which is now obtained by the aid of inventions in machinery, must give additional impulse to the public mind for the demand of stone as a building material. The good sense and the fine taste of the community must become a law unto itself, by virtue of which brick