tion in, and responsibility for, Houses may have done, will be a those acts; an assumption which party to no such transaction; & this House indignantly disclaims. transaction which, without the VIII. That, as to the measure, grossest partiality, must lead to proposed by the Committee, ofcausing the Bank to pay in bullion, at certain rates, making the bullion of price, if paid for in Bank Notes, higher than if paid for in gold coin, it is, at once, an abandonment of all the pretensions, maintained by the Bank and its advocates from the day of the stoppage until now; seeing that it declares openly, that Bank Notes are depreciated, and that they are at a discount, even when paid to the ulterers themselves. That this act, the receiving of its own notes at a discount; making the holders bate something of the value at which they have received notes; putting forth a note of a certain nominal value, and taking it back at a less nominal value: that this has always, in all countries, been deemed thestrongest evidence of commercial turpitude. That this act is sometimes committed covertly by fraudulent merchants, who cause their paper to be bought up at a discount by other persons; but, for the issuer to purchase it himself, in his own behalf, at his own dwelling, and in his proper person, has hitherto been a flight too high for the most daringswind. ler to attempt to take: And yet, that it is now proposed that the Bank shall be permitted to do this, and that, too, under the sanction of an act of parliament. IX. That this House, notwithstanding any thing that former the permitting of other Companies, and also to individuals, taking dis counts on their notes and bills in a similar way; and thus, in a short time, to contract debts and then to get into discredit, would become the easiest and safest mode of se curing the possession of wealth; and this would amount to a ba nishment of all love of fair-dealing and of integrity from amongst men. X. That, however, besides the open avowal of depreciation in the paper of the Bank; besides the intended scandalous traffic in its own notes; besides all the shame and all the disgrace, which would attach themselves to an act of parliament, grounded on such a proposition: besides all these, the measure would fail of producing, or tending to produce, the effects, or any part of the effects, which the Select and Secret Committee profess to have principally, and immediately, in view: the enabling of the Bank to resume cashpayments and to proceed in the same way that it proceeded in, before the year 1797. 4 XI. That, in order to show that the proposed measure would so fail, it is necessary to take a more comprehensive view of the subject than the Committee appear to have thought it its duty to take. XII. That money, like every other political invention, is a good or an evil according to the effect | ject of gold payments, or an apwhich it has upon the community; pearance of gold payments, seem and, that, therefore, if a paper. money were as good in its effects as a money of gold, there would be no need to endeavour to change the nature of the money now in circulation. That, therefore, this House must take it for granted, that a paper-money is not so good as a gold money; and hence comes the laudable desire to introduce the latter instead of the former. XIII. That the object is, then, to obtain gold in exchange for a part, at least, of the paper now in circulation. The paper now in circulation is owed by, or lent by, the Bank. The Bank cannot, therefore, obtain gold with any part of this paper. It cannot obtain it with the paper it qwes gold for. It cannot obtain gold for the paper that it has lent; because, in order to do that, it must withdraw its loans, and lend no more; and then prices must fall so greatly as to produce universal ruin. 21: XIV. That, therefore, to obtain gold in addition to the gold already in its possession, the Bank must first add to the quantity of the paper now in circulation. This would raise prices, and, amongst other prices, the price of bullion. So that, if a discount of five pounds in the hundred will do now, a greater discount must be taken upon the paper taken in payment for the new Jy purchased gold. XV. That the Committee, with their eyes steadily fixed on the ob not to have noticed the other side of the difficulty; namely, the necessity of an immense quantity of circulating medium. They saw such quantity; but, they do not appear to have seen the necessity of it. What they propose is not payment, in the first instance; but, it is to produce a capacity to pay in the end; and this it is impossible to produce without a lessening of the quantity of the paper now in circulation; and this lessening cannot take place without the ruin of all the borrowers and debtors in the country. 1 XVI. That this House can easily see that an individual, owing a sum of money, and then issuing notes, and receiving their value, and then taking up these notes at a discount, and carrying on this traffic for four years, might gain enough by the traffic to pay his debt; but, this House also sees, that the Notes of the Bank are already issued, and that they must be taken up, if taken up with gold, before the Bank can purchase any gold to take them up with, unless additional notes be first issued, and then no lessening of the paper can take place. XVII. That this House perceives, that the persons must be few who will wish to possess gold in bars, or that can find the means of purchasing sixty ounces of gold in that state; but, as mere dealers în gold may be disposed to make such purchases, it is possible, that no little expedients, that no palliatives, can be of any use to the nation; and, therefore, it resolves to reject the proposition of its Com a, compulsory regulation of this XVIII. That this House is aware, that there exists an enormous amount of taxes; that these, though enormous, and though burdensome to a degree that discourages industry and drives the best labourers and most enterprizing farmers into foreign countries, are yet insufficient to satisfy the annual demands upon the Treasury; and that the Debt is continually augmenting, though in time of peace. That the real amount of these taxes, and the weight of their pressure, is augmented, and must always be augmented, by a lessening of the quantity of the circulating medium. That, therefore, every measure, which tends to the producing of cash-payments, unaccompanied with a reduction of taxes and a revision of contracts, must tend to an augmentation of the nation's miseries; and that, even if the present proposition were practicable, it would lead to ruin and convulsion. - Now, my good fellow, ifany man had moved these, or similar, Resolutions, would it have been doing nothing? They would not have passed; but they would have caused a debate; or, at least, they would have been published. The humbug would have received a blow in its passage. It would have gone forth with a cut on its forehead. But, no! The sluggish lumps of Shoy-hoys could not find a word to say. There are other parts of the Report well worthy of jest; but, I shall pass them over with the exception of what is said about the debt, due from the government to the Bank. Who is meant by "the "government," I wonder? What Debt can it owe to the Bank? And what has the Bank lent? There has always been a talk about this; and I will now explain what the vagabonds mean. The Boroughmongers, impatient to get public money into their hands, have, from time to time, borrowed of the Bank Company ás well as of others. They have, however, paid the Bank, in the same way that they have paid other lenders. They have given the Bank Exchequer Bills and Per Cents as they have given others. Others have lent them Bank Notes, and so has the Bank. What do " " they owe the Bank, then, that has any thing particular about it? The Bank is a fund-holder and so is that fool GREENHORN, but, what does the government owe the Bank different in its nature to what it owes GREENHORN? The latter may, if he can, sell his stock, and so may the Bank. This Committee has the wisdom to say, that, perhaps, the government may pay the Bank part of the debt due to it. How? Why in Bank Notes, to be sure. Aye, but then, if these Bank Notes be brought in by the tax gatherer, and given to the Bank for their own use, it will be payment indeed. And this would wipe off so much debt. Very true; but, then, the soldiers, or fundholders, or pensioners, must go unpaid to the amount of the Bank's demand! Or a loan must be made in order to pay the Bank, and that would leave the thing pretty nearly where it was. The property of the Bank consists of stock, and of merchants' promissory notes, and of Exchequer Bills. And its debts consist of Bank Notes. Ifit could get its property turned into gold at par, then it might, indeed, pay in specie. But, its property is just of the same quality as its Debts: the whole consists of paper promises to pay. The grand thing to bear in mind is, that the system has no remedy. It stands between the death-hammer of imitation and the deathhammer of low-prices. Every shrink it gives to avoid the one places it nearer the other. The Puff-out is continually threatening it; and low-prices crying out: "come this way, if you dare." However, this Report has done much. It has confirmed all niy predictions and doctrines relativé to the paper-system; and it has proved my opponents to be either fools or knaves. This is no small matter; and I am quite satisfied with the thing, as it now stands, for the present. The Boroughmongers will be crafty and cruel; but, they will be less daring than they have been of late years. The "sudden transi"tion from war to peace" has now been completely exploded. Long and long before their proposed five years are expired, the bubble and the bubblers will all be blown to dust. I see, that they have adopted a scheme of one RICARDO (I won. der what countryman he is), who is, I believe, a converted Jew. At any rate, he has been a 'ChangeAlley-man for the last fifteen or twenty years. If the Old Lord Chatham were now alive, he would speak with respect of the MUCKWORM, as he called the ChangeAlley-people. Faith! they are now become every thing. Baring assists at the Congress of Sovereigns, and Ricardo regulates things at home. The Muckworm is no longer a creeping thing; it rears its head aloft, and makes the haughty Borough Lords sneak about in holes and corners. Observe with what care Har 1 rowby and Castlereagh repeat, Bank was unable to face such a run. over and over again, that the Bank does not want to stop the payment of the fractions; that the Bank stands in need of no such mea sure; that the Bank has a plenty to meet all the demands on it This was said fifty times over, at least. Well, then, why pass such a Bill? Why hurry it through the houses with as much haste, as if it had been to secure the means of defending London against an enemy, who was marching on from Norwich? Why make the law as quickly as any despot can utter an edict? If the Bank had full coffers, why take effectual measures to prevent it from putting forth another bit of coin? I believe that the Bank has not half a million of real money. I pay no attention to any of their assertions, or their documents. These very Boroughmongers have been asserting, year after year, that the Bank would pay the next year. The Bank, while it went clandestinely to Pitt, and obtained a protection, declared most solemnly, in public, that it wanted no protection! After this, what a fool must that man be who can believe either of them! There is no reliance upon any thing they say; and we ought to form our opinions according to the evidence which their acts afford us. We see, that, if they had not passed the fraction Bill, the Bank would have been run upon for 300,000 or 400,000 pounds in gold; and, we have, therefore, to conclude, that the That is to say, that the Bank does not possess half a million in gold; and this is my firmly settled opi nion. The pretence, that this new stoppage was necessary, in order to facilitate a return to cash. payments is as false as the hearts of the fellows. It is impossi ble that it could have any such tendency; and this I have, in my last Register, proved as clear as day-light. It can have no such tendency. Besides, is it not évident, from the whole tenor of the scheme, that cash-payments are not intended? Is it not evident, that this bullion scheme is intended to let the thing gradually down? Do we not see, in the COURIER, and in other hired prints, paragraphs preaching up the doctrine of the inutility of a "metallic" money; of its costliness; and of the economy and convenience of a paper-money; " a well-regulated and solid paper"currency?" All these are symptoms of what is intended. No doubt the Boroughmen would gladly get back to a real money. But, they begin to see, that they never can. They are frightened, and they lie to their own hearts as well as to the world. This RICARDO says, that the country is happy in the discovery of a paper-money; that it is an improvement in political science. Now, if this be true, it would be better to have a paper-money in all countries. And what standard of value would there then be? It |