And the main question earlier than which all others sink and vanish in significance, is this.-Is the circulation of the nation to be left free; is the amount of it to be accommodated to the total wants and calls for of the neighborhood upon mere reference to these demands? It will be nonetheless insisted, that if taxes and levies have decreased, foreign money ought to lower proportionably;-and if taxes and levies had been the only real standards for the just quantity of our forex, the conclusion cannot be resisted: but the true criterion of the quantity of a forex is not the mere quantity of levies and taxes, but the amount of the entire income of a rustic, and its whole exchangeable value in labour, produce, and manufacture.-The Question then is, has the national earnings increased or decreased for the reason that diminution of taxes and levies? I now then beg go away to return to my citation from the Bullion Report of 1810. I beg leave to substitute Increase of Taxes to Excess of Currency, as the reason for the rise of prices-after which I argue with the Report, that within the occasion of prices being significantly augmented in one Country by an incredible enhance of taxes, whilst no related improve has led to an identical rise of prices in a neighbouring Country, the price of gold will now not continue to bear the identical relative value in the 2 Countries as earlier than.

I consider, in a mixt currency of Gold and Paper, the Gold will never continue its circulation with paper, unless the Gold truly preponderates; as was the case before the warfare, when Gold in circulation was within the ratio of 25 to 10. Upon this principle, a Bullion Bank, if made on a scale sufficiently intensive, may be productive of a lot benefit; and if the Bank be obliged to purchase all Gold always at a value which allows for the operation of our taxation, perhaps we may acquire our object, and it will produce no distinction in point of profit to the nation, whether an ideal mass of Gold be preserved in depot within the Bank, or dispersed in circulation as a substitute of paper. They then ship in giant quantities of Notes to the Bank, and receive bullion for them at 3l. 17s. 10½d. and they then oblige the Bank to re-buy the identical bullion at 4l. an ounce. Or is it to be progressively diminished, in order with much less open and apparent violence to force the value of Gold all the way down to the Mint value of coin and Bank Notes?

As the French take a seignorage of their Coin, of above 7 per cent, they will not be at a loss for similar operations, if we must be absurd sufficient to bind down hereafter the current price of our Coin or the worth of bullion to the Mint worth. 1 s. an ounce could also be a good experiment; and if adhered to at that price, without any contraction of circulation, however with an encouragement to the banks to reply the calls for of the home market in low cost with liberality, and an assurance to the public that this precept will in no case be departed from; it might result in a conses to 1810 inclusive; and within the five years subsequent; and in addition the quantity of the levies in the 5 years previous to 1810, and in the 5 years subsequent.