of Mr. Morgan. By Daniel Wakefield, Esq. 8vo. pp. 70, Is. 6d. Rivingtons. 1797. Mr. W. begins this pamphlet with observations on the expences of the war. With what propriety,' he demands, can my Lord Lau, derdale and Mr. Morgan compare the expences of the present war with that of queen Anne? Those of George II. and the American war? when the experience of every house-keeper proves, that three hundred a year now will scarcely go as far as two hundred a year twenty years ago, when it is known that an hundred a year at the revolution would support an establishment as large as five hundred a year now, It is unreasonable to suppose, that the expences of go vernment alone should stand still.'-He notices some variations between Mr. Morgan's statements and those of the Select Committee; and he does not pass without animadversion the error committed by Lord Lauderdale, of 18,000,000l. in stating the sums raised in 1796. Mr. W. bestows high commendations on the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for his system with regard to the navy debt, and for the bargains that he has made for the loans during the war :-he is of opinion, (and, we think, justly,) that Mr. Morgan, when comparing the increase of taxes during the administration of Mr. Pitt with their increase in other administrations, should have noticed the constant supplies that Mr. Pitt has given to the sinking fund, far greater than any other minister has ever done, and the provision which he has made for discharging the capital of all new loans, in about 46 years, by raising one per cent. in addition to the interest on them. A letter from the author has informed us of the following errors of the press, which have been observed in this performance since its publication; Page 8 line 12, for accelerate increase read accelerate the increase 33 21, for 4,924,214 read 4,909,699 23, for 1,763,786 read 1,778,301 38 note, for 1,403,537 read 1,404,408 46 line 17, for Ordnance do. 4,610,246 read Ordnance do. 69 136,780 1, for 247,634,961 read 217,636,962 1797. Art. 37. An Essay on the English National Credit: or an Attempt to remove the Apprehensions of those who have Money in the English Funds. By C. L. A. Patje, President of the Board of Commerce and Finance at Hanover. 8vo. fs. Marsh. The translator of this work is the Rev. Herb. Marsh, the translator of Michaëlis and the opponent of Travis; and he assures us that he has received no small consolation from the present essay. Mr. Patje is certainly an ingenious reasoner. His arguments are always speciQus, but we have not found them often convincing. He begins with cautioning the persons to whom he addresses himself against being deceived by alarming expressions. It is true (says he) that they are heard even in the British parliament: but we must recollect that in this public assembly the passions are continually in agitation, and it is not to be expected from men heated by party spirit, that their representations should never exceed the bounds of strict accuracy. Further, Further, be it observed, that those very declarations which are now heard in the British parliament, are nothing new: for an hundred years ago, when the national debt was only seventeen millions, the same dreadful picture was drawn of England, and the same prophecies of approaching ruin were pronounced, as in the present crisis, when the debt amounts to nearly four hundred millions.' From this remark, we do not think any great consolation can be drawn. Whatever may be derived from it might be derived if our debt, instead of being 400 millions, were 400,000 millions. Whatever may have been the fate of former predictions, it cannot be denied that the nation must become bankrupt, (that is, unable to pay either the capital or the interest of her debts,) if she proceeds in the accumulation of them as she has done during the last five years.-Mr. P. then explains, what is universally known in Great Britain, that as long as we pay the interest of our debt, (of the greater part of it, at least,) we perform all that the public creditor can lawfully demand. The grand question, (says he,) is the following. Is there sufficient reason to apprehend either a suspicion in the payments of the halfyearly dividends, or a diminution of their value? What may happen at a distant period, it is impossible to calculate in the present moment; and therefore the inquiry must be wholly confined to the duration of the present war, and of the peace which will immediately follow it. How long the war will continue between England and France is uncertain, and therefore no one can exactly determine what interest England will have to pay after the conclusion of it. But, be that as it may, sooner or later peace must be made ; and if we may reasonably expect, that at that period the English nation will still be able to continue the regular payments of the halfyearly dividends, we have as much consolation as we ought to expect. No man, who has lent money to another, should say, it is true that my interest is regularly paid at present, but it may be otherwise an hundred years hence: and it is surely irrational to be anxiously concerned for distant possibilities, or to be uneasy, because a capital now in the funds may not last there for ever. As it is uncertain how long the war will continue, and therefore uncertain what addition will be made before the peace to the national debt, it will be said perhaps, that during even the present war the debt may receive a very alarming augmentation. It is true that it may, but no one can affirm that it will: and when an event is uncertain, or the chances are equal on both sides, we have no more reason to prognosticate evil, than to prognosticate good. Besides, in the present case there is really more foundation for the opinion that a peace will soon be concluded, than that the war will last for many years. Let us suppose then, that at the end of the present war the national debt amounts to four hundred millions. To pay the additional interest additional taxes must be levied : for the interest cannot be de frayed by loans, without bringing the nation to ruin. Now it is generally supposed that the taxes are already so high in England, that an augmentation sufficient to defray the interest of the augmented capital, would be impracticable. But this is a mistake: for, in the 15 first first place, the taxes are not so high in England as they appear to be; and secondly, productive sources of taxation are still remaining.' When this gentleman asserts that our taxes are not so high as they appear to be, he either means nothing or asserts what is not true. The taxes of this country are high, whether estimated by the property from which they are paid, or compared with the taxes that are paid or ever have been paid in any age by any people. That sources of taxation are still remaining we admit, because a considerable quantity of property still remains: but this is not the only branch of the question. Mr. P. then proceeds- The next thing to be considered is, whether these taxes are capable of such an augmentation as will be sufficient to defray the increased interest of the national debt at the conclusion of the present war. As long as the money which is raised in taxes flows again into the circulating mass from which it was drawn, the сараbility of augmentation is so great that it would be difficult to assign a limit: as, on the other hand, the deepest source will be gradually exhausted from which water is continually drawn, but to which none returns. A certain country, which makes a part of the Germanic empire, though its resources are numerous, is now actually on the decline, and for no other reason, than because a too strict economy is observed in the public expenditure, and too little is brought again into circulation. This is an error which is not committed in England, where the nation and the government are continually giving and receiving, where both parties give much, and both parties receive much; and, as long as the receipt of the nation keeps pace with its expenditure, it is immaterial what it gives, since the equilibrium is still preserved.' We are surprised to find such a writer as Mr. Fatje fall into so gross and exploded an error as the above passage contains. According to this doctrine, if an highwayman (we mean nothing disrespect-. ful to any government) should meet a shoemaker and rob him of ten pounds, the latter would have no reason for complaint, provided the robber laid out the whole of the money with him in the purchase of shoes. In this case, the shoemaker would certainly be less injured than if the money were laid out with another,' exactly by the difference of the profit that he would have on ten pounds worth of his goods. In the one instance, he would be deprived of ten pounds clear; in the other, of no more than so much of his labour and commodities as he could afford to sell for that sum. It is the same with governments in respect to taxation. (We hope it will be understood that we mean nothing more than to illustrate our argument.) If the people pay to government one million, they are less injured, if that million be laid out with or expended on them, than if it were carried to a foreign country, not by the whole sum, as many imagine, but by the profit which they would have on it: for if it were all expended in a foreign country, it is not to be supposed that the labour and the commodity which would have been given for it, if expended at home, will be of no value or find no market. The people first pay a million in taxes to the government; and, to get that million returned to them, they barter for it as much of their labour and property as would at any time produce to them 8 or 900,000l.; and this is what Mr. P. denominates denominates giving and receiving.'-In our opinion, the nation ap pears to be the only true donor: that which it gives is given gratis: that which the government gives is given for value. Mr. P. does not consider that what is paid in taxes goes, in general, to the support of idle and useless persons; and that it would otherwise have been applied either to augment the comforts of the industrious and deserving, or to increase the productive capital of the country. The next argument of Mr. P. is that the commerce of England will keep pace with the accumulation of her debts.-It is possible that this may happen. We, however, have our apprehensions; and they arise from the vigorous and uniform policy of France to exclude us from all the continental markets; from the pressure of taxes that will increase the money price but not the real price of labour, and will give a manifest advantage to the manufacturers of other countries; and from the exorbitant price of all the necessaries and moderate luxuries of life, occasioned by the same taxes, that will urge the proprietors of small capitals and small fortunes to emigrate to France or America, and will compel those who have no other fortune than the wages of their labour to go where it will procure for them a more comfortable subsistence. pro Another source of consolation to Mr. P. is, that, as a considerable addition is made annually to the quantity of money which circulates in the world, England will by the balance of trade receive her portion constantly; the value of money will be therefore diminishing, whereas the interest of the debt remains unaltered.-This cause might, indeed, in an hundred years, have the same effect on our funds that a movement of Tippoo Saib's army, or a revolution in San Marino, would produce in ten minutes. Speaking of the Imperial Loans, Mr. P. observes, the money which has been transmitted to the Emperor has been advanced by way of loan; and a loan does not imply the total loss of the capital. With the following extract, we conclude this article. That the whole money expended in the prosecution of the present war is not an absolute loss to England, will appear from the following consideration. Let us suppose that the war had not taken place, but that the French West India islands, the annual produce of which the French estimated at an hundred and eighty millions of livres, the half of St. Domingo, the Dutch West India possessions, with their setslements in Ceylon, and the Cape of Good Hope, had been offered to the English for sale, and that the sum demanded was an hundred millions of pounds sterling; would the English have hesitated to make the purchase: and if government had not been provided with a sufficient quantity of ready money, would they have scrupled to borrow it? But if the English would have readily paid an hundred millions to obtain those possessions by purchase, why should they repent of the sums which they have expended in the present war, when by those very sums the above-mentioned possessions have been obtained? It is true that the English do not go so rashly to work as the French with the incorporation of conquered countries; and it is one thing to conquer, another to retain. But if the advocates of the French nation will not admit the supposition that the Netherlands and and the French conquests in Italy should ever be restored to their former sovereigns, why shall we suppose that the English must restore their conquests? And, if no force can oblige the French to give up their acquisitions on the continent, I should be glad to know what force can oblige the English to abandon their acquisitions in the East and West Indies. The barbarous ravagers on the defenceless coasts of Sierra Leone and Newfoundland, the wind-defying adventurers in Bantry Bay, the Dutch fleet moored within the Texel, and the Spanish armada cruising off. Cape St. Vincent, have afforded no reason to believe, that the English will soon be driven from every quarter of the globe. The English nation therefore is in the situa tion of a debtor who has considerably increased his debts, but at the same time has made a proportional increase of his capital. Consequently, the creditors of the English nation have no more to apprehend at present, than they had before the augmentation of the debt." Art. 38. Read or be ruined! containing some few Observations on the Cause of the Commencement,-of the distastrous Progress,and of the ruinous Expences of the present War; with a serious Call on the Stock-holders in the British Funds, to forego the Receipts of a Part of their Dividends for a stated Period, as the only possible Mode of rendering their Property secure, as well as of saving their Country. Also a Plan for discharging the National Debt in 55 Years, and yet immediately ameliorating the distressed Situation of the middling and inferior Classes of the People of Great Britain, by commencing its Operation with the Abolition Annum. 8vo. pp.73. of Taxes to the Amount of ten Millions 2s. Jordan. per This writer ventures to differ completely with the prince of our political philosophers, Adam Smith. He boldly asserts that, in the present distressed state of our finances, national economy would be national ruin. Were every person in Great Britain' says he, connected with government, to live, no matter whether by choice, or by necessity, on half his income, our internal trade would be ruined: the list of bankrupts would increase an hundred fold; and additional taxes, to the amount of several millions, would be annually required to fill up the chasms in the revenue occasioned by such economical experiments. Should a retrenchment of enormous salaries on sinecure places, and a lopping off of heavy pensions, compel people of the first fashion to curtail their household expences, thousands of other families, from motives of prudence, might be glad of the favourable opportunity of following the examples of those who become economical merely from compulsion, and what, then, would become of our taxes on articles of luxury? And if the manufacturer, the cultivator, and the merchant, pay such wages to those employed by them as will enable those to support the duties levied on articles of absolute necessity? Or how will the manufacturer, the cultivator, or the merchant, be enabled to employ those men at all? Did national economy ever increase the trade and manufactures of any country? Was luxury, and dissipation ever more triumphant than |