The
people who receive what they earn in a currency they hold in contempt,
are more anxious to spend than to save; and those who formerly hoarded
six liards or twelve sols pieces with great care, would think it folly to
hoard an assignat, whatever its nominal value. Hence the lower class of
females dissipate their wages on useless finery; men frequent
public-houses, and game for larger sums than before; little shopkeepers,
instead of amassing their profits, become more luxurious in their table:
public places are always full; and those who used, in a dress becoming
their station, to occupy the "parquet" or "parterre," now, decorated
with paste, pins, gauze, and galloon, fill the boxes:--and all this
destructive prodigality is excused to others and themselves _"par ce que
ce n'est que du papier."_ [Because it is only paper.]--It is vain to
persuade them to oeconomize what they think a few weeks may render
valueless; and such is the evil of a circulation so totally discredited,
that profusion assumes the merit of precaution, extravagance the plea of
necessity, and those who were not lavish by habit become so through
their eagerness to part with their paper. The buried gold and silver
will again be brought forth, and the merchant and the politician forget
the mischief of the assignats. But what can compensate for the injury
done to the people? What is to restore their ancient frugality, or
banish their acquired wants? It is not to be expected that the return
of specie will diminish the inclination for luxury, or that the human
mind can be regulated by the national finance; on the contrary, it is
rather to be feared, that habits of expence which owe their introduction
to the paper will remain when the paper is annihilated; that, though
money may become more scarce, the propensities of which it supplies the
indulgence will not be less forcible, and that those who have no other
resources for their accustomed gratifications will but too often find
one in the sacrifice of their integrity.
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