Law. By establishing a bank of a particular kind, which he seems to
have imagined might issue paper to the amount of the whole value of all
the lands in the country, he proposed to remedy this want of money. It
was afterwards adopted, with some variations, by the Duke of Orleans, at
that time Regent of France. The idea of the possibility of multiplying
paper to almost any extent, was the real foundation of what is called
the Mississippi scheme, the most extravagant project both of banking and
stockjobbing, that perhaps the world ever saw. The principles upon
which it was founded are explained by Mr. Law himself, in a discourse
concerning money and trade, which he published in Scotland when he first
proposed his project. The splendid but visionary ideas which are set
forth in that and some other works upon the same principles, still
continue to make an impression upon many people, and have perhaps,
in part, contributed to that excess of banking which has of late been
complained of both in Scotland and in other places.' The Mississippi
scheme, it is well known, ended in France in the bankruptcy of the
public treasury, the crush of thousands and thousands of private
fortunes, and scenes of desolation and distress equal to those of an
invading army, burning and laying waste all before it.
At the time we were funding our national debt, we heard much about 'a
public debt being a public blessing'; that the stock representing it was
a creation of active capital for the aliment of commerce, manufactures,
and agriculture.
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