— 
LORD KING’S THOUGHTS ON RESTRICTION OF PAYMENTS IN SPECIE. 353 
Art. LVII. An Investigation into the Principles and Credit of the Circulation of Paper- 
money, or Bank Notes in Great Britain ; as protected or enforced by Legislative Authority 
under the Suspension of Paying them in Cash ; in the Extent of such Paper-money, the Re= 
sponsibility attached to it, and its Effects upon Prices of Commodities, individual Income, 
Agriculture, Manufactures, Commerce, and upon the Course of Exchange with Foreign 
Countries. Together with a Discussion of the Question, whether the Restraining Law in 
favour of the Bank of England from paying Notes in Money ought or ought not to be con 
tinued as a Measure of State? By Witttam Howison, £sg. 8vo. pp. 75. 
FORGETFUL of the old proverb, 
*that good wine needs no bush,’ Mr. 
Howison has given us an explanatory 
title page, in which he has taken care to 
omit no subject which is discussed in 
his pamphlet. 
_ The restriction bill, and the general 
principles of banking, have of late re- 
ceived a very ample and acute investi- 
gation ‘from various quarters; as we 
stated our opinion at large on the nature- 
of paper currency in our review of Mr. 
Thornton’s “ Enquiry, &c.”’ (See Ann. 
Rev. vol. I. p. 384.) we shall not repeat 
it here. Mr. Howison feels very sensi- 
bly the genera! alarm on the present al- 
most unlimited extension of paper credit, 
and reasons forcibly on the impolitic an- 
nulment of that law of William and 
Mary which prohibited the bank from 
advancing money to government, ex- 
cept on the credit of parliament. The 
restriction bill, if intended to be perma- 
nent, or even of indefinite duration, is 
severely to be reprobated: so long as 
it remains unrepealed, indeed, every 
bank of England note is stamped with a 
deliberate lie upon its face. The mea- 
sure, however, from the circumstances of 
the country at the time of its enactment, 
was generally thought to be necessary, 
and therefore it was defended. The 
subject cannot long lie neglected: it 
must come before the public again, and 
it will be discussed with a judgment ma- 
tured by time and sanctioned by expe- 
rience. 
The following passage will suffice to 
Arr. LVIII. 
_ WHETHER Lord King has yet ac- 
quired that celerity of thinking, which 
enables him to deliver off hand the in- 
_ ferences of his judgment, we know not. 
The speeches attributed to him in the 
bin ers, however honourable to the state | 
Of his acquired information, did not im- 
‘press that degree of admiration which his 
itten treatise is adapted to secure. 
ere Mr, Pitt to attempt so lucid a-state- 
shew the style in which these remarks 
are written: 
«« In the intercourse betwixt foreign coun- 
tries every advance upon commodities must 
either be repaid in the course of exchange, or 
discounted on the price on going out of the 
country in which it is produced. For in as 
much as the money in any country is depre- 
ciated, the goods or merchandise of any other 
country sold to it, will bejust so much raised 
in price on entering the country. 
«« Excessive circulation of bank notes be- 
yond the only possible criterion, their con- 
vertibility into gold, which the restraining 
law has done away entirely, would, from the 
preceding observations, so far as they may be 
Just, appear to be attended with much in- 
jury to the community at large in various re- 
spects ; more varticularly, first, in bringing 
the public ae contribution of an annuity 
to the banks of a million and a half, equal to 
the interest of thirty millions of estimated 
circulating paper, without any value what- 
ever—this sum in real money formerly would 
have been equal to the expence of a campaign 
in war: secondly, in the diminution of the 
fixed income of every individual in the state, 
of one half, or at least of a third; and of 
course in a proportional deprivation of his 
comforts; thirdly, in increasing the difficul- 
ties to agriculture, to manufactures, and to 
commerce, by enhancing capital and interest 
employed in them by rafsing the prices of 
labour and commodities, and by diminishing 
the consumption ; fourthly, in encreasing 
the evils of an unfavourable course of ex+ 
change with foreign countries: and finally, 
in laying the foundation for, and leading di- 
rectly to a general explosion of all confidence 
founded on paper credit; and which may be 
attended by the ruin of many individuals at 
least, if not by public confusion.” 
Thoughts on the Restriction of Payments in Specie at the Banks of Eng- 
land and Ireland. By Lorn Kine. 8vo. pp. 106. 
ment of the topics here discussed, he 
would most probably fail in the werk. 
Perspicuity, precision, and that decided- 
ness of practical counsel, which always 
accompanies clearness of intellect, are 
not apparently within his competence. 
But in Lord King’s they are: and as 
this nobleman’s views in finance are not 
at present inflected from the line of duty 
WOO ambitious considerations of per- 
at 
