ee on stagnation in businefs. 293 
father of spirits, he will be ready meekly to surren- 
der his life unto him who gaveit. “ 
Non jam se moriens difsolvi conqueratur, 
Sed magis ire foras, vestemque relinquere ut anguis 
Gauderet, prelonga Senex aut Cornua Cervus. 
End of the fragments of lord Bacon, on the art of 
life. 
AN INQUIRY INTO THE CAUSE. . 
OF THE PRESENT STAGNATION IN BUSINESS. 
Ir is common enough for individuals to over-trade 
themselves : companies sometimes do the same; but 
for a nation to over-trade itself, has scarce been ap- 
prehended before ; yet as the symptoms are precisely 
the same as in the case of an individual when over- 
trading himself, we need seek for no other cause for the 
present distrefs in the trading part of the nation; for 
the amazing extent to which trade was carried on by 
the Britifh merchants, was a good deal of it upon fic- 
ticious stock, for such is paper currency when ever 
it is ifsued beyond what there is a real deposit of 
property for the value. The very form of the pro- 
mifsary notes in circulation proves this, for they are 
all for value received, which is-supposed to be the 
deposit, to answer the credit of the notes. But 
‘where (in too many cases) was the deposit, when it 
came to be-called for? This thews the bad effe@s of 
