WEALTH OF NATIONS. 159 



importations from particular countries on account of the 

 balance of trade is next shown, first, on the principles of 

 the Mercantile System, and secondly, upon general and 

 sounder principles. 



1. Supposing that the freest trade were allowed with 

 any given country with w r hich the balance was supposed 

 unfavourable, it by no means follows that this would 

 prevent a gain with all countries in the amount of specie 

 imported, because the importation of more goods from 

 the given country than we exported to it might very 

 possibly enable us to export more to some other countries 

 with which we had no other means of trading, because 

 even if all the goods imported from the given country 

 were consumed, and not re-exported, the balance would 

 be better preserved if they were bought cheaper there 

 than they could be elsewhere. Add to this, the impossi- 

 bility of ascertaining with any tolerable approach to 

 accuracy the balance of trade with any country from the 

 inaccurate valuations in custom-house books, and from 

 the course of exchange being influenced, not merely by 

 the dealings between any two countries, but by the 

 dealings of each with all other countries, as well as by 

 the state of the coin in both, by the arrangements made 

 for defraying the expense of coinage, and by the practice 

 of paying sometimes in bank money and sometimes in 

 specie currency. The course of exchange will frequently 

 appear to be in favour of nations which pay in bank 

 money, and against those which pay in currency, though 

 the real exchange may be the other way in each case. 

 This leads to a long but very valuable digression con- 

 cerning Banks of Deposit, especially that of Amsterdam, 

 on which the author tells us, in the last edition, that he 



