2^6 A. D. 1792. 



wifely availed himfelf of the plan propofed many years before by Dodof 

 Price, but hitherto negleded by all the mlnifters, who had had the ad* 

 miniftration of the finances fince he wrote. It confifts in eftablifhing, 

 aloiig with the funds neceflary for paying the intereft of any debt to be 

 created, an additional annual fund of one hundredth part of the capital 

 created. This plan was fandioned by the authority of parliament, the 

 funds appropriated for it being placed under the management of the 

 fame commidioners who have the charge of the annual million, and 

 they improving the proceeds of it in the fame manner. And it was en- 

 aded, that, when the income of the fund fhould arife to three millions 

 annually exclufive of the fums paid in from the exchequer, the divid- 

 ends fhould no longer be iffued, and the capital to that amount flaould 

 be confidered as redeemed, [r. 55.] 



This is by far the moft judicious, and the mod powerful, diflolver of 

 the national debt ever yet invented, and it has the peculiar advantage of 

 bringing the antidote along with the difeafe. This finking fund, and 

 that eftablillied in the year 1786, have made a filent, but a rapid, pro- 

 grefs in reducing the debt in the faireft poffible way by buying at the 

 current price from thofe who are defirous of felling. There need no 

 longer be any of the tumult, vexation, and diftrefs, which have been 

 produced by the violent, not to fay cruel and unjull, meafure of com- 

 pelling any of the national creditors to receive payment, or to fubmit 

 to a redudion of their income, which ought furely to be as facred to 

 the proprietors of five-per-cents and four-per-cents as to thofe of three- 

 per-cents, as they muft be equally prefumed to have acquired their pro- 

 perty by fair purchafes *. And furely a compulfion to accept lower in- 

 tereft (for if the creditor knows of no other opportunity to employ the 

 money, the option of payment or redudion of intereft is a compulfion) 

 cannot be deliberately defended by any man of integrity, who will al- 

 low fome regard for the individuals, who compofe the nation, to have 

 its due weight in the fcale with his zeal for the intereft of the nation in 

 its corporate capacity. 



It is alfo a great beauty of this plan, that the higher the intereft of 

 money is, or, in other words, the lower the prices of the funds are, the 

 quicker is the progrefs made in extingui(hing the national debt, or of 

 transferring the dividends from the fellers to the national purfe, for the 

 purpofe of annihilating in time a portion of the taxes, which prefs fo 



• Without an abfolute breach of faith the re- cept the reduced intereft, to retrench her expenfes, 



duftion of intereft can only be elfefled by an offer and fink in the fcale of fociety : or elfe fhe ven- 



of paying oft the debt, or, in the option of the tures her property upon inferior fecurity, perhaps 



creditor, keeping it on at a lower intereft. The lofes her capital, and is ruined. As long as there 



creditor, perhaps an infant, or a helplefs widow, are thoufands defirous of felling their pioperty in 



whofe fole dependence is on her property in the the funds, whereby the commiilioners are enabled 



funds, not knowing what to do with the money if (not to leffen, but) to anujiiilate the intereft, there 



•fhe receives it, and fearful of trufting it in any can be no neceffity of fuLjefting any creditor ef 



iituatlon of inferior fecurity, is compelled to ac- the nation to fo cruel a dilemma. 



