246 MEMOIR OF AUGUSTUS DE MORGAN. 



1856. Many sanguine persons had been withheld from join- 



ing the Decimal Association, in the hope of establishing 

 an International Currency ; ' a proposal which,' Mr. De 

 Morgan said, 'unites the millennial and decimal systems.' 

 They also contemplated the universal decimalisation of 

 weights and measures. Mr. J. B. Smith's resolution for 

 an Address to the Queen, praying her to invite a congress 

 of all nations for this purpose, had not been carried, but 

 shortly after, in the autumn, the Paris Exhibition took 

 place, and the difficulty of harmonising the various 

 weights, measures, quantities, and prices of the articles 

 brought by contributors from twenty-two different states 

 or countries, led to the consideration of the possibility of 

 making a uniform system throughout the world. The 

 advantages of such uniformity would be felt both morally 

 and socially, in making free trade more easy, and war 

 between nations more difficult. All these, as well as the 

 benefits to commerce and merchandise, were fully acknow- 

 ledged by all the advocates of decimal coinage. The only 

 question was as to the first step. The mutual advances 

 made by the French and Americans by interchange of 

 specimens of weights and measures were followed by 

 memorials and petitions to their respective governments 

 in favour of a congress of delegates from the leading 

 nations of the world. In Tract No. 12 of the Liverpool 

 Financial Reform Association, all the evils of the present 

 confused state of the means of effecting commercial ex- 

 changes were shown, and all the arguments for a complete 

 decimal system throughout brought forward. Shortly 

 after the Paris Exhibition an ' International Association ' 

 was formed, 'for obtaining a uniform decimal system of 

 weights, measures, and coin throughout the world.' The 

 proposals and arguments of this Association caused a 

 great deal of extra work to the active members of tha 

 Decimal Association. Among my husband's letters are 

 several like this from the secretary it enclosed some new 

 tract or report of speech : 



