177 



The object of a medal then is, to perpetuate to future 

 generations the remembrance of some remarkable achieve- 

 ment, in perpetuam rei memoriam. It is designed to be a 

 monument of an event, the knowledge of which is to be 

 widely diffused. 



History teaches us that in accordance with this principle, 

 the Roman emperors were accustomed to stamp the record 

 of their conquests on pieces of metal to be widety circu- 

 lated as the specie currency of the empire. Hundreds of 

 thousands of some of the varieties of these coins were 

 struck, and in consequence have not even yet become rare 

 with collectors, and ma} 7 bear the memorial of the events 

 delineated to the end of time. The same principle prevails 

 in modern times. The French have struck probably more 

 than two thousand medals since 1789. During the Napo- 

 leonic period, more than eight hundred medals were struck 

 to illustrate the national glory. Of some of these medals, 

 especially after making dies a quarter of the size of the 

 original, thousands upon thousands were distributed to the 

 senate, the armies and the people. At the museum of the 

 mint in Paris, the dies of all the medals, which have been 

 made for the government since the time of Charles VIII, are 

 still preserved. The dies when worn out are occasionally 

 renewed or retouched, and the bureau is ready at all times, 

 to sell copies of the medals at a price fixed in the cata- 

 logues. 



These facts show, that it is designed in producing a 

 medal, that the person concerned in the meritorious action 

 should have his fame enhanced, not by creating and bestow- 

 ing upon him individually, a single piece of metal com- 

 memorating the event, and which had been decreed- to him 

 by any body of men, but by multiplying copies of it to be 

 widely distributed. In this way the knowledge of the 

 action and of the esteem in which he was held by his con- 

 temporaries is perpetuated, in numerous, almost imperishable 

 monuments. 



