Tea with refpeEi to the Export of Gold and Silver . 285 
PART IV. 
Tea with refpeSl to go l d and silver. Excufes 
the east-india company . General view <?/ tea. 
Ballance of trade with France. Thoughts on 
the public debt,, and public love. 
LETTER XVIL 
To the fame* 
Madam, 
Y OU are not yet informed of what confequence you are 
to the date, nor how much you may ferve or injure it. 
The fubjeft of this letter will be mercantile and political ; it is 
fometimes treated as a mystery, and lometimes as too plain to 
be intitled to any attention at all. I apprehend it is with a na- 
tion, as it is in common life : you can as eafily comprehend that 
nothing remains with us but the ballance of our trade with 
other nations, as that the real produce of your eftate is only 
that which remains to you of the rents, after all neceflary 
buildings and repairs are paid for. You are to fuppofe that 
this nation, and its colonies, export to the value of twenty 
millions of their natural produce, and import of the produce 
of other countries, in articles of consumption, about as, 
much more : but that we gain upon the twenty millions ex- 
ported, five per cent, which is one million. This we will call 
