314 Thoughts on PUBLIC CREDIT, 
fterity. We muff remember, however, that virtue is the baffs 
of happinefs to nations as well as to private men ; and tho’ this 
is one of the great truths which many of us will neither hear nor 
see, we must correct ourfelves, and mend our ways, or to all 
human appearance we fhall be undone! 
Whether the oppulence and reputation of this nation would 
have rifen fo high, had no debt been contracted, is a queftion 
more difficult to anfwer than many imagine. But whether we 
ffiould be in a better condition than we are now, was there no 
debt in the cafe, anfwers itfelf. It is not difputed that we have 
increafed in commerce, and improved in many other national 
advantages, ffiice the firft contracting this debt ; and I appre- 
hend we have alfo increafed in wickednefs, or at leaft that we 
make fo bad a ufe of our advantages, that they may be the cause 
of our undoing. There is fome merit in public concerns, as 
well as in the private affairs of life, in feeking for reafons to 
make a virtue of necessity, and todifcover motives to render 
that eafy which is unavoidable. If by means of the debt, we 
could maintain a mutual dependance, fufficient to counterpoife 
a vicious selfishness ; and alfo promote the comfort and 
ease of individuals, whofe fituation will hardly admit of any 
better manner of being fupported, than by receiving intereff of 
their money from the public, a moderate standing debt 
might do us no greater harm than a moderate standing army. 
If the former is lefs eafy to pay off, than the latter to disband, 
it does not follow that either one or the other will ruin us. 
But whilft we have fo many drains for our gold and filver, the 
fum annually due to foreigners, for the intereff of the money we 
have borrowed of them, is a formidable objetff to us; yet even 
this 
