DEB 
disturbance, or shaking the place W-here it 
is, &c. 
DEBENTURE, a terra of trade used at 
the custom-house for a kind of certificate 
signed by the officers of the customs, which 
entitles a merchant exporting goods to the 
receipt of a bounty or drawback. All mer- 
chandises that are designed to be taken on 
board for that voyage being entered and 
shipped, and the Ship being regularly clear- 
ed out, and sailed out of port on her intend- 
ed voyage, debentures may be made out 
from the exporter’s entries, in order to ob- 
tain the drawbacks, allowances, bounties, 
or premiums ; which debentures for foreign 
goods are to be paid within one month af- 
ter demand. And in making out these de- 
bentures, it must be observed, that every 
piece of vellum, parchment, or paper, con- 
taining any debenture for drawing back 
customs or duties, must, before writing, be 
stamped, and pay a duty. 
Debenture, in military affairs, is a kind 
of warrant, given in the office of the board 
of ordnance, whereby the person whose 
name is thereby specified, is entitled to re- 
ceive such a sum of money as by former 
contract had been agreed on. Debenture, 
in some acts of parliament, denotes a kind 
of bond or bill, by which the government 
is charged to pay the soldier, creditor, or 
his assigns, the money due on auditing the 
account of his arrears. The payments of 
the board of ordnance for the larger ser- 
vices at home are always made by deben- 
tures ; and the usual practice has been to 
make those payments, which are said to be 
in course of office, at a period which is al- 
ways something more than three months af- 
ter the date of each debenture. 
DEBET, among merchants, signifies the 
sums due to them for goods sold on credit, 
for which they have charged their journal 
«r ledger. It is more particularly under- 
stood, of the remainder of debts, part of 
which has been paid on account. 
Debet, among book-keepers, is used to 
express the left hand page of the ledger, to 
which are carried all articles supplied or 
paid, on the subject of an account. 
DEBT, a siun due from one person to 
another, in consequence of work done, 
goods delivered, or money lent, for which 
reimbursement has not been made. The 
non payment in these cases, is an injury, 
for which the proper remedy is by action 
of debt, to compel tlie performance of 
the contract, and recover the special sum 
due. 
VOL. II. 
DEB 
Debt, national, the engagement en- 
tered, into by a government, to repay at a 
future period money advanced by indivi- 
duals for the public service, or to pay the 
lenders an equivalent annuity. National 
debts have arisen from the necessity of ob- 
taining larger sums of money than could be 
raised at the time, they were wanted by 
direct contributions ; and often, when it 
would not have been absolutely impossible 
to raise the requisite sura if a heavy tax had 
been imposed, and strictly levied, it has 
been deemed more prudent to avoid the 
evils attendant on such a measure by the 
less obnoxious expedient of a loan. In 
most countries, the subordinate governors, 
to whom is generally consigned the task of 
providing for the public expenses, being de- 
sirous of popularity have shewn a great 
predeliction for this mode of obtaining mo- 
ney, as it enables them to support a pro- 
fuse expenditure, without appearing to op- 
press the people in so great a degree as 
they otherwise must : the system of getting"' 
into debt, or the funding system, as it is ge- 
nerally called, from particular' funds being 
usually appropriated for payment of inte- 
rest on the debts contracted, has therefore 
been adopted by most of the states of Eu- 
rope, by many of the colonies,- and by the 
American republic. 
The persons who lend the mqney wirich a 
government has occasion to borrow, gene- 
rally make a profit by it, but nothing is 
brought into the country, nor the least ad- 
dition made to its total v;ealth by a transac- 
tion of this kind ; whatever therefore is 
gained by any individual concerned in it, 
must be taken from others, and as those , 
who lend the money are persons already 
possessing considerable^ roperty, and those 
from whom the sums requisite for paying 
the interest or repaying any part of the 
principal is to be drawn, are the public at 
large, it is evident that all transactions of 
this nature contribute to increase the exist- 
ing disparity in the condition of the dif- 
ferent classes of the community, and conse- 
quently that the natural tendency of the 
fiinding system, when made a constant re- 
source, is, to destroy the intermediate ranks, 
and divide a nation into the two classes 
only, as unequal in number as in circum- 
stances, of very rich and very poor. It 
may however be carried to a very great ex- 
tent, without fully producing this effect, if 
counteracting circumstances exist suffici- 
ently powerful to dissipate the gains of the 
rich nearly as fast as they are acquired, and 
H h 
