MONEY FALLACIES. 
373 
maximum of efficiency we have only to recall the nature 
and uses of the ordinary bank check. By the increasing 
uses of this device much the greater part of the exchanges 
of this country are effected. By means of the promissory 
note, which may pass from creditor to creditor, another great 
amount of exchange is accomplished. Foreign exchanges 
are now settled without the use of money at all, except at 
long intervals, and even the bullion which is interchanged 
moves rather in the capacity of a commodity than of money. 
Many other devices might be mentioned, but these will suf¬ 
fice for illustration. 
The causes of this tendency to a minimum use of money 
are superior convenience, the economy of time, labor, and 
capital, and greater security, and this is in accordance with 
all tendencies of the age. Money has been superseded to a 
wonderful extent by devices which accomplish money pur¬ 
poses far better. Transfers of solid credit have taken its 
place wherever possible. They all perform the money func¬ 
tion in a more speedy and satisfactory manner, and they may 
very properly be called special kinds of money. By the 
use of these devices the money function of a great and 
wealthy country can be multiplied and expanded almost in 
an instant to an enormous extent. If occasion were to arise, 
in conformity with the real demands of trade, for an instant 
increase in the money of this country to the extent of a 
hundred million dollars it could be effected in less than 
fifteen minutes by the simple action of tens of thousands of 
men opening their check books in the morning and making 
a few scratches of the pen. By night 95 per cent, of these 
checks would be in the banks and through the clearing¬ 
houses, and the same operation could be repeated the next 
day, and day after day, ad infinitum. 
And so people think there isn’t money enough in the 
country! Why, Mr. President, the creditors in this country 
can create in a day more money than all the mints can coin 
in a year, and every dollar of it would have solid face value 
under it. More money, forsooth! The world is using 
