230 
(improving the quality of the Wares ;) 
or by both; and that, therefore, it is pof- 
fible to buy and feil again in thegrofs.at an 
advanced price, not only without detriment, 
but with advdntage to the public. The 
«* victuals and merchandife’’ are kept 
for the public, either till the article is 
demanded, as corn; or till it has improved 
itielf, as wine ; and whether it be kept in 
the hands of John, cr in the hands of 
Thomas, who advances money to John, 
‘and enables him te provide more, is, I 
do not fay, nothing to.the public, but 
that the property fhould change hands, is 
an advantage to the public ; becaufe John 
has thus an opportunity of employing the 
capital advanced to him by Thomas, to 
the advantage of himfelf, and ultimately 
of the public. If the merchandife had 
femained in John’s hands, he ought -to 
have had a price from the cenfumer, as 
much higher thanthatwhich hereceived from 
‘Thomas, as would be fufficient to make 
up for the lofs of the improvement of that 
capital, which he knew how to improve 
fo much better than Thomas. If John 
has not money to maintain himfelf, and 
much lefs to go on in his bufinefs.of pro- 
curing more, while the wine is growing 
mellow, or the confumer wants the corn, 
he muft either pawn his merchandife, or 
fell to Thomas, for the confumer will not 
yet purchafe. If he fhould pawn, pre- 
cifely the fame additional price muft be 
jaid upon the merchandife, to pay the in- 
tereft, as if he had fold. And yet, pawn- 
ing would be fair trading, and a fale be 
acrime! Whatend, then, does it an- 
{wer, in any cafe, to hinder the transfer of 
the property, and detain it by violence in 
thefamehands? In fome cafes it may an- 
fiwer a very badend. As the property on 
which money muft be raifed, muft alfo 
fometimes be transferred to the keeping 
of the money-lender, who feldom lends to 
the full amount, it will be kept with lefs 
tare, and confequently with fome detri- 
ment to the public. It is well known, 
that every man takes moft care of his 
own. | 
They who are accuftcmed to indulge 
their indolence by implicit reliance on 
authorities, will perhaps be offended at 
the little deference that.I pay to great 
names. There js nota more fertile fource 
of error than refting on the conclufions 
drawn by men, on many accounts defer- 
vedly eminent, without bringing their 
premifes to the teft of reafon and experi- 
ence. It isunreafonable to expect that 
Lord Coke fhould be two centuries before 
his contempofaries in mercantile know- 
lege, becaufe he excelled them in his 
Defence of Foreftalling: 
[ April 1; 
knowledge of law. Being a great lawyer 
does not neceflarily mply being g good le- 
giflator. There is a wide difference between 
knowing what is law, and knowing what | 
fhould be law. Itis not my intention toargue 
at all from authorities. I fhall not, know- 
ingly,quote Adam Smith, the moft able de- 
fender, but not, as is generally fuppofed, the 
father of thefe opinions. TI fhall not urge 
the difciples of Edmund Burke, with his- 
latter political fentiments to adopt his con= 
{tant opinions on political eeconomy ; nor 
requeft thofe who lament that eloquence 
can furvive argument, to pay fome atten- 
tion to the reafonings of thofe years of his 
life, when his mind was in full vigour, 
and untouched by the failings of age. 
But I cannot refrain from one quotation, 
which fhews that it was long ago fulpeéted 
that foreftalling could do no harm; as 
the fuppofed crimes of witchcraft and 
ufury had a few advocates, long before 
they were declared by law and lawyers to 
be, one a good, and the other an impoffi- 
bility. It is the fate of foreftalling to be 
deemed acrime by lawyers, when it has — 
ceafed to be a crime by law. ‘* Velut Dea 
difplicerent Statuta pracedentis Parlia- 
menti (de Carne, &c.) omnia folito cariora 
Suerunt.” Thomasde Walfingham, p.107. 
A.D. 1315. and therefore (fays Barring- 
ton, in his Obfervations on the Statutes, } 
the prefent Parliament applied the only 
wife remedy, by enacting that every one— 
ViGtualia fua meliort pro quo poffet vendercé 
ad libitum.” 
MisorHETOR. 
——E— oN: 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
SIR, 
FEEL myfelf obliged to Mr. Cogan 
for his candid explanation, page 107 
of your laft Number, and haften to ac- 
knowledge the error into which I was un- 
warily drawn, refpecting the verb réparras: 
however the error is not mine except by - 
adoption ; for Hill’s Greek Lexicon, un- 
der the verb wipeuuas, ftates répavrat tobe 
5 plu. p. pall. verbi ¢deive, apparés. 
This I with to mention as fome apology 
for my former affertion. | The manner in 
which the paffive voice of &» governs two 
fubftantives following it, and fer which 
there isno rule infthe common Grammars, 
induces me to remark that, as in the pre- 
fent initance, fo at other times I have had 
occafion to obferve, that the Greek Gram- 
mars generally ufed are deficient in rules of 
concord. hes 
In Iliad 9, v. 186, we have, regulariter\ 
vEpéan ElAupLEvOS Gees, 
_. ¥our’s, Seed), 
W.. SINGLETON. 
For, 
Hanficpe, 
March 9, 1802. 
