Currency fallacies refuted, and paper money ... - University Library

APPENDIX.No. I.Leading Article, extracted from " The Times,"Thursday, March 7, 1833.We have seldom been more struck with any display of humanfolly or arrogance than with the contemplated projectof a Currency Club, mentioned by our city correspondent.Hitherto we have had, indeed, a great assortment of such associations,composed of different kinds of people, acting underdifferent laws, and directed to the accomplishment of differentobjects. We have had clubs of epicures, of gamblers, of conspirators,and of conservatives, — of country gentlemen andmerchants, — of beef-steak eaters, of artists, and players, — ofliterary characters, — of " eccentrics,'' — of " odd fellows,"and formerly even of " fat" or " lean men," — clubs directedto the promotion ofgood fellowship, — to the encouragementof art and science, — to the support of charity, — to the celebrationof the memory of distinguished statesmenor the advancementof political doctrines ; but it was reserved for thepresent time, so fertile in novelties, to organize a club ofbankersand speculators, who boldly announce their hostility tothesovereign, (we mean not, however, to accuse them of hightreason), — who declare malice prepense against His Majesty'smint, — who avow their intention of insinuating their fingersinto our pockets or coffers to clip our coin or to exchange itfor rags, — who profess a kind of jugglery calculated, in silenceand secrecy, to defraud creditors and to alter contracts,— and who, not content with the appalling fluctuations of nationaland private fortune, already occasioned by tamperingwith our monetary system (from which we have justescaped)would plunge us anew into all the agonies and dangers ofpanics, bankruptcies, and bank restrictions.