THE CURRENCY QUESTION. 
 
 The Confidence of “ THE TIMES ” in its own Monetary 
 Doctrines j^xemplified, by its Refusal togivePublicity 
 to a Free Offer of the Sum of ONE HUNDRED 
 GUINEAS to any Man who may be able to Main¬ 
 tain tlieir Validity before a Competent and Impar¬ 
 tial Tribunal. 
 
 A REJECTED LETTER 
 
 “THE TIMES,” 
 
 OH THE SUBJECT OF THE CUHREHCY: 
 
 THE ABOVE-K AMI) OFFER REPEATED; 
 
 FIVE HUNDRED GUINEAS. 
 
 BY JOHN aiUY, 
 
 EDINBURGH: 
 
 ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK, 
 LONDON : LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS. 
 MDCCCXLVJI. 
 
TO THE NEWSPAPER PRESS. 
 
 The following pages have been planted solely on 
 public grounds. That the author seeks not any 
 private advantage by their publication, will be suffi¬ 
 ciently obvious from their own contents. A sixpenny 
 pamphlet will not bear the expense of much adver¬ 
 tising ; but to every gentleman of the public press, 
 whether he reside in England, Ireland, or Scotland, 
 who shall insert in his paper the title-page hereof, 
 adding thereto the words—“ This dag is published, 
 price Sixpence ,” immediately before the words—“ A 
 Rejected Letter,' 1 —the advertisement-duty will be im¬ 
 mediately forwarded for one insertion, on receipt of 
 a copy of his paper containing the advertisement. 
 By publishing which ho will also oblige 
 
 A Brother Newspaper Proprietor. 
 
 Edinburgh, No. ] J, Invf.rleitii Row, 
 
 C3’ For your News Columns extract ad libitum. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Everybody knows that a very general opinion is 
 now making its way in the world, that some radical 
 error pervades the Monetary System of society. 
 
 Everybody knows that, in consequence of this 
 general opinion, certain public meetings have been 
 held in London, Birmingham, Newcastle, Glasgow, 
 and elsewhere, to take the subject of Money into 
 consideration ; at which meetings various resolutions, 
 condemnatory of the existing monetary laws, have 
 been passed by large majorities. 
 
 Everybody knows that the resolutions carried at 
 these meetings have been stigmatized by the Times, 
 day by day as they have been passed, as little better 
 than the solemn imbecilities of a pack of fools. Ar¬ 
 gument, satire, pity for the infirmity of their minds, 
 and good-natured abuse, have been heaped in about 
 equal proportions on the heads of the unfortunate 
 speakers and movers of the resolutions ; whilst 
 Everybody knows that, upon the said subject of 
 Money, the Times is the self-constituted Oracle of 
 wisdom, at whose feet, argument, evidence, demon¬ 
 stration, that the monetary laws are a tissue of ab¬ 
 surdities, must fall in humble and abject prostration. 
 
so long at least as the Oracle aforesaid shall continue 
 to issue forth the mandate—“ The Monetary laics are 
 just: Obey them, !"—Yet 
 
 Everybody knows, who truly knows anything 
 whatever about the matter, that the Times cannot 
 put forth six consecutive sentences upon the subject 
 of Money, without writing the most absurd and ridi¬ 
 culous nonsense—I beg pardon for the adjectives! 
 Hope no infringement of any Printing-house Square 
 patent by the use thereof 1 
 
 From what follows it will be seen, that “ Audi 
 alteram partem ” is no motto of the Times on the 
 subject of 
 
 THE CURRENCY. 
 
No. I. 
 
 To the Editor of the Times. 
 
 Edinburgh, Od.S, 1847. 
 
 (Private.) 
 
 Sir —The enclosed letter will speak for itself. But, 
 in placing it in your hands in the unusual form of 
 proof instead of manuscript , you will distinctly un¬ 
 derstand that it has been put into type solely for the 
 purpose of being presented to you in a clear and dis¬ 
 tinct form. Three proofs of it only exist; not a line 
 of it has been published, nor will be, until after it 
 shall either have appeared in the columns of your pa¬ 
 per or been refused a place therein. 
 
 I am, Sir, 
 
 Your most obedient Servant, 
 
 JOHN GRAY. 
 
 No. II. 
 
 To the Editor of tiie Times. 
 
 Edinburgh, Od. 15,1847. 
 
 Sir—O n (lie 5th instant I addressed a letter to 
 you on the subject of the Currency, accompanied by 
 a short note marked “ private stating the reason 
 why the said letter was presented to you in proof in 
 place of manuscript. 
 
Observing that, np to yesterday’s date inclusive, 
 neither my letter on the Currency, nor any intimation 
 that it is or is not declined, had appeared in your 
 paper, I shall consider that the said communication 
 is rejected, unless some notice to the contrary shall 
 appear in the Times on or before Wednesday first, 
 the 20th instant. 
 
 I am, Sir, 
 
 Your most obedient Servant, 
 
 JOHN GRAY. 
 
 No. III. 
 
 Copy of the Letter refused insertion by the limes, 
 referred to in number one. 
 
 THE CURRENCY QUESTION. 
 
 PRIZE ARGUMENT 
 
 ONE HUNDRED GUINEAS 
 AND MORE. 
 
 TO THE EDITOR OF THE TIMES. 
 
 Sir, 
 
 So many and various are the forms in which your 
 numerous correspondents are accustomed to acknow¬ 
 ledge the brilliancy of your talents, the straightforward 
 honesty of your motives, and the uncompromising 
 fearlessness of your writings upon whatsoever subject 
 may engage your pen, that it would perhaps be diffi- 
 
9 
 
 cult to find a new shape in which to reiterate the same 
 sentiments. And yet, when I tell you that although 
 in the course of my ordinary avocations, I receive at 
 least a score of London and provincial Newspapers 
 a-week, of which number I peruse with any thing like 
 regularity but one, that one being the Times, I pay 
 you at least the highest compliment that it is within 
 my power to offer. 
 
 It is with some feeling of regret, therefore, that I 
 observe the sarcastic character of your observations 
 upon the Anti-gold law league party. I refer to your 
 leading article on the subject in your paper of the 
 first of this month. 
 
 I am not a member of the Anti-gold law league; 
 but I entertain certain opinions upon the subject of 
 Money, with which your article of the first instant is, 
 in some respects, as completely at variance as it is with 
 those against which it was more especially directed. 
 
 Now, judging from the fairness which you usually 
 exhibit in such matters, if I were to write even a long 
 article in reply to such of your opinions as I think I 
 could refute, you would probably give it a place in 
 your columns. .And, if so, what then? Why just 
 this: The Times says one thing, and some obscure 
 and unheard-of Correspondent of the Times, who is 
 favoured with space in the Times for the purpose, 
 says another thing. Would, in this case, equal 
 strength of argument hare equal influence on the public 
 mind ? Assuredly it would not! The mere ipse dixit 
 of a ereat man—although ereat men are nearly as 
 often wrong upon certain points as small ones—or of 
 a great authority like that of The Times, has ever 
 been accustomed to prove, for a time at least, an 
 
10 
 
 over-match for the most conclusive arguments, and 
 even for demonstration itself, when merely placed 
 side by side in the columns of a newspaper. And 
 most especially is this true with reference to such 
 matters as the Currency; a subject which nobody 
 seems fully to comprehend, and about which nine- 
 tenths of the public will freely tell you in so many 
 words, that they really know little or nothing about 
 it. What, therefore, would be the use of any No- 
 authority Man writing in your paper against yourself 
 upon such a subject as this! 
 
 Again, how is it possible for any one to convey his 
 opinions, with any considerable degree of fulness or 
 fairness, upon the subject of Currency, within the 
 space of one, or even two or three, newspaper articles, 
 however liberally the same might be admitted into 
 your columns ? It is not possible. 
 
 I decline, therefore, to meet you, even though you 
 should be inclined to allow me, on this most unequal 
 ground. Hut if in this question—as in most others 
 I am well convinced you are—it is your real object 
 to arrive at truth, even though the attainment thereof 
 should oblige you, in certain particulars, to retract 
 your own opinions, I shall now endeavour to afford 
 you an opportunity, by means of which I think it not 
 improbable that we may be able to arrive at truth; 
 or, failing that, at least to obtain a little further 
 knowledge of a subject, in which, if we may judge 
 from the recent disquisitions of the public press, a 
 large proportion of the mercantile classes seems just 
 now inclined to take an especial interest. 
 
 Thus, then, does a humble, and, politically speak¬ 
 ing, wholly unknown individual, venture to throw 
 
down the gauntlet to the Editor of the Times, and 
 through him, to every advocate for a golden standard 
 of mlue in the three kingdoms. 
 
 It is just sixteen years ago —at which time, if I 
 remember correctly, not Monetary , but Parliamentary 
 Reform, was to be the great panacea for nearly all the 
 evils that flesh is heir to—when monetary reform was 
 apparently little thought of, and when the voice of 
 any Anti-gold law league had as yet been unheard 
 at Anderton’s—that 1 printed and published the fol¬ 
 lowing assertion, which assertion, I still maintain, 
 contains a truth , to the recognition of which mankind 
 in general—in this country at least—are just now 
 beginning to open their eyes for the first time since 
 England was a nation. 
 
 “ As it is by labour that all things valuable to mankind 
 are produced, so is it by exchange that individuals are 
 enabled to partake of a great variety of things which their 
 own labour could never, by any possibility, have com¬ 
 manded without it. In an advanced state of society, the 
 food, clothing, and-habitation, in ordinary use, amongst 
 all classes of men, are composed of an immense number of 
 ingredients, the result of the industry of individuals scat¬ 
 tered over the face of half the globe; whilst it is evident, 
 that if each person could obtain nothing but what should 
 be immediately and directly produced by the labour of his 
 own hands, mankind never could have emerged from a state 
 of the rudest ignorance and barbarism.* 
 
 “ Exchange, therefore, may be denominated the bond 
 and principle of society; but it is a matter of legitimate 
 
12 
 
 inquiry, whether the existing plan of exchange be a good 
 one ? whether it be founded in right principles ? and 
 whether it be calculated to confer upon us all the benefits 
 which the present advanced state of human knowledge and 
 resource entitles us to look for and expect ? 
 
 “ And these questions I answer with an unequivocal and 
 emphatic A r o. It is our system of exchange which forms 
 the hiding-place of that giant of mischief which bestrides 
 the civilized world, rewarding industry with starvation, 
 exertion with disappointment, and the best efforts of our 
 rulers to do good, with perplexity, dismay, and failure; 
 and it is our system of exchange which has produced the 
 worse than Babylonian confusion in the ideas of men upon 
 the subject of their collective interests. 
 
 “ Give us—and we have it now within our grasp— 
 parliamentaiy reform—give us universal suffrage, annual 
 parliaments, vote by ballot, free trade, an acquittal of the 
 public debt, freedom from all taxes, a repeal of the Union, 
 and eveiy other thing upon which the public has ever yet 
 rested its disappointed hopes—and still shall this demon 
 of commercial error hold our prosperity in his iron grasp, 
 and smile upon our ignorance and folly, as he shall see our 
 burdens, as we call them, one by one removed, whilst we 
 continne to sink deeper and deeper still into the Slough of 
 Despond, under the invisible but enormous weight that is 
 oppressing us.” 
 
 In 1812 I repeated the same language, and sent a 
 copy of the work that contained it to upwards of five 
 hundred of the principal reviews, magazines, and news¬ 
 papers, throughout the kingdom, a b c fashion, just 
 as I found their names in a then recently published 
 list of such works, and without the slightest selection 
 or regard to their party or politics. But, if I except 
 a few rather remarkable instances to the contrary, 
 
this work, as well as the former one—which it is not 
 the object of this letter to advertise—fell amongst the 
 public like lead into the sea; and by the publication 
 of the two I had the happiness of losing some i?250. 
 Nothing daunted, however, here I am again, in 1847, 
 singing the same song to the self-same words, now for 
 the first time admitted into the columns of [read 
 refused insertion by] the Times newspaper; whilst 
 an ill-trained, uninstructed, and blundering chorus to 
 the same tune is now faintly but distinctly heard to 
 resound from one end of the kingdom to the other. 
 
 It may be asked, however, what can I expect to do 
 note more than I have already done, seeing that my 
 opinions as to the especial cause of commercial mis¬ 
 fortune and general distress and difficulty remain pre¬ 
 cisely what they were before ? 
 
 The answer is obvious: The times themselves hate 
 changed —the people of to-day are not the people we 
 had to deal with on this subject sixteen years ago, or 
 even five years ago; and, moreover, I am now pre¬ 
 pared to demonstrate a mode of operation a thousand 
 times less complicated than any which I could see 
 before, in carrying a Free System of Exchange into 
 operation. 
 
 But, to the end and purpose of this letter, which 
 is to say, that, having been engaged by the Directors 
 of the Edinburgh Philosophical Institution to deliver 
 “ Eight Lectures on the Nature, use, and proper 
 qualities of money: what money is, and what it 
 should be: a subject which necessarily includes a brief 
 review of the General principles of Political Eco¬ 
 nomy, in February and March next,”* I hereby offer 
 
14 
 
 the sum of One hundred guineas to any man who 
 shall be able to produce the best refutation of and to 
 refute , the main argument which I shall then and there 
 repeat; namely, that it is to the Reconstruction of 
 our Monetary System, and to this only, that we must 
 look for any great and general improvement in the 
 condition, of the productive and mercantile classes of 
 society. I affirm that our Monetary system is false 
 in principle; that it is root and branch a system of 
 error; that it is utterly destructive of the interests 
 of society; and that it will ever be quite impossible 
 materially to improve our social condition and pros¬ 
 pects generally, until it shall be erected upon a 
 foundation totally different in character from that on 
 which it at present rests. 
 
 The terms and conditions of the Competition to be 
 as follows :— 
 
 First —The Lectures to be delivered by me before 
 the Members of the Edinburgh Philosophical Insti¬ 
 tution shall be printed and published, at my own cost, 
 within three months after the delivery of the last 
 lecture. 
 
 Secondly —Any person who may feel inclined to re¬ 
 fute the arguments which I shall adduce, shall be at 
 liberty to do so in the English language, and to hand 
 his production, bearing some fictitious signature, to 
 the office of the Times newspaper, along with the 
 sum of one guinea, within the space of four months 
 from and after the day whereon the said lectures 
 shall be advertised as being “ published," in the 
 Times and in the North British Advertiser. 
 
 Thirdly —The Editor of the Times —it being pre¬ 
 sumed that it would be quite impossible for him to 
 
15 
 
 undertake the task liimself— shall hand the said re¬ 
 futations, as received, to any person whom he may 
 consider to be fully qualified, to select from amongst 
 the number the best refutation of the Monetary 
 principle, for the establishment of which it will be 
 my duty to contend. 
 
 Fourthly —All the other Refutations shall be re¬ 
 turned to their respective authors, in such manner as 
 the editor of the Times may direct; whilst the writer 
 of the one elect shall receive, in the first place, from 
 the editor of the Times , the whole amount of the 
 guinea sweepstakes; that is to say, as many guineas 
 as there shall have been candidates for the small honour 
 of refuting a poor advocate for the immediate esta¬ 
 blishment of a, paper currency- 
 
 Fifthly —On the best refutation of my principles 
 being selected, two copies thereof shall be handed to 
 me—either in print, the type not being smaller than 
 Long-primer, or else in a large, clear, and perfectly 
 distinct hand-writing—and within four months from 
 the receipt thereof l shall be bound to reply to it. 
 
 Sixthly —-Two first-class Members of the Scottish 
 Bar—men accustomed to sift and judge of evidence— 
 who shall, at the time of adjudication, be unpledged, 
 by any public declaration or writing, to any monetary 
 system, or system of Political Economy whatsoever 
 —shall be selected as Adjudicators by each of the con¬ 
 tending parties: that is to say, two by the author of 
 the best Refutation, and two by myself; and these 
 gentlemen, should they differ in opinion, shall appoint 
 an umpire. 
 
 Seventhly —In the hands of the Adjudicators so 
 elected, shall be placed, 
 
1st, A copy of the original Lectures ; 
 
 2dly, A copy of the Refutation ; and 
 Sdly, A copy of my Reply thereto. 
 
 And, without pledging themselves to any opinion 
 whatever as to the point at issue, if they, by a majo¬ 
 rity of their number, shall nevertheless declare that, 
 upon view of the whole case, I shall have had the 
 worst of the argument , then, to the writer of the best 
 Refutation aforesaid, I will pay the sum of one hun¬ 
 dred guineas, in addition to whatsoever number of 
 guineas he may have previously received in terms of 
 the fourth article of this proposal; whilst, on the 
 other hand, should the Adjudicators award the case in 
 my favour, the defeated combatant shall pay me— 
 nothing. 
 
 Eighthly —I shall retain the copyright of my own 
 lectures, and I stipulate also for the right, but not 
 the exclusive right, to publish, ad libitum, the Prize 
 Refutation, and that whether I he beaten or not;— 
 and I shall retain also, of course, the copyright of my 
 reply. 
 
 Thus, upon this plan of competition, the Arbiters 
 would have but three papers to examine; whilst in 
 the case of the Atlas Prize-Essay, on the Causes of, 
 and Remedies for, the Distresses of the Country, the 
 Adjudicators had the effusions of no less than one 
 hundred and fifty-eight competitors to go over. 
 
 And now, Sir, if you have really all the confidence 
 you profess in your golden standard of value, show it 
 by publishing this challenge in an early number of 
 your valuable and—on the present subject—too 
 
17 
 
 influential, paper ; as also by accepting the very small 
 share of trouble which would devolve upon yourself as 
 banker, pro tempore , for the competitors, and nomi¬ 
 nator of the golden judge of the argument. 
 
 And in case you have not a competent judge of the 
 subject at this moment in your mind’s eye, what 
 think you of the sapient author of the celebrated 
 '■'■fire-light" article on “The Instrument of Ex¬ 
 change," which appeared in the first number of the 
 Westminster Review?—unless, indeed, he should 
 prefer to try his hand at a wee bit refutation himself. 
 
 In conclusion, I have only to add, that, as I am 
 an entire stranger to you, the Bank of Scotland will 
 satisfy you as to my ability to perform the pecuniary 
 part of the above engagement. 
 
 I am. Sir, 
 
 Your constant reader, 
 
 And most obedient humble servant, 
 
 JOHN GRAY. 
 
 
 The foregoing proposition being unsuitable for the 
 Times —the subject thereof being probably of insuffi¬ 
 cient general interest or importance , particularly at the 
 present time, to be worthy of a place in the columns 
 of the “ Leading Journal of Europe ”—the same offer 
 which has been refused admission into the Times 
 is now repeated through the medium of this pamphlet, 
 
18 
 
 as also through the medium of every newspaper 
 that may be pleased to extend its publicity ; the 
 office of treasurer for the competitors and selec¬ 
 tor of the best Refutation, refused by the Times 
 being now proffered to any person to be nominated 
 and appointed by Sir Eobert Peel, whom failing 
 by the Editor of ike Edinburgh Renew . whom fail¬ 
 ing by any advocate of a golden standard of value of 
 equal public status with those already mentioned. 
 
 But I will not refer this matter to any inferior 
 party. If I take any golden bull by the horns, he 
 shall be at least a real bull and not a bull-calf. It 
 would be child’s play to make mincemeat of such a 
 Times' suckling as this, for example :— 
 
 “ Among the various projects that have been suggested 
 for the relief of the present commercial panic, it was pro¬ 
 posed at a meeting held in London on Wednesday last, 
 by a Society who have assumed the title of the Anti-gold 
 law league, to substitute a paper for a gold currency , 
 which was to be issued under the authority of Government 
 to a vast amount, with which the national debt was to be 
 paid, and a new and halcyon era to be introduced, in which 
 panics, and all the other evils to which commerce is liable, 
 were to be entirely unknown. We should have thought 
 that such chimeras were too absurd to obtain even an 
 audience in the present age of boasted improvement. 
 They are certainly too absurd to be dwelt upon : and, but 
 for the absence of all other news, would hardly, at present, 
 have attracted the attention bestowed on them.”— From 
 a recent number of an Edinburgh Paper. 
 
 No one, however, would say “ thank you ” for my 
 pains; neither would any advantage be gained by 
 the immolation. 
 
 But bring the proud, haughty, and dictatorial 
 
19 
 
 Times before a tribunal of competent, honourable, and 
 impartial men; obtain a verdict against him , and pub¬ 
 lish it, along with every word of the pleadings on both 
 sides of the question, so that every man may be enabled 
 to judge for himself of the justice of the decision, and 
 then a battle worth the fighting will have been fought 
 and won—the instantaneous effect of which would be 
 to concentrato the intellectual power of England upon 
 the consideration of the nature, use, and proper quali¬ 
 ties of money. 
 
 My offer of a premium to any man who may be able 
 to refute my argument against a golden standard of 
 value may, however, be too liberal. The Times would 
 probably disdain to allow liis name to be mixed up 
 with so unfair, so unequal a contest. 
 
 If so, put it into another shape. The Editor of 
 the Times has a hundred-fold my learning, a hundred- 
 times my talent. I could as readily undertake, with 
 any chance of success, to compete, in their own depart¬ 
 ment, with a Sir Isaac Newton or a Sir W alter Scott, 
 as to edit the Times newspaper. But, so far as re¬ 
 gards the knowledge of this one subject— money, I 
 acknowledge no superior, either in the establishment 
 of the Times or out of it. I deny that the Editor of 
 that paper, so far as shown by his writings, has ever 
 made himself acquainted with even th o first principles 
 of a sound Monetary system. This he will deny. 
 Let us then try the question in the manner already 
 proposed; but in place of a premium on the one side, 
 and nothing on the other, let the contest be for five 
 hundred guineas, that is to say, for two hundred and 
 fifty guineas a side. 
 
 I now publicly challenge the Times to discuss the 
 
20 
 
 question for this sum of money; the terms and. condi¬ 
 tions of the competition being as per my rejected letter 
 to himself, only that Ms own refutation, or any one 
 that he can produce —and it may be written by a 
 committee of bullionists if he likes—shall come in 
 room and place of one selected from the effusions of a 
 number of competitors; the other offer being with¬ 
 drawn until I shall receive his reply. 
 
 As already mentioned, I am not a member of any 
 Anti-gold-law league, nor of any other league. I take 
 no active part in politics, attend no political meetings, 
 or almost none; and, indeed, for many years past have 
 not even taken the trouble to record my vote at any 
 election of a member of Parliament. Nor have I the 
 slightest inclination to deviate from this general rule 
 of conduct, so long at least as I may continue to 
 fill a situation in life the duties of which would seem 
 to say “ You should be a looker on in political mat¬ 
 ters rather than an active participator therein.” 
 
 But money is of no party, or rather it is of all 
 parties: it is the life-blood of trade, commerce, and 
 manufactures, and whosoever shall attempt to place 
 it upon a sound basis will be exerting himself not for 
 class, sect, party, or even country, but equally for 
 queens and kings upon their thrones and the most 
 humble inhabitants of their respective dominions; as 
 also for every grade of society between these two ex¬ 
 tremes. For, so far as the present writer at least is 
 concerned, he contemplates not the infliction of any 
 act of injustice upon man, woman, or child, living or 
 yet to live, either in this country or in any other, by 
 the Monetary changes he would bring about; and 
 neither could they be the cause of any. 
 
21 
 
 I await tlie Times reply. If he accept my challenge 
 to discuss the subject in manner proposed, then the 
 previous offer of a free gift to any man who may be 
 able to produce the best refutation of my arguments, 
 and to refute them, is withdrawn. But if the Times 
 shall decline the controversy, and thus write himself 
 down libeller — boaster — coward, before the face of 
 Europe, then and in that case I abide by my previous 
 offer of premium. For this important question shall 
 be publicly discussed now- to its termination, and that 
 whether the TimeswiW. or will not that it should be so. 
 
 In conclusion, it may be proper to state that, for 
 the reasons given in my rejected letter to the Times, 
 I decline entering at all upon the discussion of the 
 subject of money here. Still, however, it may not 
 be out of place to refer to one or two considerations 
 that can hardly fail to obtrude themselves upon the 
 general reader, whilst turning over this subject in his 
 
 Will it not, for example, be considered extraordi¬ 
 nary that the Times, usually so well informed, so ac¬ 
 curate, so able, and so honest, should have failed to 
 discover the radical error of our Monetary system, if 
 there really be one ? 
 
 Not particularly so. Most men are accustomed to 
 think, just as they are accustomed to walk, in certain 
 directions only ; and if they chance to start in a wrong 
 one, the farther they go the more distant they become 
 from the very object of which they are in quest. But 
 fix they will on something; and if they find not 
 truth, they are pretty sure to pick up error in its 
 stead, and to adopt it. Hence, truth itself, when 
 tested by the creed of error, is error; and error. 
 
similarly tested, truth. Minds of the very first class, 
 and hundreds of them, are in this predicament upon 
 certain points, and the Times is one of them. 
 
 Again, the Editor of the Times possesses, not im¬ 
 probably, a learned rather than a self-taught mind. 
 He may have been a reader rather than a thinker; 
 and if so, God help him, when he refers to his autho¬ 
 rities upon that science of contradictions, Political 
 Economy. 
 
 But be this as it may—I speak now of his general 
 writings—whilst he has avoided some of the errors of 
 M'Cnlloch, such as Irish absenteeism being no evil, 
 and effectual demand depending wholly on production, 
 he has adopted, almost to the letter, the absurdi¬ 
 ties of the Westminster Review. In one word, his 
 stumbling-block is depreciation , a subject he under¬ 
 stands just as accurately as did the learned goose who 
 wrote the article on the Instrument of Exchange in 
 the first number of that work. “ Whether we shall 
 ever have to give a five-pound note to a waiter for 
 bringing a cup of coffee! and if not, why not!” was 
 the text of the learned Eecieicer. “ Shall we permit 
 the National Creditor to be defrauded of one-lialf of 
 his dues, by allowing the country to be inundated 
 with a Paper Currency f” is the text, though not 
 the precise words, of the equally learned Times. 
 Nay, they are so precisely at one on this point, 
 that their writings may be from the pen of the same 
 man for aught I know to the contrary; but if so, I do 
 not know the fact. 
 
 In any case, however, the answer is the same ; 
 and thus it is:—Paper money may be increased 
 to an almost indefinite extent —to an extent certainly 
 
very far beyond that apparently contemplated by 
 the Anti-gold law league party, not merely with¬ 
 out depreciating in value at all; but it is also the 
 fact, that, by no conceivable means can depreciation he 
 prevented , and a strict and invariable standard of 
 value brought into existence , and maintained , EXCEPT 
 by the adoption of A PAPER CURRENCY. And 
 this is not a mere opinion founded upon general reason¬ 
 ings and observation,—it is a truth capable of the 
 clearest and most indisputable demonstration. 
 
 The Editor of the Times may not, perhaps, be able 
 to see very clearly in what manner this may be 
 effected. No matter—the misfortune is not deadly : 
 if he cannot, I can.