772

THE NATURE AND CAUSES OE

but what is equivalent to money, to its subjects. By ad-vancing to private people, at interest, and upon land securityto double the value, paper bills of credit to be redeemedfifteen years after their date, and in the meantime madetransferable from hand to hand like bank notes, and declaredby act of assembly to be a legal tender in all payments fromone inhabitant of the province to another, it raised a mode-rate revenue, which went a considerable way towards de-fraying an annual expense of about 4,500/. the whole ordinaryexpense of that frugal and orderly government. The successof an expedient of this kind must have depended upon threedifferent circumstances; first, upon the demand for someother instrument of commerce, besides gold and silver money;or upon the demand for such a quantity of consumable stock,as could not be had without sending abroad the greater partof their gold and silver money, in order to purchase it; se-condly, upon the good credit of the government which madeuse of this expedient; and, thirdly, upon the moderationwith which it was used, the whole value of the paper billsof credit never exceeding that of the gold and silver moneywhich would have been necessary for carrying on their cir-culation, had there been no paper bills of credit. The sameexpedient was upon different occasions adopted by severalother American colonies ; but, from want of this moderation,it produced, in the greater part of them, much more disorderthan conveniency.

The unstable and perishable nature of stock and credit,however, render them unfit to be trusted to, as the principalfunds of that sure, steady, and permanent revenue, which canalone give security and dignity to government. The govern-ment of no great nation, that was advanced beyond the shep-herd state, seems ever to have derived the greater part of itspublic revenue from such sources.

Land is a fund of a more stable and permanent nature;and the rent of public lands, accordingly, has been the prin-cipal source of the public revenue of many a great nation thatwas much advanced beyond the shepherd state. From theproduce or rent of the public lands, the ancient republics ofGreece and Italy derived, tor a long time, the greater part ofthat revenue which defrayed the necessary expenses of thecommonwealth. The rent of the crown lands constituted fora long time the greater part of the revenue of the ancientsovereigns of Europe .