proposed raising of our coin will produce; and therefore I have dwelt longer upon them. His remaining six reasons being of less moment, and offering most of them but some circumstantial conveniencies, as to the computation of our money, &c. I shall more briefly pass over. Only before I proceed to them, I shall here set down the different value of our money, collected from our author's history of the several changes of our coin since Edward the First's reign, quite down to this present time. A curious history indeed, for which I think myself, and the world, indebted to Mr. Lowndes's great learning in this sort of knowledge, and his great exactness in relating the particulars.

I shall remark only the quantity of silver was in a shilling, in each of those changes; that so the reader may at first sight, without farther trouble, compare the lessening or increase of the quantity of silver upon every change. For in propriety of speech, the adding to the quantity of silver in our coin, is the true raising of its value; and the diminishing the quantity of silver in it, is the sinking of its value; however they come to be transposed, and used in the quite contrary sense.

If my calculations, from the weight and fineness I find set down in Mr. Lowndes's extract out of the indentures of the mint, have not misled me, the quantity of silver to a grain, which was in a shilling in every change of our money, is set down in the following tables

And so it has remained from the 43d year of queen Elizabeth to this day.

Mr. Lowndes's

66

69

Mr. Lowndes having given us the fineness of the standard silver in every reign, and the number of pieces a pound troy was coined, into closes this history with words to this purpose, page 56, " By this deduction it doth evidently appear, that it hath been a policy constantly practised in the mints of England, to raise the value of the coin in its extrinsic denomination, from time to time, as any exigence or occasion required, and more especially to encourage the bringing of bullion into the realm to be coined." This, indeed, is roundly to conclude for his hypothesis. But I could wish, that from the histories of those times, wherein the several changes were made, he had showed us the exigencies and occasions that produced the raising of the coin, and what effects it had.

If I mistake not, Henry the Eighth's several raisings of our coin brought little increase of silver into England. As the several species of our coin lessened in their respective quantities of silver, so the treasure of the realm decreased too: and he, that found the kingdom rich, did not, as I remember, by all his raising our coin, leave it so.

Another thing, that (from this history) makes me suspect, that the raising the denomination was never found effectively to draw silver into England, is the lowering the denomination, or adding more silver to the species of our coin; as in Henry the Sixth's time, the shilling was increased from one hundred forty-two grains of

silver to one hundred seventy-six; and in the sixth of Edward the Sixth, in whose time raising the denomination seems to have been tried to the utmost, when a shilling was brought to twenty grains of silver. And the great alteration that was then quickly made on the other hand, from twenty to eighty grains at one leap, seems to show that this lessening the silver in our coin had proved prejudicial: for this is a greater change in sinking of the denomination in proportion, than ever was made at once in raising it; a shilling being made four times weightier in silver, the sixth, than it was in the fifth year of Edward the Sixth's reign.

Kingdoms are seldom found weary of the riches they have, or averse to the increase of their treasure. If therefore the raising the denomination did in reality bring silver into the realm, it cannot be thought that they would at any time sink the denomination, which, by the rule of contraries, should be at least suspected to drive or keep it out.

Since, therefore, we are not from matter of fact informed, what were the true motives that caused those several changes in the coin; may we not with reason suspect, that they were owing to that policy of the mint, set down by our author, p. 83, in these words, "That the proposed advance is agreeable to the policy that in past ages hath been practised, not only in our mint, but in the mints of all politic governments; namely, to raise the value of silver in the coin to promote the work of the mint?" As I remember, suitable to this policy of the mint, there was, some two years since, a complaint of a worthy gentleman, not ignorant of it, that the mill in the mint stood still; and therefore there was a proposal offered for bringing grist to the mill.

The business of money, as in all times, even in this our quick-sighted age, hath been thought a mystery: those employed in the mint must, by their places, be supposed to penetrate deepest into it. It is no impossible thing then to imagine, that it was not hard, in the ignorance of past ages, when money was little, and skill in the turns of trade less, for those versed in the busi

ness and policy of the mint to persuade a prince, especially if money were scarce, that the fault was in the standard of the mint, and that the way to increase the plenty of money was to raise (a well-sounding word) the value of the coin. This could not but be willingly enough hearkened to; when, besides the hopes of drawing an increase of silver into the realm, it brought present gain, by the part which the king got of the money, which was hereupon all coined anew, and the mint officers lost nothing, since it promoted the work of the mint.

This opinion Mr. Lowndes himself gives sufficient grounds for in his book, particularly page 29, where we read these words: "Although the former debasements of the coins, by public authority, especially those in the reigns of king Henry the Eighth, and king Edward the Sixth, might be projected for the profit of the crown, and the projectors might measure that profit by the excessive quantities of alloy, that were mixed with the silver and the gold," (and let me add, or by the quantity of silver lessened in each specie, which is the same thing.) "And though this was enterprised by a prince, who could stretch his prerogative very far upon his people; and was done in times, when the nation had very little commerce, inland or foreign, to be injured or prejudiced thereby; yet experience presently showed, that the projectors were mistaken, and that it was absolutely necessary to have the base money reformed." This, at least, they were not mistaken in, that they brought work to the mint, and a part of the money coined to the crown for seniorage: in both which there was profit. Mr. Lowndes tells us, p. 45, "That Henry the Eighth had to the value of fifty shillings for every pound weight of gold coined." I have met with it somewhere, that formerly the king might take what he pleased for coinage. I know not too, but the flattering name of raising money might prevail then as it does now; and impose so far on them as to make them think the raising, i. e. diminishing the silver in their coin, would bring it into the realm, or stay it here, when they found it going out. For if we

may guess at the other by Henry the Eighth's raising, it was probably when, by reason of expense in foreign wars, or ill-managed trade, they found money begin to grow scarce.

A

The having the species of our coin one-fifth bigger, or one-fifth less than they are at present, would obe neither good nor harm to England, if they had always been so. Our standard has continued in weight and fineness, just as it is now, for very near this hundred years last past and those who think the denomination and size of our money have any influence on the state of our wealth, have no reason to change the present standard of our coin; since under that we have had a greater increase, and longer continuance of plenty of money, than perhaps any other country can show: I see no reason to think, that a little bigger or less size of the pieces. coined is of any moment one way or the other. The species of money in any country, of whatsoever sizes, fit for coining, if their proportions to one another be suited to arithmetic and calculations, in whole numbers, and the ways of accounts in that country; if they are adapted to small payments, and carefully kept to their just weight and fineness, can have no harm in them. The harm comes by the change, which unreasonably and unjustly gives away and transfers men's properties, disorders trade, puzzles accounts, and needs a new arithmetic to cast up reckonings, and keep accounts in; besides a thousand other inconveniencies, not to mention the charge of recoining the money; for this may be depended on, that, if our money be raised as is proposed, it will enforce the recoining of all our money, both old and new, (except the new shillings) to avoid the terrible difficulty and confusion there will be in keeping accounts in pounds, shillings, and pence, (as they must be) when the species of our money are so ordered as not to answer those denominations in round numbers.

This consideration leads me to Mr. Lowndes's fifth and sixth reasons, p. 85, wherein he recommends the raising our money in the proportion proposed, for its