are fure in the end to turn to his Honour and Advantage. The reasonable and unprejudiced Part of Mankind will be of his Side, and rejoice to see their common Intereft lodged in fuch honeft Hands. A ftrict Examination of a great Man's Character is like the Trial of a fufpected Chastity, which was made among the Jews by the Waters of Jealoufy. Mofes affures us, that the Criminal burft upon the drinking of them; but if she was accufed wrongfully, the Rabbins tell us, they heighten'd her Charms, and made her much more amiable than before: So that they destroyed the Guilty, but beautified the Innocent.

N° 18 Monday, February 20.

· Inopem me Copia fecit. Ovid. Met. 1. 3. v. 466. Too much Plenty makes me die for Want.

ADDISON.

VERY Englishman will be a good Subject to King George, in proportion as he is a good Englishman, and a Lover of the Conftitution of his Country. In order to awaken in my Readers the Love of this their Conftitution, it may be neceffary to set forth its fuperior Excellency to that Form of Government, which many wicked and ignorant Men have of late Years endeavour'd to introduce among us. I shall not therefore think it improper to take notice from time to time of any particular Act of Power, exerted by thofe among whom the Pretender to His Majefty's Crown has been educated;

which wou'd prove fatal to this Nation, fhou'd it be Conquer'd and Govern'd by a Perfon, who, in all probability, would put in practice the Politicks in which he has been fo long inftructed.

There has been nothing more obfervable in the Reign of his prefent Gallick Majefty, than the Method he has taken for fupplying his Exchequer with a neceffary Sum of Money. The Ways and Means for raifing it has been an Edict, or a Command in Writing figned by himfelf, to increase the Value of Louis d'Ors from Fourteen to Sixteen Livres, by virtue of a new Stamp, which will be ftruck upon them. As this Method will bring all the Gold of the Kingdom into his Hands, it is provided by the fame Edict, that they fhall be paid out again to the People at Twenty Livres each; fo that Four Livres in the Score by this means accrue to his Majesty out of all the Money in the Kingdom of France.

This Method of raifing Money is confiftent with that Form of Government, and with the repeated Practice of their late Grand Monarque ; fo that I fhall not here confider the many evil Confequences which it must have upon their Trade, their Exchange, and publick Credit. I fhall only take notice of the whimfical Circumftances a People muft lie under, who can be thus made poor or rich by an Edict, which can throw an Alloy into a Louis d'Or, and debafe it into half its former Value, or, if his Majefty pleafes, raife the Price of it, not by the Acceffion of Metal, but of a Mark. By the prefent Edict many a Man in France will fwell into a Plumb, who fell feveral Thousand Pounds fhort of it the Day before its Publication. This convey

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conveys a kind of Fairy Treasure into their Chefts, even while they are under Lock and Key; and is a Secret of Multiplication without Addition. It is natural enough however for the Vanity of the French Nation to grow infolent upon this imaginary Wealth, not confidering that their Neighbours think them no more Rich by virtue of an Edict to make Fourteen Twenty, than they wou'd think 'em more formidable fhould there be another Edict to make every Man in the Kingdom Seven Foot high.

It was ufual for his late Moft Chriftian Majesty to fink the Value of their Louis d'Ors about the time he was to receive the Taxes of his good People, and to raise them when he had got them fafe into his Coffers. And there is no queftion but the prefent Government in that Kingdom will fo far obferve this kind of Conduct, as to reduce the Twenty Livres to their old Number of Fourteen, when they have paid them out of their Hands; which will immediately fink the prefent Tympany of Wealth, and re-establish the natural Poverty of the Gallick Nation.

One cannot but pity the melancholy Condition of a Mifer in this Country, who is perpetually telling his Livres, without being able to know how Rich he is. He is as ridiculously puzzled and perplexed as a Man that counts the Stones on Salisbury-Plain, which can never be settled to any certain Number, but are more or fewer every time he reckons them.

I have heard of a young French Lady, a Subject of Louis the Fourteenth, who was contracted to a Marquis upon the foot of a Five Thoufand Pound Fortune, which she had by her in Specie ; but one of these unlucky Edicts coming out

a Week

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a Week before the intended Marriage, fhe loft a Thousand Pound, and her Bridegroom into the Bargain.

The Uncertainty of Riches is a Subject much difcourfed of in all Countries, but may be infifted on more emphatically in France than any other. A Man is here under fuch a kind of Situation, as one who is managed by a Juggler. He fancies he has fo many Pieces of Money in his Hand; but let him grafp them never fo carefully, upon a Word or two of the Artift they increase or dwindle to what Number the Doctor is pleafed

to name.

This Method of lowering or advancing Money, we, who have the Happiness to be in another Form of Government, fhould look upon as an unwarrantable kind of Clipping and Coining. However, as it is an Expedient that is of ten practifed, and may be juftify'd in that Conftitution which has been fo thoroughly ftudied by the Pretender to His Majesty's Crown, I do not see what should have hinder'd him from making ufe of fo expeditious a Method for raifing a Supply, if he had fucceeded in his late Attempt to dethrone His Majefty, and fubvert our Conftitution. I fhall leave it to the Confideration of the Reader, if in fuch a Cafe the following Edict, or fomething very like it, might not have been expected.

WH

HEREAS thefe our Kingdoms have long groned under an expenfive and confuming Land-War, which has very much exhaufted the Treasure of the Nation, we, being willing to increase the Wealth of our People, and not thinking it advifeable for this Purpofe to make ufe of the tedious Methods • of

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of Merchandife and Commerce, which have been always promoted by a Faction among the worst of our Subjects, and were fo wifely discountenanc'd by the beft of them in the late Reign, do hereby enact by our fole Will and Pleafure, that every Shilling in Great• Britain fhall pafs in all Payments for the Sum of Fourteen Pence, till the First of September next, and that every other Piece of Money fhall rife and pass in current Payment in the fame proportion. The Advantage, which will accrue to thefe Nations by this our Royal Donative, will visibly appear to all Men of found Principles, who are fo juftly famous for their Antipathy to Strangers, and would not fee the Landed Intereft of their Country weaken'd by the Importations of Foreign Gold and Silver: But fince by reason of the great • Debts which we have contracted Abroad during our fifteen Years Reign, as well as of our prefent Exigencies, it will be neceffary to fill our Exchequer by the most prudent and expeditious Methods, we do alfo hereby order every one of our Subjects to bring in these his Fourteen-penny Pieces, and all the • other current Cafh of this Kingdom, by what new Titles foever dignified or diftinguished, to the Mafter of our Mint, who, after having fet a Mark upon them, fhall deliver out to them, on or after the Firft of September aforefaid, their refpective Sums, taking only Fourpence for Ourself for fuch his Mark on every Fourteen-penny Piece, which from thenceforth fhall pass in Payment for Eighteen-pence, and fo in proportion for the reft. By this Method, the Money of this Nation will be more by one Third than it is at prefent; and we shall

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