It is thought that the monster of a
commonwealth cannot possibly live,--that at any rate the ill contrivance
of their fabric will make it fall in pieces of itself,--that the
Assembly must be bankrupt,--and that this bankruptcy will totally
destroy that system from the contagion of which apprehensions are
entertained.
For my part I have long thought that one great cause of the stability of
this wretched scheme of things in France was an opinion that it could
not stand, and therefore that all external measures to destroy it were
wholly useless.
[Sidenote: Bankruptcy.]
As to the bankruptcy, that event has happened long ago, as much as it is
ever likely to happen. As soon as a nation compels a creditor to take
paper currency in discharge of his debt, there is a bankruptcy. The
compulsory paper has in some degree answered,--not because there was a
surplus from Church lands, but because faith has not been kept with the
clergy. As to the holders of the old funds, to them the payments will be
dilatory, but they will be made; and whatever may be the discount on
paper, whilst paper is taken, paper will be issued.
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