328

CHAPTER the income of the crown, and all the fixed incomes of in-
^^^' dividuals, to be constantly deteriorated by the prevalence
of a system, that is productive of no one advantage to
compensate the mischief, which it occasions. All the evils,
that resulted under the Henrys and the Edwards, from
the adulteration and debasemejit of the coin, now result
from the fabrication of factitious money ; and as parlia¬
ment then made various attempts to counteract the effects
of the degradation, it is surely important, that it should
interpose its authority at the present period, when money
is made much more than formerly the instrument of
mediation in all compacts.

The only policy which it is necessary to pursue, is to
prevent an increase of currency. If the relative amount
of currency be not augmented, it is impossible that money
can be depreciated. The means, by which this policy is to
be carried into effect, will be the subject of the following
chapter.

But as all legislative provisions are necessarily imper¬
fect, it is essential, before I close these observations, to
remark, that in compositions of a permanent nature,
some criterion should be assumed for the purpose of pro¬
viding a graduated scale of the value of money, and that
an increase or diminution of income should be allowed in
conformity to the result. The present impoverishment of
the crown is a sufficient warning against permanent com¬
pacts for a definite sum ; and no public composition will,
I trust, be hereafter concluded, that does not contjun
within itself the power of revision as to the pecuniary