date

12 Decr 1801 Maximum Beginning
12 Decr 1801

Maximum

Beginning

Terms[?]

2

On what precise ground I had happened to be numbered among the condemners of a

measure I had never presumed so much as to glance /glanced/ at is a question I

can answer no otherwise than by conjecture. I had brought to view an /the/

interference of the legislator in a case in which for the reason given,

according to my humble conception of the matter that interference might have as

well been spared: or I had talked about levels, and about things finding their

own level observing that level was a very proper thing to find, and that money,

if left to itself, would stand a good chance of finding it. What helps to

incline me to this conjecture is – that gentlemen when they have done me the

honour to join with me as they supposed /it seemed to them/ in opinion on this

subject /ground/, would /have/ sometimes whether for shortness or for ornament

refer /referred in this way/ to a law in hydrostatics as the ground for it.

Money according to in my opinion, I mean according to their edition of it – was

a sort of thing that would find its own level or that ought to be left to find.

Between what does naturally take place and what ought to take place, there is

indeed some difference: but it is a difference which moralists are apt enough to

overlook which they constantly overlook as often as they talk of the law of

nature, and which it is quite as easy for them to overlook, if instead of

sufferings and enjoyments, they betake themselves to measuring of levels. In the

play of convivial conversation I have never had the inurbanity to requite a

complement with a criticism: but on a serious occasion, speaking with that

sincerity and recollection that becomes a man who is addressing himself to the

public and to save a well intended and as I flattered myself a harmless

publication from being a cause of mischief and mistake, I must needs

say
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    say that neither of those […?] /conceptions/ /allusions/ will serve to convey a

    just conception of the principles on which the arguments of /in/ that book are

    grounded. Neither on that or any other occasion have I ever given or shall I

    ever give, serpents for fish, sentiment or metaphor for argument. I have not, I

    never had nor ever shall have any sentimental horror /any horror, sentimental or

    anarchical/ of the hand of government. I leave it to Adam Smith and the

    champions of the rights of man (for confusion of ideas will jumble together the

    best subjects and the worst citizens upon the same ground) to talk of invasions

    of natural liberty and to give as a special argument against this or that law,

    an argument the effect of which would be to put a negative on /upon/ all laws.

    Of The interference of government, as often as in my humble view of the matter

    any the smallest ballance on the side of advantage is the result /is an event I

    witness/, with altogether as much satisfaction as I should its forbearance, and

    with much more than I should its negligence. Neither in that book nor in any

    other book of mine will any expression be found in /by/ which any such

    association is attempted to be made between the idea of money and that of a

    level between rates of interest and levels. The particles of a mass of fluid,

    the particles of a mass of water have a propensity when left to themselves to

    range themselves upon the same level: human creatures have on their part a

    propensity to save their own lives: and when water in the search after a level

    is making its way too fast into a ship, pumps are employed by men to

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  • Title: [10 Decr 1801 Maximum 6. Scarcity]
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    Here as before, the Hon: Gentleman having wrapped up his argument in an interrogation, at the peril of the charge of misconception and misrepresentation, I find myself obliged to make a proposition for the Hon Gentleman which I do with all imaginable diffidence and reluctance, prepared and resolved to discard it /turn it out of doors/ the very instant he disowns it: protesting most sincerely that if this be not what he means I am altogether unable to conjecture what else it can be

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  • Title: [12 Dec.r 1801 Maximum Beginning]
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    prevail on it to get the better of that propensity, and look out for /betake

    itself to/ a higher level, and this may serve as an argument in favour /support/

    of maximum to any gentleman who finds himself disposed /feels in himself a

    propensity/ to consider it as such.

    [marginal note:] I choose rather to remain unread than feed readers with such

    arguments.