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A39901
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A further attempt towards the reformation of the coin with expedients for preventing the stop of commerce during the re-coinage, and supplying the mint with a sufficient quantity of bullion ... / by R. Ford.
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Ford, R., fl. 1696.
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1696
(1696)
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Wing F1471; ESTC R4545
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13,802
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26
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our Money there will also thereby ensue this further Inconvenience viz. That our Neighbours supplying us with more Goods than we do them we thereby become their Debtors and consequently must pay what we owe them in such as they will please to accept and we may be certain they will choose to have their Returns in that whereby they shall gain most So that if our Silver be reduced to a low value they will choose to have their Returns in as much of it as they can whereby we shall be at length so drain'd of our Money as to be reduced to such a Scarcity and want of Money as I affirmed and I think have proved will be the consequence of the non-advancement of Silver and the cause of such a Poverty as will disable us to pay our Taxes and Rents and manage our Trades Which though it be but a single Instance of the Mischievous Effects of setting a low Valuation on Silver yet is one of so black and extensive a Nature and draws such a Numerous and Dismal Train of Ill Consequences along with it as will spare me the Labour of adding much more to prove the Disadvantage of such a Practice However I shall mention a second grand Inconvenience that will attend the non-advancement of Silver viz. That the making our Money of a great Weight and a low Value will mightily obstruct the Sale of our Manufactures and In-land Commodities both to our Neighbours abroad and amongst our selves at home For as to our Neighbours if our Money be made of so extraordinary Goodness they will as I said before choose to have their Returns made in that and in as few of our Goods as possible Which will cause our Commodities to fall very much on our hands for want of Buyers In the mean time our Neighbours taking as much Money and as few Goods from us as possible will thereby together with the concurrence of some other causes mentioned in the foregoing Head occasion such a want of Money as will mightily obstruct the Vent of our In-land Commodities even among our selves and so very much prejudice our Domestick as well as Foreign Commerce For a great scarcity of Money will oblige Persons to retrench their usual Expences and employ their Money in such things only as are of pure Necessity So that most of the Trades that subsist by furnishing things for the Pleasure and Ornament of Humane Life of which kind the Greater part of the Trades of the Nations subsist must necessarily droop and decline for Persons not having Money sufficient to gratifie both their Necessities and their Pleasures will be obliged to baulk the latter to serve the former or at least to disappoint one of the two and then amongst other Commodities that will fall so much by reason of the Scarcity of Money We may be certain that Corn Cattel and the other Products of Land will bear a Proportion And if a Tenant cannot make so much of the Product of his Farm as he used to do then it will be impossible for him to pay his Landlord the usual Rent So that all the Lands and Tenements must of necessity sink considerably below their present yearly Rents Which will not be the only Diskindness that this hopeful Project of Reducing the Silver to so low a Rate as 5 s. 2 d. per Ounce if it succeed will procure to the Gentlemens and Landlords Estates in England For this low Rate of Silver causing a Scarcity of Money and this Scarcity of Money naturally causing the Advancement of the Interest thereof to perhaps double the present Rate and the Advancement of the Interest of Money will certainly lower the Purchase of Lands by several Years for that when the Increase of Money was high Lands yielded but a few Years Purchase But on the contrary When the Interest of Money was lowest then Lands sold for the most Years Purchase as will be evident if we compare the Purchase of Lands in King Henry the Eighth's Time when Interest of Money was at 12 or 14 l. per Cent. per Annum with the Purchase of the same Lands now when Interest is not above a third part of what it was at that time It being always observed That as the Price of Money was advanced and thereby the Species increased that the Interest thereof fell and grew less and according as the Interest of Money fell so Land advanced several years Purchase as will be manifest if we observe how much the Land of England hath been improved since the aforesaid time of King Henry the Eighth when Interest of Money was so very high So that upon the whole we may see how much the Gentlemen and Landlords of England are obliged to these Persons for proposing such a Method of Regulating the Coin that will not only by introducing a Scarcity of Money cause all the Products and consequently the yearly Rents of Lands to fall considerably but also advance the Interest of Money and thereby lower the Purchase of Lands by several years And I conceive I have by this time so throughly represented the fatal Consequences that will ensue on the fixing Silver at a low Rate that the Impartial Reader by this time cannot but be sensible how destructive that course would be to the Publick Good I should now as I proposed enforce my Reasons for advancing the Price of Silver by representing the Advantages that would accrue to the Nation by doing thereof But these being in some measure handled under the former Head when I enumerated the ill Consequences of the contrary course And these Advantages of raising Silver being but as it were the Reverse of and directly opposite unto the Disadvantages of fixing a low Value thereon The good Effects of the one are best seen by opposing them to the bad ones of the other Method which I shall do very briefly if the setting a low Valuation on Silver will cause that it will pass but a little way in Payments the contrary method will make it go as far as possible If the former be such a Discouragement to the bringing in of Silver to be coin'd as cuts off all hopes of increasing the Quantity of our Money the latter affords all imaginable Incouragement both to the Importation of it into the Kingdom and to the carrying it into the Mint to be coin'd By which means we may hope to have as great a Plenty of good Money as ever was yet in the Nation Again If the setting too low a Valuation on Silver be a Temptation to convey it out of the Kingdom the fixing a high Rate thereon will be a means of preserving the Coin intire and unmelted And if the low Rate of Silver will obstruct the Exportation of our Commodities because our Neighbours will choose our Money before our Goods On the contrary The advancing Silver to a pretty high Rate will induce them to choose our Commodities rather than our Money and thereby incourage our Trade and Manufactures and preserve
our Money in the Kingdom to manage our Inland Trade In short If the low Rate of Silver will cause such a Scarcity of Money as will oblige Persons to retrench their usual pleasurable Expences and thereby occasion the Decay of a great many Trades depending thereon but the setting a high Price on Silver thereby causing a Plenty thereof in the Nation will enable Persons to spend freely to the Advantage of Trade Again If the one will produce such a Scarcity of Silver as will cause all Commodities and among the rest all the Products of Land to fall considerably and consequently all Lands to sink something in their yearly Rent The other on the contrary by advancing Silver would keep Commodities up at such a tolerable Price as would preserve the present yearly Rent of Land Finally If fixing Silver at a low Rate will cause such a Scarcity as must of necessity advance the Interest of Money and thereby cause Land to fall several years Purchase On the contrary The Advancement of Silver causing as I have proved a Plenty of Money which Plenty must consequently lower the Interest thereof And the Lessening of the Interest of Money will as Experience evinces advance Land several years Purchase Having as I Hope sufficiently evinced the Necessity and Advantage of raising the Price of Silver I come now to fix the particular Rate to which I humbly conceive it is requisite to be advanced which with the Judicious Mr. Lowndes who seems to have understood this matter better than most who have treated of it besides I judge to be one fourth part above the present Establishment so that the Ounce of Silver must consequently be raised from 5 s. 2 d. unto 6 s. 5 d. ½ per Ounce which may be done two ways either by Retaining of the same Weight and Fineness as before with the addition of a fourth part of Extrinsick Value and so every mill'd Crown must be ordered to pass at 6 s. 3 d. and the other pieces proportionable The other Method of advancing the Silver is by Coining it of a less weight than before but still affixing the same Value by which Regulation the Standard of one of the new Crown pieces to pass at 5 s. will consist of 15 penny-weights and an half within an inconsiderable Fraction and the other Pieces proportionable Both which methods come to one and the same effect only if it shall be thought fit to make use of the latter method of diminishing the weight but retaining the extrinsick value Then the better to make the New Crowns answer to such as shall be left of the old Establishment it will be requisite that besides Half Crowns there should be also Coined Quarter Crowns or pieces of 15 d. one whereof added to a New Crown will make it exactly answer the Old Mill'd Crown pieces that shall remain of the former Standard This Rate setled on our Silver Coins will soon reduce our Gold to the same proportion according to which a Guinea is worth 25 s. at which rate I humbly conceive it is for the Publick Interest to have them fix'd by Authority And moreover to prevent the extraordinary Loss that will fall so heavy on some particular persons by their falling 5 s. per piece viz. from 30 s. unto 25 s. at one instant as they are like to do if left to take their course I judge it would prevent that Inconvenience if the Loss that will ensue upon them be equally born by the Nation which may be effected by Ordering them to fall 6 d per piece ever month for the first six months next ensuing the date of an Order to be publish'd for that effect and to fall 4 d. per piece every month for the next six months to commence from the Expiration of the first six months and all Persons shall be commanded to take them at the Rates they shall be currant in each respective month under the Penalty of forfeiting the value of the money they shall so refuse And all other Gold Coins to fall by the same proportion Whereby in 12 months time we should have our Gold Coin reduced to their true value with a Trouble and Loss that being thus divided among the Nation in general would be very inconsiderable and almost insensible But were it to be born by each particular person would very much impoverish some Families whilst the rest escape Scot-free for all persons that shall be thus obliged to take Guinea's for their Goods would reimburse themselves in some measure by making a better price of their Commodities and be likewise in hopes of paying their Guinea's away again before a month is expired So as I am perswaded that such an Ordinance would be received with almost an Universal Satisfaction Thus have I gone through the First and indeed Principal Point I intended in this Discourse and therefore shall be more brief in what remains The Second General Head I proposed to enquire into is By whom shall the Loss that will ensue on the Re-coining the Clipt and Counterfeit Money be sustained Unto that part of the Query that relates to the Clipt Silver Money the Resolution of Parliament That the Loss thereof shall be made good by the Publick is a sufficient Reply But it being yet undetermined By whom the Loss occasion'd by the Counterseit Money should be sustained I hope I may be permitted to communicate my Opinion Which is That the Loss thereof be born one part by the Publick and the other by the several Proprietors in the sollowing Proportion viz. That for all such Counterfeit-Money as hath any Mixture or Incorporation of Silver in it and is not intirely Brass Copper Iron or some such Metal the Owner shall upon their carrying it into the Mint be allowed for so much as the said Money shall weigh after the rate of 5 s. per Ounce Troy-weight to be paid them partly out of such Silver as shall be found in the said Money that is Carried in after the Melting and Separation thereof and the residue out of such a Tax as the Parliament shall think fit to lay for that purpose Until which Money can be rais'd they shall have Notes given them entitling themselves or the Bearers thereof unto so much Sterling Money as the said Counterfeit-Money they carried in amounted unto by weight at 5 s. per Ounce to be paid as before and to have an Allowance of 5 per Cent. per Ann. for the said Value of their Counterfeit-Money until the time of Payment By which Method the Poorer sort of People in whose hands great part of the Bad Money is lodg'd would be extremely eas'd and with no great burden to the Nation For supposing there should be about 2500000 l. Bad Money in the Kingdom whereof we may suppose at least 500000 l. entirely Brass Copper c. which Loss is to fall wholly on the Proprietors And the Two Millions that may be suppos'd to be Mix'd Metal would hardly weigh One Million the Bad