DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.22140#0152
136 INDUSTRIAL AND COMMERCIAL HISTORY.
word has not been said upon the subject. But the question of
the currency is the strong meat of economics, and it is perhaps
dangerous to ofser it to beginners in the science, seeing how it
has tried the digestive powers of many who would fain be con-
sidered authorities. Be that as it may, it was a measure which,
of its kind, was as great a departure from tradition as any of
the Acts framed by that great statesman, and marks a new era
in politics.
The days indeed of chartered joint-stock enterprise have long
passed away. The South Sea Company, as a trading association,
had a brief and shameful career. That of the East India
Company was long, splendid, and unique. Both, I believe, if
trade was to be carried on, were necessary in their day. I do not
think it would have been possible in the seventeenth century to
have achieved trade with the East by private enterprise. Skinner
may have been an ill-used man, but he intended really to trade
under the aegis of the Company, whose monopoly for a time
superseded, he ventured to intrude on. Jenkins of the Ear
would not, I apprehend, have susfered in the service of the South
Sea Company. He wTas no doubt trading on his own account,
and when he had to endure, as he said, the mutilation he had
certainly undergone, he did not seek succour from the South Sea
Company, but, as he alleged, from God and his country. Of
course, as people at that time knew, there were divers processes
under which ears were lost, and the unabashed Defoe, novelist
and pamphleteer, was not the only earless person to be seen.
But the trading of these companies soon became a public scandal
and a public loss. Long before its dissolution, Parliament had to
distinguish between the East India Company as an empire and
as a trading concern. The monopoly of the latter became
intolerable.
The Bank of England, with the exception of that episode in
its history, on which I have commented, when it should have had
the firmness to resist temptation, and to have insisted on its own
account, that it should give proof of its solvency, has been
continuously useful and honourable. Its political services, on
which of course I do not comment, have been as significant, as
profound, and as important as its economical career has been. It
word has not been said upon the subject. But the question of
the currency is the strong meat of economics, and it is perhaps
dangerous to ofser it to beginners in the science, seeing how it
has tried the digestive powers of many who would fain be con-
sidered authorities. Be that as it may, it was a measure which,
of its kind, was as great a departure from tradition as any of
the Acts framed by that great statesman, and marks a new era
in politics.
The days indeed of chartered joint-stock enterprise have long
passed away. The South Sea Company, as a trading association,
had a brief and shameful career. That of the East India
Company was long, splendid, and unique. Both, I believe, if
trade was to be carried on, were necessary in their day. I do not
think it would have been possible in the seventeenth century to
have achieved trade with the East by private enterprise. Skinner
may have been an ill-used man, but he intended really to trade
under the aegis of the Company, whose monopoly for a time
superseded, he ventured to intrude on. Jenkins of the Ear
would not, I apprehend, have susfered in the service of the South
Sea Company. He wTas no doubt trading on his own account,
and when he had to endure, as he said, the mutilation he had
certainly undergone, he did not seek succour from the South Sea
Company, but, as he alleged, from God and his country. Of
course, as people at that time knew, there were divers processes
under which ears were lost, and the unabashed Defoe, novelist
and pamphleteer, was not the only earless person to be seen.
But the trading of these companies soon became a public scandal
and a public loss. Long before its dissolution, Parliament had to
distinguish between the East India Company as an empire and
as a trading concern. The monopoly of the latter became
intolerable.
The Bank of England, with the exception of that episode in
its history, on which I have commented, when it should have had
the firmness to resist temptation, and to have insisted on its own
account, that it should give proof of its solvency, has been
continuously useful and honourable. Its political services, on
which of course I do not comment, have been as significant, as
profound, and as important as its economical career has been. It