The Querist..........................................................................................................................................................1

George Berkeley......................................................................................................................................1

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The Querist was first published in the year one thousand seven hundred and thirtyfive; since which time the

face of things is somewhat changed. In this edition some alterations have been made. The three Parts are

published in one; some few Queries are added, and many omitted, particularly of those relating to the sketch

or plan of a national bank, which it may be time enough to take again in hand when the public shall seem

disposed to make use of such an expedient. I had determined with myself never to prefix my name to the

Querist, but in the last edition was overruled by a friend, who was remarkable for pursuing the public interest

with as much diligence as others do their own. I apprehend the same censure on this that I incurred upon

another occasion, for meddling out of my profession; though to feed the hungry and clothe the naked, by

promoting an honest industry, will, perhaps, be deemed no improper employment for a clergyman who still

things himself a member of the commonwealth. As the sum of human happiness is supposed to consist in the

goods of mind, body,and fortune, I would fain make my studies of some use to mankind with regard to each

of these three particulars, and hope it will not be thought faulty or indecent in any man, of what profession

soever, to offer his mite towards improving the manners, health, and prosperity of his fellowcreatures.

QUERY 1 Whether there ever was, is, or will be, an industrious nation poor, or an idle rich?

2 Whether a people can be called poor, where the common sort are well fed, clothed, and lodged?

3 Whether the drift and aim of every wise State should not be, to encourage industry in its members? And

whether those who employ neither heads nor hands for the common benefit deserve not to be expelled like

4 Whether the four elements, and man's labour therein, be not the true source of wealth?

5 Whether money be not only so far useful, as it stirreth up industry, enabling men mutually to participate the

6 Whether any other means, equally conducing to excite and circulate the industry of mankind, may not be as

7 Whether the real end and aim of men be not power? And whether he who could have everything else at his

8 Whether the public aim in every wellgoverned State be not that each member, according to his just

9 Whether power be not referred to action; and whether action doth not follow appetite or will?

10 Whether fashion doth not create appetites; and whether the prevailing will of a nation is not the fashion?

11 Whether the current of industry and commerce be not determined by this prevailing will?

13 Whether it may not concern the wisdom of the legislature to interpose in the making of fashions; and not

leave an affair of so great influence to the management of women and fops, tailors and vintners?

14 Whether reasonable fashions are a greater restraint on freedom than those which are unreasonable?

15 Whether a general good taste in a people would not greatly conduce to their thriving? And whether an

16 Whether customs and fashions do not supply the place of reason in the vulgar of all ranks? Whether,

17 Whether the imitating those neighbours in our fashions, to whom we bear no likeness in our

18 Whether frugal fashions in the upper rank, and comfortable living in the lower, be not the means to

19 Whether the bulk of our Irish natives are not kept from thriving, by that cynical content in dirt and beggary

20 Whether the creating of wants be not the likeliest way to produce industry in a people? And whether, if

our peasants were accustomed to eat beef and wear shoes, they would not be more industrious?

21 Whether other things being given, as climate, soil, etc., the wealth be not proportioned to the industry, and

this to the circulation of credit, be the credit circulated or transferred by what marks or tokens soever?

22 Whether, therefore, less money swiftly circulating, be not, in effect, equivalent to more money slowly

circulating? Or, whether, if the circulation be reciprocally as the quantity of coin, the nation can be a loser?

23 Whether money is to be considered as having an intrinsic value, or as being a commodity, a standard, a

measure, or a pledge, as is variously suggested by writers? And whether the true idea of money, as such, be

24 Whether the value or price of things be not a compounded proportion, directly as the demand, and

25 Whether the terms crown, livre, pound sterling, etc., are not to be considered as exponents or

denominations of such proportion? And whether gold, silver, and paper are not tickets or counters for

26 Whether the denominations being retained, although the bullion were gone, things might not nevertheless

be rated, bought, and sold, industry promoted, and a circulation of commerce maintained?

27 Whether an equal raising of all sorts of gold, silver, and copper coin can have any effect in bringing

money into the? And whether altering the proportions between the kingdom several sorts can have any other

effect but multiplying one kind and lessening another, without any increase of the sum total?

29 What makes a wealthy people? Whether mines of gold and silver are capable of doing this? And whether

30 Whether there be any virtue in gold or silver, other than as they set people at work, or create industry?

31 Whether it be not the opinion or will of the people, exciting them to industry, that truly enricheth a nation?

And whether this doth not principally depend on the means for counting, transferring, and preserving power,

32 Whether if there was no silver or gold in the kingdom, our trade might not, nevertheless, supply bills of

exchange, sufficient to answer the demands of absentees in England or elsewhere?

33 Whether current banknotes may not be deemed money? And whether they are not actually the greater

34 Provided the wheels move, whether it is not the same thing, as to the effect of the machine, be this done by

35 Whether power to command the industry of others be not real wealth? And whether money be not in truth

tickets or tokens for conveying and recording such power, and whether it be of great consequence what

36 Whether trade, either foreign or domestic, be in truth any more than this commerce of industry?

37 Whether to promote, transfer, and secure this commerce, and this property in human labour, or, in other

words, this power, be not the sole means of enriching a people, and how far this may be done independently

38 Whether it were not wrong to suppose land itself to be wealth? And whether the industry of the people is

not first to be considered, as that which constitutes wealth, which makes even land and silver to be wealth,

39 Whether in the wastes of America a man might not possess twenty miles square of land, and yet want his

40 Whether a fertile land, and the industry of its inhabitants, would not prove inexhaustible funds of real

wealth, be the counters for conveying and recording thereof what you will, paper, gold, or silver?

41 Whether a single hint be sufficient to overcome a prejudice? And whether even obvious truths will not

42 Whether, if human labour be the true source of wealth, it doth not follow that idleness should of all things

43 Whether even gold or silver, if they should lessen the industry of its inhabitants, would not be ruinous to a

44 Whether the opinion of men, and their industry consequent thereupon, be not the true wealth of Holland

45 Whether there is in truth any such treasure lying dead? And whether it be of great consequence to the

46 Whether, in order to understand the true nature of wealth and commerce, it would not be right to consider

a ship's crew cast upon a desert island, and by degrees forming themselves to business and civil life, while

47 Whether such men would not all set themselves to work? Whether they would not subsist by the mutual

participation of each other's industry? Whether, when one man had in his way procured more than he could

consume, he would not exchange his superfluities to supply his wants? Whether this must not produce credit?

Whether, to facilitate these conveyances, to record and circulate this credit, they would not soon agree on

48 Whether reflection in the better sort might not soon remedy our evils? And whether our real defect be not

49 Whether it would not be an unhappy turn in our gentlemen, if they should take more thought to create an

interest to themselves in this or that county, or borough, than to promote the real interest of their country?

50 Whether if a man builds a house he doth not in the first place provide a plan which governs his work? And

51 Whether by how much the less particular folk think for themselves, the public be not so much the more

52 Whether small gains be not the way to great profit? And if our tradesmen are beggars, whether they may

53 Whether some way might not be found for making criminals useful in public works, instead of sending

54 Whether we may not, as well as other nations, contrive employment for them? And whether servitude,

chains, and hard labour, for a term of years, would not be a more discouraging as well as a more adequate

55 Whether there are not such things in Holland as bettering houses for bringing young gentlemen to order?

56 Whether it be true that the poor in Holland have no resource but their own labour, and yet there are no

57 Whether he whose luxury consumeth foreign products, and whose industry produceth nothing domestic to

58 Whether necessity is not to be hearkened to before convenience, and convenience before luxury?

59 Whether to provide plentifully for the poor be not feeding the root, the substance whereof will shoot

60 Whether there be any instance of a State wherein the people, living neatly and plentifully, did not aspire to

61 Whether nastiness and beggary do not, on the contrary, extinguish all such ambition, making men listless,

62 Whether a country inhabited by people well fed, clothed and lodged would not become every day more

populous? And whether a numerous stock of people in such circumstances would? and how far the product of

not constitute a flourishing nation; our own country may suffice for the compassing of this end?

63 Whether a people who had provided themselves with the necessaries of life in good plenty would not soon

64 Whether those same manufactures which England imports from other countries may not be admitted from

Ireland? And, if so, whether lace, carpets, and tapestry, three considerable articles of English importation,

might not find encouragement in Ireland? And whether an academy for design might not greatly conduce to

65 Whether France and Flanders could have drawn so much money from England for figured silks, lace, and

66 Whether, when a room was once prepared, and models in plaster of Paris, the annual expense of such an

67 Whether our linenmanufacture would not find the benefit of this institution? And whether there be

anything that makes us fall short of the Dutch in damasks, diapers, and printed linen, but our ignorance in

68 Whether those who may slight this affair as notional have sufficiently considered the extensive use of the

art of design, and its influence in most trades and manufactures, wherein the forms of things are often more

69 Whether there be any art sooner learned than that of making carpets? And whether our women, with little

time and pains, may not make more beautiful carpets than those imported from Turkey? And whether this

70 Whether human industry can produce, from such cheap materials, a manufacture of so great value by any

71 Whether pictures and statues are not in fact so much treasure? And whether Rome and Florence would not

72 Whether they do not bring ready money as well as jewels? Whether in Italy debts are not paid, and

73 Whether it would not be more prudent, to strike out and exert ourselves in permitted branches of trade,

74 Whether it be true that two millions are yearly expended by England in foreign lace and linen?

75 Whether immense sums are not drawn yearly into the Northern countries, for supplying the British navy

76 Whether there be anything more profitable than. hemp? And whether there should not be great premiums

for encouraging our hempen trade? What advantages may not Great Britain make of a country where land and

77 Whether Ireland alone might not raise hemp sufficient for the British navy? And whether it would not be

vain to expect this from the British Colonies in America, where hands are so scarce, and labour so

78 Whether, if our own people want will or capacity for such an attempt, it might not be worth while for

some undertaking spirits in England to make settlements, and raise hemp in the counties of Clare and

Limerick, than which, perhaps, there is not fitter land in the world for that purpose? And whether both nations

79 Whether if all the idle hands in this kingdom were employed on hemp and flax, we might not find

80 How far it may be in our own power to better our affairs, without interfering with our neighbours?

81 Whether the prohibition of our woollen trade ought not naturally to put us on other methods which give no

82 Whether paper be not a valuable article of commerce? And whether it be not true that one single

bookseller in London yearly expended above four thousand pounds in that foreign commodity?

83 How it comes to pass that the Venetians and Genoese, who wear so much less linen, and so much worse

than we do, should yet make very good paper, and in great quantity, while we make very little?

84 How long it will be before my countrymen find out that it is worth while to spend a penny in order to get a

85 If all the land were tilled that is fit for tillage, and all that sowed with hemp and flax that is fit for raising

them, whether we should have much sheepwalk beyond what was sufficient to supply the necessities of the

87 Whether it be not a sure sign or effect of a country's inhabitants? And, thriving, to see it well cultivated

and full of; if so, whether a great quantity of sheepwalk be not ruinous to a country, rendering it waste and

88 Whether the employing so much of our land under sheep be not in fact an Irish blunder?

89 Whether our hankering after our woollen trade be not the true and only reason which hath created a

jealousy in England towards Ireland? And whether anything can hurt us more than such jealousy?

90 Whether it be not the true interest of both nations to become one people? And whether either be

91 Whether the upper part of this people are not truly English, by blood, language, religion, manners,

92 Whether we are not as much Englishmen as the children of old Romans, born in Britain, were still

93 Whether it be not our true interest not to interfere with them; and, in every other case, whether it be not

94 Whether a mint in Ireland might not be of great convenience to the kingdom; and whether it could be

attended with any possible inconvenience to Great Britain? And whether there were not mints in Naples and

95 Whether anything can be more ridiculous than for the north of Ireland to be jealous of a linen

96 Whether the county of Tipperary be not much better land than the county of Armagh; and yet whether the

97 Whether every landlord in the kingdom doth not know the cause of this? And yet how few are the better

98 Whether large farms under few hands, or small ones under many, are likely to be made most of? And

whether flax and tillage do not naturally multiply hands, and divide land into small holdings, and

99 Whether, as our exports are lessened, we ought not to lessen our imports? And whether these will not be

lessened as our demands, and these as our wants, and these as our customs or fashions? Of how great

100 Whether it would not be more reasonable to mend our state than to complain of it; and how far this may

101 What the nation gains by those who live in Ireland upon the produce of foreign Countries?

102 How far the vanity of our ladies in dressing, and of our gentlemen in drinking, contributes to the general

103 Whether nations, as wise and opulent as ours, have not made sumptuary laws; and what hinders us from

104 Whether those who drink foreign liquors, and deck themselves and their families with foreign ornaments,

105 Whether, as our trade is limited, we ought not to limit our expenses; and whether this be not the natural

106 Whether the dirt, and famine, and nakedness of the bulk of our people might not be remedied, even

although we had no foreign trade? And whether this should not be our first care; and whether, if this were

107 Whether comfortable living doth not produce wants, and wants industry, and industry wealth?

108 Whether there is not a great difference between Holland and Ireland? And whether foreign commerce,

109 Might we not put a hand to the plough, or the spade, although we had no foreign commerce?

110 Whether the exigencies of nature are not to be answered by industry on our own soil? And how far the

conveniences and comforts of life may be procured by a domestic commerce between the several parts of this

111 Whether the women may not sew, spin, weave, embroider sufficiently for the embellishment of their

persons, and even enough to raise envy in each other, without being beholden to foreign countries?

112 Suppose the bulk of our inhabitants had shoes to their feet, clothes to their backs, and beef in their

bellies, might not such a state be eligible for the public, even though the squires were condemned to drink ale

113 Whether, if drunkenness be a necessary evil, men may not as well drink the growth of their own country?

114 Whether a nation within itself might not have real wealth, sufficient to give its inhabitants power and

115 Whether, if the arts of sculpture and painting were encouraged among us, we might not furnish our

116 Whether we have not, or may not have, all the necessary materials for building at home?

117 Whether tiles and plaster may not supply the place of Norway fir for flooring and wainscot?

118 Whether plaster be not warmer, as well as more secure, than deal? And whether a modern fashionable

house, lined with fir, daubed over with oil and paint, be not like a fireship, ready to be lighted up by all

119 Whether larger houses, better built and furnished, a greater train of servants, the difference with regard to

equipage and table between finer and coarser, more and less elegant, may not be sufficient to feed a

reasonable share of vanity, or support all proper distinctions? And whether all these may not be procured by

domestic industry out of the four elements, without ransacking the four quarters of the globe?

120 Whether anything is a nobler ornament, in the eye of the world, than an Italian palace, that is, stone and

mortar skilfully put together, and adorned with sculpture and painting; and whether this may not be

121 Whether an expense in gardens and plantations would not be an elegant distinction for the rich, a

domestic magnificence employing many hands within, and drawing nothing from abroad?

122 Whether the apology which is made for foreign luxury in England, to wit, that they could not carry on

123 Whether one may not be allowed to conceive and suppose a society or nation of human creatures, clad in

woollen cloths and stuffs, eating good bread, beef and mutton, poultry and fish, in great plenty, drinking ale,

mead, and cider, inhabiting decent houses built of brick and marble, taking their pleasure in fair parks and

gardens, depending on no foreign imports either for food or raiment? And whether such people ought much

124 Whether Ireland be not as well qualified for such a state as any nation under the sun?

125 Whether in such a state the inhabitants may not contrive to pass the twentyfour hours with tolerable

126 Whether they may not eat, drink, play, dress, visit, sleep in good beds, sit by good fires, build, plant,

127 Whether, upon the whole, a domestic trade may not suffice in such a country as Ireland, to nourish and

clothe its inhabitants, and provide them with the reasonable conveniences and even comforts of life?

128 Whether a general habit of living well would not produce numbers and industry' and whether,

considering the tendency of human kind, the consequence thereof would not be foreign trade and riches, how

129 Whether, nevertheless, it be a crime to inquire how far we may do without foreign trade, and what would

130 Whether the number and welfare of the subjects be not the true strength of the crown?

131 Whether in all public institutions there should not be an end proposed, which is to be the rule and limit of

the means? Whether this end should not be the wellbeing of the whole? And whether, in order to this, the

132 Whether there be upon earth any Christian or civilized people so beggarly, wretched, and destitute as the

133 Whether, nevertheless, there is any other people whose wants may be more easily supplied from home?

134 Whether, if there was a wall of brass a thousand cubits high round this kingdom, our natives might not

nevertheless live cleanly and comfortably, till the land, and reap the fruits of it?

135 What should hinder us from exerting ourselves, using our hands and brains, doing something or other,

136 Be the restraining our trade well or ill advised in our neighbours, with respect to their own interest, yet

137 Whether it be not vain to think of persuading other people to see their interest, while we continue blind to

138 Whether there be any other nation possessed of so much good land, and so many able hands to work it,

139 Whether it be true that we import corn to the value of two hundred thousand pounds in some years?

140 Whether we are not undone by fashions made for other people? And whether it be not madness in a poor

142 Whether it be not certain that from the single town of Cork were exported, in one year, no less than one

hundred and seven thousand one hundred and sixtyone barrels of beef; seven thousand three hundred and

seventynine barrels of pork; thirteen thousand four hundred and sixtyone casks, and eightyfive thousand

seven hundred and twentyseven firkins of butter? And what hands were employed in this manufacture?

143 Whether a foreigner could imagine that one half of the people were starving, in a country which sent out

144 Whether an Irish lady, set out with French silks and Flanders lace, may not be said to consume more beef

145 Whether ninetenths of our foreign trade be not carried on singly to support the article of vanity?

146 Whether it can be hoped that private persons will not indulge this folly, unless restrained by the public?

147 How vanity is maintained in other countries? Whether in Hungary, for instance, a proud nobility are not

148 Whether there be a prouder people upon earth than the noble Venetians, although they all wear plain

149 Whether a people are to be pitied that will not sacrifice their little particular vanities to the public. good?

And yet, whether each part would not except their own foible from this public sacrifice, the squire his bottle,

150 Whether claret be not often drank rather for vanity than for health, or pleasure?

151 Whether it be true that men of nice palates have been imposed on, by elder wine for French claret, and by

152 Do not Englishmen abroad purchase beer and cider at ten times the price of wine?

153 How many gentlemen are there in England of a thousand pounds per annum who never drink wine in

their own houses? Whether the same may be said of any in Ireland who have even? one hundred pounds per

154 What reasons have our neighbours in England for discouraging French wines which may not hold with

155 How much of the necessary sustenance of our people is yearly exported for brandy?

156 Whether, if people must poison themselves, they had not better do it with their own growth?

157 If we imported neither claret from France, nor fir from Norway, what the nation would save by it?

158 When the root yieldeth insufficient nourishment, whether men do not top the tree to make the lower

159 Whether, if our ladies drank sage or balm tea out of Irish ware, it would be an insupportable national

160 Whether it be really true that such wine is best as most encourages drinking, i.e., that must be given in

the largest dose to produce its effect? And whether this holds with regard to any other medicine?

161 Whether that trade should not be accounted most pernicious wherein the balance is most against us? And

162 Whether it be not even madness to encourage trade with a nation that takes nothing of our manufacture?

163 Whether Ireland can hope to thrive if the major part of her patriots shall be found in the French interest?

164 Whether great plenty and variety of excellent wines are not to be had on the coasts of Italy and Sicily?

And whether those countries would not take our commodities of linen, leather, butter, etc. in exchange for

165 Particularly, whether the Vinum Mamertinum, which grows on the mountains about Messina, a red

generous wine, highly esteemed (if we may credit Pliny) by the ancient Romans, would not come cheap, and

166 Why, if a bribe by the palate or the purse be in effect the same thing, they should not be alike infamous?

167 Whether the vanity and luxury of a few ought to stand in competition with the interest of a nation?

168 Whether national wants ought not to be the rule of trade? And whether the most pressing wants of. the

169 Whether it is possible the country should be well improved, while our beef is exported, and our labourers

170 If it be resolved that we cannot do without foreign trade, whether, at least, it may not be worth while to

consider what branches thereof deserve to be entertained, and how far we may be able to carry it on under our

171 What foreign imports may be necessary for clothing and feeding the families of persons not worth above

one hundred pounds a year? And how many wealthier there are in the kingdom, and what proportion they

172 Whether trade be not then on a right foot, when foreign commodities are imported in exchange only for

173 Whether the quantities of beef, butter, wool, and leather, exported from this island, can be reckoned the

174 Whether it would not be wise so to order our trade as to export manufactures rather than provisions, and

175 Whether she would not be a very vile matron, and justly thought either mad or foolish, that should give

away the necessaries of life from her naked and famished children, in exchange for pearls to stick in her hair,

177 Whether the remark made by a Venetian ambassador to Cardinal Richelieu 'That France needed

nothing to be rich and easy, but to know how to spend what she dissipates' may not be of use also to other

178 Whether hungry cattle will not leap over bounds? And whether most men are not hungry in a country

179 Whether there should not be published yearly, schedules of our trade, containing an account of the

180 Whether other methods may not be found for supplying the funds, besides the custom on things

182 Whether our peers and gentlemen are born legislators? Or, whether that faculty be acquired by study and

183 Whether to comprehend the real interest of a people, and the means to procure it, doth not imply some

fund of knowledge, historical, moral, and political, with a faculty of reason improved by learning?

184 Whether every enemy to learning be not a Goth? And whether every such Goth among us be not an

185 Whether, therefore, it would not be an omen of ill presage, a dreadful phenomenon in the land, if our

186 Whether, on the contrary, it should not seem worth while to erect a mart of literature in this kingdom,

under wiser regulations and better discipline than in any other part of Europe? And whether this would not be

187 Whether the governed be not too numerous for the governing part of our college? And whether it might

188 Whether, if we had two colleges, there might not spring a useful emulation between them? And whether

it might not be contrived so to divide the fellows, scholars, and revenues between both, as that no member

189 Whether ten thousand pounds well laid out might not build a decent college, fit to contain two hundred

persons; and whether the purchase money of the chambers would not go a good way towards defraying the

191 Whether, in imitation of the Jesuits at Paris, who admit Protestants to study in their colleges, it may not

be right for us also to admit Roman Catholics into our college, without obliging them to attend chapel duties,

or catechisms, or divinity lectures? And whether this might not keep money in the kingdom, and prevent the

192 Whether it is possible a State should not thrive, whereof the lower part were industrious, and the upper

194 Whether Themistocles his art of making a little city, or a little people, become a great one be learned

195 Whether a wise State hath any interest nearer heart than the education of youth?

196 Whether the mind, like soil, doth not by disuse grow stiff and whether reasoning and study be not like

197 Whether an early habit of reflexion, although obtained by speculative sciences, may not have its use in

198 Whether even those parts of academical learning which are quite forgotten may not have improved and

enriched the soil, like those vegetables which are raised, not for themselves, but ploughed in for a dressing of

199 Whether it was not an Irish professor who first opened the public schools at Oxford? Whether this island

hath not been anciently famous for learning? And whether at this day it hath any better chance for being

200 Whether we may not with better grace sit down and complain, when we have done all that lies in our

201 Whether the gentleman of estate hath a right to be idle; and whether he ought not to be the great promoter

202 Whether in the cantons of Switzerland all under thirty years of age are not excluded from their great

203 Whether Homer's compendium of education, would not be a good rule for modern educators of youth?

And whether half the learning and study of these kingdoms is not useless, for want of a proper delivery and

204 Whether in any order a good building can be made of bad materials? Or whether any form of government

206 Whether the public is more concerned in anything than in the procreation of able citizens?

207 Whether to the multiplying of human kind, it would not much conduce if marriages were made with

208 Whether, if women had no portions, we should then see so many unhappy and unfruitful marriages?

209 Whether the laws be not, according to Aristotle, a mind without appetite or passion? And consequently

210 Suppose a rich man's son marries a poor man's daughter, suppose also that a poor man's daughter is

212 Whether a promise made before God and man in the most solemn manner ought to be violated?

213 Whether it was Plato's opinion that, 'for the good of the community, rich should marry with rich?' De

214 Whether, as seed equally scattered produceth a goodly harvest, even so an equal distribution of wealth

215 Whence is it that Barbs and Arabs are so good horses? And whether in those countries they are not

217 Whether the real foundation for wealth must not be laid in the numbers, the frugality, and the industry of

the people? And whether all attempts to enrich a nation by other means, as raising the coin, stockjobbing,

218 Whether a door ought not to be shut against all other methods of growing rich, save only by industry and.

219 Whether the abuse of banks and papermoney is a just objection against the use thereof? And whether

220 Whether national banks are not found useful in Venice, Holland, and Hamburg? And whether it is not

221 Whether the banks of Venice and Amsterdam are not in the hands of the public?

222 Whether it may not be worth while to inform ourselves in the nature of those banks? And what reason

can be assigned why Ireland should not reap the benefit of such public banks as well as other countries?

223 Whether a bank of national credit, supported by public funds and secured by Parliament, be a chimera or

impossible thing? And if not, what would follow from the supposal of such a bank?

224 Whether the currency of a credit so well secured would not be of great advantage to our trade and

225 Whether the notes of such public bank would not have a more general circulation than those of private

226 Whether it be not agreed that paper hath in many respects the advantage above coin, as being of more

dispatch in payments, more easily transferred, preserved, and recovered when lost?

227 Whether, besides these advantages, there be not an evident necessity for circulating credit by paper, from

228 Whether it be rightly remarked by some that, as banking brings no treasure into the kingdom like trade,

private wealth must sink as the bank riseth? And whether whatever causeth industry to flourish and circulate

229 Whether the ruinous effects of Mississippi, South Sea,1 and such schemes were not owing to an abuse of

paper money or credit, in making it a means for idleness and gaming, instead of a motive and help to

230 Whether the rise of the bank of Amsterdam was not purely casual, for the security and dispatch of

payments? And whether the good effects thereof, in supplying the place of coin, and promoting a ready

circulation of industry and commerce may not be a lesson to us, to do that by design which others fell upon

231 Whether plenty of small cash be not absolutely necessary for keeping up a circulation among the people;

232 Whether that which increaseth the stock of a nation be not a means of increasing its trade? And whether

that which increaseth the current credit of a nation may not be said to increase its stock?

233 Whether the credit of the pubic funds be not a mine of gold to England? And whether any step that

234 Whether such credit be not the principal advantage that England hath over France? I may add, over every

235 Whether by this the public is not become possessed of the wealth of foreigners as well as natives? And

236 Whether, as our current domestic credit grew, industry would not grow likewise; and if industry, our

237 Whether foreign demands may not be answered by our exports without drawing cash out of the

238 Whether as industry increased, our manufactures would not flourish; and as these flourished, whether

better returns would not be made from estates to their landlords, both within and without the kingdom?

239 Whether the sure way to supply people with tools and materials, and to set them at work, be not a free

240 Whether in New England all trade and business is not as much at a stand, upon a scarcity of

241 Whether it be certain that the quantity of silver in the bank of Amsterdam be greater now than at first; but

whether it be not certain that there is a greater circulation of industry and extent of trade, more people, ships,

242 Whether money, lying dead in the bank of Amsterdam, would not be as useless as in the mine?

243 Whether our visible security in land could be doubted? And whether there be anything like this in the

244 Whether it be just to apprehend danger from trusting a national bank with power to extend its credit, to

circulate notes which it shall be felony to counterfeit, to receive goods on loans, to purchase lands, to sell also

or alienate them, and to deal in bills of exchange; when these powers are no other than have been trusted for

245 Whether the objection from monopolies and an overgrowth of power, which are made against private

246 Whether the evil effects which of late years have attended papermoney and credit in Europe did not

247 Whether the great evils attending papermoney in the British Plantations of America have not sprung

from the overrating their lands, and issuing paper without discretion, and from the legislators breaking their

own rules in favour of themselves, thus sacrificing the public to their private benefit? And whether a little

248 Whether the subject of freethinking in religion be not exhausted? And whether it be not high time for

249 Whether it must not be ruinous for a nation to sit down to game, be it with silver or with paper?

250 Whether, therefore, the circulating paper, in the late ruinous schemes of France and England, was the true

evil, and not rather the circulating thereof without industry? And whether the bank of Amsterdam, where

industry had been for so many years subsisted and circulated by transfers on paper, doth not clearly decide

251 Whether there are not to be seen in America fair, towns, wherein the people are well lodged, fed, and

clothed, without a beggar in their streets, although there be not one grain of gold or silver current among

252 Whether these people do not exercise all arts and trades, build ships and navigate them to all parts of the

world, purchase lands, till and reap the fruits of them, buy and sell, educate and provide for their children?

253 Whether, whatever inconveniences those people may have incurred from not observing either rules or

bounds in their paper money, yet it be not certain that they are in a more flourishing condition, have larger

and better built towns, more plenty, more industry, more arts and civility, and a more extensive commerce,

254 Whether a view of the ruinous effects of absurd schemes and credit mismanaged, so as to produce

gaming and madness instead of industry, can be any just objection against a national bank calculated purely

255 Whether a scheme for the welfare of this nation should not take in the whole inhabitants? And whether it

be not a vain attempt, to project the flourishing of our Protestant gentry, exclusive of the bulk of the natives?

256 Whether an oath, testifying allegiance to the king, and disclaiming the pope's authority in temporals, may

not be justly required of the Roman Catholics? And whether, in common prudence or policy, any priest

257 Whether there is any such thing as a body of inhabitants, in any Roman Catholic country under the sun,

that profess an absolute submission to the pope's orders in matters of an indifferent nature, or that in such

258 Whether since the peace of Utrecht, mass was not celebrated and the sacraments administered in divers

259 Whether a sum which would go but a little way towards erecting hospitals for maintaining and educating

the children of the native Irish might not go far in binding them out apprentices to Protestant masters, for

260 Whether there be any instance of a people's being converted in a Christian sense, otherwise than by

261 Whether catechists in the Irish tongue may not easily be procured and subsisted? And whether this would

262 Whether it be not of great advantage to the Church of Rome, that she hath clergy suited to all ranks of

263 Whether her numerous poor clergy are not very useful in missions, and of much influence with the

264 Whether, in defect of able missionaries, persons conversant in low life, and speaking the Irish tongue, if

well instructed in the first principles of religion, and in the popish controversy, though for the rest on a level

with the parish clerks, or the schoolmasters of charityschools, may not be fit to mix with and bring over

our poor illiterate natives to the Established Church? Whether it is not to be wished that some parts of our

liturgy and homilies were publicly read in the Irish language? And whether, in these views, it may not be

right to breed up some of the better sort of children in the charityschools, and qualify them for missionaries,

265 Whether a squire possessed of land to the value of a thousand pounds per annum, or a merchant worth

twenty thousand pounds in cash, would have most power to do good or evil upon any emergency? And

whether the suffering Roman Catholics to purchase forfeited lands would not be good policy, as tending to

266 Whether the seaports of Galway, Limerick, Cork, and Waterford are not to be looked on as keys of this

kingdom? And whether the merchants are not possessed of these keys; and who are the most numerous

267 Whether a merchant cannot more speedily raise a sum, more easily conceal or transfer his effects, and

engage in any desperate design with more safety, than a landed man, whose estate is a pledge for his

268 Whether a wealthy merchant bears not great sway among the populace of a trading city? And whether

269 Whether, as others have supposed an Atlantis or Utopia, we also may not suppose an Hyperborean island

270 Whether an indifferent person, who looks into all hands, may not be a better judge of the game than a

271 Whether there be any country in Christendom more capable of improvement than Ireland?

272 Whether we are not as far before other nations with respect to natural advantages, as we are behind them

273 Whether we do not live in a most fertile soil and temperate climate, and yet whether our people in

275 Whether the wealth and prosperity of our country do not hang by a hair, the probity of one banker, the

276 Whether we have not been sufficiently admonished of this by some late events?

277 Whether a national bank would not at once secure our properties, put an end to usury, facilitate

commerce, supply the want of coin, and produce ready payments in all parts of the kingdom?

278 Whether the use or nature of money, which all men so eagerly pursue, be yet sufficiently understood or

279 What doth Aristotle mean by saying "Coin seems to be something trivial." De repub., ix. 9?

281 Whether there be not a measure or limit, within which gold and silver are useful, and beyond which they

283 Whether a discovery of the richest gold mine that ever was, in the heart of this kingdom, would be a real

286 Whether every man who had money enough would not be a gentleman? And whether a nation of

287 Whether all things would not bear a high price? And whether men would not increase their fortunes

288 Whether the same evils would be apprehended from papermoney under an honest and thrifty

289 Whether, therefore, a national bank would not be more beneficial than even a mine of gold?

290 Whether without private banks what little business and industry there is would not stagnate? But whether

it be not a mighty privilege for a private person to be able to create a hundred pounds with a dash of his pen?

291 Whether the wise state of Venice was not the first that conceived the advantage of a national bank?

292 Whether the great exactness and integrity with which this bank is managed be not the chief support of

293 Whether the bank of Amsterdam was not begun about one hundred and thirty years ago, and whether at

this day its stock be not conceived to amount to three thousand tons of gold, or thirty millions sterling?

294 Whether all payments of contracts for goods in gross, and letters of exchange, must not be made by

295 Whether it be not owing to this bank that the city of Amsterdam, without the least confusion, hazard, or

trouble, maintains and every day promotes so general and quick a circulation of industry?

296 Whether it be not the greatest help and spur to commerce that property can be so readily conveyed and so

well secured by a compte en banc, that is, by only writing one man's name for another's in the bankbook?

297 Whether, at the beginning of the last century, those who had lent money to the public during the war with

Spain were not satisfied by the sole expedient of placing their names in a compte en banc, with liberty to

298 Whether the example of those easy transfers in the compte en banc, thus casually erected, did not tempt

other men to become creditors to the public, in order to profit by the same secure and expeditious method of

299 Whether this compte en banc hath not proved better than a mine of gold to Amsterdam?

300 Whether that city may not be said to owe her greatness to the unpromising accident of her having been in

301 Whether it be known that any State from such small beginnings, in so short a time, ever grew to so great

wealth and power as the province of Holland hath done; and whether the bank of Amsterdam hath not been

302 Whether the success of those public banks in Venice, Amsterdam and Hamburg would not naturally

303 Whether it be possible for a national bank to subsist and maintain its credit under a French government?

304 Whether our natural appetites, as well as powers, are not limited to their respective ends and uses? But

305 Whether the simple getting of money, or passing it from hand to hand without industry, be an object

306 Whether, if money be considered as an end, the appetite thereof be not infinite? But whether the ends of

307 Whether the total sum of all other powers, be it of enjoyment or action, which belong to man, or to all

mankind together, is not in truth a very narrow and limited quantity? But whether fancy is not boundless?

308 Whether this capricious tyrant, which usurps the place of reason, doth not most cruelly torment and

delude those poor men, the usurers, stockjobbers, and projectors, of content to themselves from heaping up

riches, that is, from gathering counters, from multiplying figures, from enlarging denominations, without

knowing what they would be at, and without having a proper regard to the use or end or nature of things?

309 Whether the ignis fatuus of fancy doth not kindle immoderate desires, and lead men into endless pursuits

310 Whether counters be not referred to other things, which, so long as they keep pace and proportion with

the counters, it must be owned the counters are useful; but whether beyond that to value or covet counters be

311 Whether the public aim ought not to be, that men's industry should supply their present wants, and the

312 Whether the better this power is secured, and the more easily it is transferred, industry be not so much

313 Whether money, more than is expedient for those purposes, be not upon the whole hurtful rather than

314 Whether the promoting of industry should not be always in view, as the true and sole end, the rule and

measure, of a national bank? And whether all deviations from that object should not be carefully avoided?

315 Whether it may not be useful, for supplying manufactures and trade with stock, for regulating exchange,

316 Whether we are sufficiently sensible of the peculiar security there is in having a bank that consists of

land and paper, one of which cannot be exported, and the other is in no danger of being exported?

317 Whether it be not delightful to complain? And whether there be not many who had rather utter their

318 Whether, if 'the crown of the wise be their riches' (Prov., xiv.24), we are not the foolishest people in

319 Whether we have not all the while great civil as well as natural advantages?

320 Whether there be any people who have more leisure to cultivate the arts of peace, and study the public

321 Whether other nations who enjoy any share of freedom, and have great objects in view, be not

unavoidably embarrassed and distracted by factions? But whether we do not divide upon trifles, and whether

322 Whether it be not an advantage that we are not embroiled in foreign affairs, that we hold not the balance

of Europe, that we are protected by other fleets and armies, that it is the true interest of a powerful people,

323 Whether England doth not really love us and wish well to us, as bone of her bone, and flesh of her flesh?

And whether it be not our part to cultivate this love and affection all manner of ways?

324 What seaports or foreign trade have the Swisses; and yet how warm are those people, and how well

325 Whether there may not be found a people who so contrive as to be impoverished by their trade? And

326 Whether it would not be better for this island, if all our fine folk of both sexes were shipped off, to

remain in foreign countries, rather than that they should spend their estates at home in foreign luxury, and

327 Whether our gentry understand or have a notion of magnificence, and whether for want thereof they do

328 Whether there be not an art or skill in governing human pride, so as to render it subservient to the pubic

329 Whether the great and general aim of the public should not be to employ the people?

331 Whether men's counsels are not the result of their knowledge and their principles?

332 Whether there be not labour of the brains as well as of the hands, and whether the former is beneath a

333 Whether the public be more interested to protect the property acquired by mere birth than that which is

334 Whether it would not be a poor and illjudged project to attempt to promote the good of the community,

335 Whether there be a more wretched, and at the same time a more unpitied case, than for men to make

336 Whether to determine about the rights and properties of men by other rules than the law be not

337 Whether those men who move the cornerstones of a constitution may not pull an old house on their own

338 Whether there be not two general methods whereby men become sharers in the national stock of wealth

or power, industry and inheritance? And whether it would be wise in a civil society to lessen that share which

339 Whether all ways of spending a fortune be of equal benefit to the public, and what sort of men are aptest

340 If the revenues allotted for the encouragement of religion and learning were made hereditary in the hands

of a dozen lay lords and as many overgrown commoners, whether the public would be much the better for it?

341 Whether the Church's patrimony belongs to one tribe alone; and whether every man's son, brother, or

342 What is there in the clergy to create a jealousy in the public? Or what would the public lose by it, if every

squire in the land wore a black coat, said his prayers, and was obliged to reside?

343 Whether there be anything perfect under the sun? And whether it be not with the world as with a

particular State, and with a State or body politic as with the human body, which lives and moves under

344 Whether, nevertheless, men should not in all things aim at perfection? And, therefore, whether any wise

and good man would be against applying remedies? But whether it is not natural to wish for a benevolent

physician? 345 Whether the public happiness be not proposed by the legislature, and whether such happiness

346 Whether, therefore, a legislator should be content with a vulgar share of knowledge? Whether he should

not be a person of reflexion and thought, who hath made it his study to understand the true nature and interest

of mankind, how to guide men's humours and passions, how to incite their active powers, how to make their

several talents cooperate to the mutual benefit of each other, and the general good of the whole?

347 Whether it doth not follow that above all things a gentleman's care should be to keep his own faculties

351 Whether all men have not faculties of mind or body which may be employed for the public benefit?

353 Whether hearty food and warm clothing would not enable and encourage the lower sort to labour?

354 Whether, in such a soil as ours, if there was industry, there could be want?

355 Whether the way to make men industrious be not to let them taste the fruits of their industry? And

356 Whether our landlords are to be told that industry and numbers would raise the value of their lands, or

357 Whether our old native Irish are not the most indolent and supine people in Christendom?

358 Whether they are yet civilized, and whether their habitations and furniture are not more sordid than those

359 Whether it be not a sad circumstance to live among lazy beggars? And whether, on the other hand, it

would not be delightful to live in a country swarming, like China, with busy people?

360 Whether we should not cast about, by all manner of means, to excite industry, and to remove whatever

361 Whether vanity itself should not be engaged in this good work? And whether it is not to be wished that

the finding of employment for themselves and others were a fashionable distinction among the ladies?

363 Whether it may not be worth while to publish the conversation of Ischomachus and his wife in

364 Whether it is true that there have been, upon a time, one hundred millions of people employed in China,

365 Whether the natural inducements to sloth are not greater in the Mogul's country than in Ireland, and yet

whether, in that suffocating and dispiriting climate, the Banyans are not all, men, women, and children,

366 Whether it be not true that the great Mogul's subjects might undersell us even in our own markets, and

clothe our people with their stuffs and calicoes, if they were imported duty free?

367 Whether there can be a greater reproach on the leading men and the patriots of a country, than that the

people should want employment? And whether methods may not be found to employ even the lame and the

blind, the dumb, the deaf, and the maimed, in some or other branch of our manufactures?

368 Whether much may not be expected from a biennial consultation of so many wise men about the public

370 Whether it would be a great hardship if every parish were obliged to find work for their poor?

372 Whether there should not be erected, in each province, an hospital for orphans and foundlings, at the

373 Whether it be true that in the Dutch workhouses things are so managed that a child four years old may

374 What a folly is it to build fine houses, or establish lucrative posts and large incomes, under the notion of

375 Whether the poor, grown up and in health, need any other provision but their own industry, under public

376 Whether the poortax in England hath lessened or increased the number of the poor?

377 Whether workhouses should not be made at the least expense, with clay floors, and walls of rough stone,

378 Whether it be an impossible attempt to set our people at work, or whether industry be a habit which, like

379 Whether all manner of means should not be employed to possess the nation in general with an aversion

380 Whether it would be a hardship on people destitute of all things, if the public furnished them with

381 Whether other nations have not found great benefit from the use of slaves in repairing high roads, making

rivers navigable, draining bogs, erecting public buildings, bridges, and manufactures?

382 Whether temporary servitude would not be the best cure for idleness and beggary?

383 Whether the public hath not a right to employ those who cannot or who will not find employment for

384 Whether all sturdy beggars should not be seized and made slaves to the public for a certain term of

385 Whether he who is chained in a jail or dungeon hath not, for the time, lost his liberty? And if so, whether

386 Whether a state of servitude, wherein he should be well worked, fed, and clothed, would not be a

387 Whether criminals in the freest country may not forfeit their liberty, and repair the damage they have

389 Whether the view of criminals chained in pairs and kept at hard labour would not be very edifying to the

390 Whether the want of such an institution be not plainly seen in England, where the disbelief of a future

state hardeneth rogues against the fear of death, and where, through the great growth of robbers and

391 Whether it be not easier to prevent than to remedy, and whether we should not profit by the example of

392 Whether felons are not often spared, and therefore encouraged, by the compassion of those who should

393 Whether many that would not take away the life of a thief may not nevertheless be willing to bring him

394 Whether the most indolent would be fond of idleness, if they regarded it as the sure road to hard labour?

395 Whether the industry of the lower part of our people doth not much depend on the expense of the upper?

396 What would be the consequence if our gentry affected to distinguish themselves by fine houses rather

397 Whether any people in Europe are so meanly provided with houses and furniture, in proportion to their

398 Whether building would not peculiarly encourage all other arts in this kingdom?

399 Whether smiths, masons, bricklayers, plasterers, carpenters, joiners, tilers, plumbers, and glaziers would

400 Whether the ornaments and furniture of a good house do not employ a number of all sorts of artificers, in

iron, wood, marble, brass, pewter, copper, wool, flax, and divers other materials?

401 Whether in buildings and gardens a great number of daylabourers do not find employment?

402 Whether by these means much of that sustenance and wealth of this nation which now goes to foreigners

403 Whether, as industry produced good living, the number of hands and mouths would not be increased; and

in proportion thereunto, whether there would not be every day more occasion for agriculture? And whether

404 Whether such management would not equally provide for the magnificence of the rich, and the

405 Whether an expense in building and improvements doth not remain at home, pass to the heir, and adorn

407 Whether, for one who hurts his fortune by improvements, twenty do not ruin themselves by foreign

408 Whether in proportion as Ireland was improved and beautified by fine seats, the number of absentees

409 Whether he who employs men in buildings and manufactures doth not put life in the country, and

410 Whether money circulated on the landlord's own lands, and among his own tenants, doth not return into

411 Whether every squire that made his domain swarm with busy hands, like a beehive or anthill, would

412 Whether a gentleman who hath seen a little of the world, and observed how men live elsewhere, can

contentedly sit down in a cold, damp, sordid habitation, in the midst of a bleak country, inhabited by thieves

413 Whether, on the other hand, a handsome seat amidst wellimproved lands, fair villages, and a thriving

neighbourhood may not invite a man to dwell on his own estate, and quit the life of an insignificant saunterer

414 Whether it would not be of use and ornament if the towns throughout this kingdom were provided with

decent churches, townhouses, workhouses, marketplaces, and paved streets, with some order taken for

415 Whether, if each of these towns were addicted to some peculiar manufacture, we should not find that the

employing many hands together on the same work was the way to perfect our workmen? And whether all

these things might not soon be provided by a domestic industry, if money were not wanting?

416 Whether money could ever be wanting to the demands of industry, if we had a national bank?

417 Whether the fable of Hercules and the carter ever suited any nation like this nation of Ireland?

418 Whether it be not a new spectacle under the sun, to behold, in such a climate and such a soil, and under

such a gentle government, so many roads untrodden, fields untilled, houses desolate, and hands unemployed?

419 Whether there is any country in Christendom, either kingdom or republic, depending or independent, free

420 Whether the frugal Swisses have any other commodities but their butter and cheese and a few cattle, for

exportation; whether, nevertheless, the single canton of Berne hath not in her public treasury two millions

421 Whether that small town of Berne, with its scanty barren territory, in a mountainous corner, without

seaports, without manufactures, without mines, be not rich by mere dint of frugality?

422 Whether the Swisses in general have not sumptuary laws, prohibiting the use of gold, jewels, silver, silk,

and lace in their apparel, and indulging the women only to wear silk on festivals, weddings, and public

423 Whether there be not two ways of growing rich, sparing and getting? But whether the lazy spendthrift

424 Whether money circulating be not the life of industry; and whether the want thereof doth not render a

425 But whether, if we had a national bank, and our present cash (small as it is) were put into the most

426 Whether all circulation be not alike a circulation of credit, whatsoever medium (metal or paper) is

427 Whether the wealth of the richest nations in Christendom doth not consist in paper vastly more than in

428 Whether Lord Clarendon doth not aver of his own knowledge, that the Prince of Orange, with the best

credit, and the assistance of the richest men in Amsterdam, was above ten days endeavouring to raise �20,000

in specie, without being able to raise half the sum in all that time? (See Clarendon's History, BK. XII)

429 Supposing there had been hitherto no such thing as a bank, and the question were now first proposed,

whether it would be safer to circulate unlimited bills in a private credit, or bills to a limited value on the

430 Whether the maxim, 'What is everybody's business is nobody's,' prevails in any country under the sun

431 Whether the united stock of a nation be not the best security? And whether anything but the ruin of the

432 Whether the total sum of the public treasure, power, and wisdom, all cooperating, be not most likely to

establish a bank of credit, sufficient to answer the ends, relieve the wants, and satisfy the scruples of all

433 Whether London is not to be considered as the metropolis of Ireland? And whether our wealth (such as it

is) doth not circulate through London and throughout all England, as freely as that of any part of his Majesty's

434 Whether therefore it be not evidently the interest of the people of England to encourage rather than to

oppose a national bank in this kingdom, as well as every other means for advancing our wealth which shall

435 Whether it is not our interest to be useful to them rather than rival them; and whether in that case we may

436 Whether we can propose to thrive so long as we entertain a wrongheaded distrust of England?

437 Whether, as a national bank would increase our industry, and that our wealth, England may not be a

proportionable gainer; and whether we should not consider the gains of our mothercountry as some

accession to our own? 438 Whether there be any difficulty in comprehending that the whole wealth of the

nation is in truth the stock of a national bank? And whether any more than the right comprehension of this be

439 Whether the prejudices about gold and silver are not strong, but whether they are not still prejudices?

440 Whether paper doth not by its stamp and signature acquire a local value, and become as precious and as

scarce as gold? And whether it be not much fitter to circulate large sums, and therefore preferable to gold?

441 Whether it doth not much import to have a right conception of money? And whether its true and just idea

be not that of a ticket, entitling to power, and fitted to record and transfer such power?

442 Though the bank of Amsterdam doth very rarely, if at all, pay out money, yet whether every man

possessed of specie be not ready to convert it into paper, and act as cashier to the bank? And whether, from

the same motive, every monied man throughout this kingdom would not be cashier to our national bank?

443 Whether we may not obtain that as friends which it is in vain to hope for as rivals?

444 Whether in every instance by which we prejudice England, we do not in a greater degree prejudice

445 Whether in the rude original of society the first step was not the exchanging of commodities; the next a

substituting of metals by weight as the common medium of circulation; after this the making use of coin;

lastly, a further refinement by the use of paper with proper marks and signatures? And whether this, as it is

446 Whether we are not in fact the only people who may be said to starve in the midst of plenty?

447 Whether there can be a worse sign than that people should quit their country for a livelihood? Though

men often leave their country for health, or pleasure, or riches, yet to leave it merely for a livelihood, whether

448 Whether, in order to redress our evils, artificial helps are not most wanted in a land where industry is

449 Whether, although the prepossessions about gold and silver have taken deep root, yet the example of our

Colonies in America doth not make it as plain as daylight that they are not so necessary to the wealth of a

450 Whether it be not evident that we may maintain a much greater inward and outward commerce, and be

five times richer than we are, nay, and our bills abroad be of far greater credit, though we had not one ounce

451 Whether wrongheaded maxims, customs, and fashions are not sufficient to destroy any people which

452 Whether it would not be a horrible thing to see our matrons make dress and play their chief concern?

453 Whether our ladies might not as well endow monasteries as wear Flanders lace? And whether it be not

454 Whether England, which hath a free trade, whatever she remits for foreign luxury with one hand, doth

not with the other receive much more from abroad? Whether, nevertheless, this nation would not be a gainer,

if our women would content themselves with the same moderation in point of expense as the English ladies?

455 But whether it be not a notorious truth that our Irish ladies are on a foot, as to dress, with those of five

456 Whether it be not even certain that the matrons of this forlorn country send out a greater proportion of its

wealth, for fine apparel, than any other females on the whole surface of this terraqueous globe?

457 Whether the expense, great as it is, be the greatest evil; but whether this folly may not produce many

other follies, an entire derangement of domestic life, absurd manners, neglect of duties, bad mothers, a

458 Whether the first beginning of expedients do not always meet with prejudices? And whether even the

460 Whether all regulations of coin should not be made with a view to encourage industry, and a circulation

461 Whether to oil the wheels of commerce be not a common benefit? And whether this be not done by

462 Whether, all things considered, a general raising the value of gold and silver be not so far from bringing

greater quantities thereof into the kingdom that it would produce a direct contrary effect, inasmuch as less, in

that case, would serve, and therefore less be wanted? And whether men do not import a commodity in

463 Whether the lowering of our gold would not create a fever in the State? And whether a fever be not

464 Whether raising the value of a particular species will not tend to multiply such species, and to lessen

others in proportion thereunto? And whether a much less quantity of cash in silver would not, in reality,

465 Whether, ceteris paribus, it be not true that the prices of things increase as the quantity of money

increaseth, and are diminished as that is diminished? And whether, by the quantity of money is not to be

understood the amount of the denominations, all contracts being nominal for pounds, shillings, and pence,

466 Whether our exports do not consist of such necessaries as other countries cannot well be without?

467 Whether upon the circulation of a national bank more land would not be tilled, more hands employed,

468 Whether silver and small money be not that which circulates the quickest, and passeth through all hands,

469 Whether, all things considered, it would not be better for a kingdom that its cash consisted of half a

470 Whether there be not every day five hundred lesser payments made for one that requires gold?

471 Whether Spain, where gold bears the highest value, be not the laziest, and China, where it bears the

472 Whether it be not evidently the interest of every State, that its money should rather circulate than

473 Whether the principal use of cash be not its ready passing from hand to hand, to answer common

occasions of the common people, and whether common occasions of all sorts of people are not small ones?

474 Whether business at fairs and markets is not often at a stand and often hindered, even though the seller

hath his commodities at hand and the purchaser his gold, yet for want of change?

475 As wealth is really power, and coin a ticket conveying power, whether those tickets which are the fittest

476 Whether those tickets which singly transfer small shares of power, and, being multiplied, large shares,

477 Whether the public is not more benefited by a shilling that circulates than a pound that lies dead?

479 Whether the same shilling circulating in a village may not supply one man with bread, another with

stockings, a third with a knife, a fourth with paper, a fifth with nails, and so answer many wants which must

480 Whether facilitating and quickening the circulation of power to supply wants be not the promoting of

wealth and industry among the lower people? And whether upon this the wealth of the great doth not depend?

481 Whether, without the proper means of circulation, it be not vain to hope for thriving manufacturers and a

482 Whether four pounds in small cash may not circulate and enliven an Irish market, which many

483 Whether a man that could move nothing less than a hundredpound weight would not be much at a loss

to supply his wants; and whether it would not be better for him to be less strong and more active?

484 Whether the natural body can be in a state of health and vigour without a due circulation of the

extremities, even? And whether the political body, any in the fingers and toes more than the natural, can

thrive without a proportionable circulation through the minutest and most inconsiderable parts thereof?

485 If we had a mint for coining only shillings, sixpences, and coppermoney, whether the nation would not

486 Whether the greater waste by wearing of small coins would not be abundantly overbalanced by their

487 Whether it be not the industry of common people that feeds the State, and whether it be possible to keep

488 Whether the want of this be not a great bar to our employing the people in these manufactures which are

489 Whether therefore such want doth not drive men into the lazy way of employing land under sheepwalk?

490 Whether the running of wool from Ireland can so effectually be prevented as by encouraging other

491 Whatever commodities Great Britain importeth which we might supply, whether it be not her real interest

492 Whether the apprehension of many among us (who for that very reason stick to their wool), that England

may hereafter prohibit, limit, or discourage our linen trade, when it hath been once, with great pains and

expense, thoroughly introduced and settled in this land, be not altogether groundless and unjust?

493 Whether it is possible for this country, which hath neither mines of gold nor a free trade, to support for

494 Whether in fact our payments are not made by bills? And whether our foreign credit doth not depend on

495 Whether, in order to mend it, we ought not first to know the peculiar wretchedness of our state? And

496 Whether there are not single market towns in England that turn more money in buying and selling than

497 Whether the small town of Birmingham alone doth not, upon an average, circulate every week, one way

or other, to the value of fifty thousand pounds? But whether the same crown may not be often paid?

499 Whether the police and economy of France be not governed by wise councils? And whether any one

from this country, who sees their towns, and manufactures, and commerce, will not wonder what our senators

500 What variety and number of excellent manufactures are to be met with throughout the whole kingdom of

501 Whether there are not everywhere some or other mills for many uses, forges and furnaces for ironwork,

502 What quantities of paper, stockings, hats; what manufactures of wool, silk, linen, hemp, leather, wax,

503 Whether the manufactures and commerce of the single town of Lyons do not amount to a greater value

504 Whether, in the anniversary fair at the small town of Beaucaire upon the Rhone, there be not as much

505 Whether the very shreds shorn from woollen cloth, which are thrown away in Ireland, do not make a

507 Whether the coarse fingers of those very women, those same peasants who one part of the year till the

ground and dress the vineyards, are not another employed in making the finest French point?

508 Whether there is not a great number of idle fingers among the wives and daughters of our peasants?

509 Whether the French do not raise a trade from saffron, dyeing drugs, and the like products, which may do

510 Whether we may not have materials of our own growth to supply all manufactures, as well as France,

except silk, and whether the bulk of what silk even France manufactures be not imported?

511 Whether it be possible for this country to grow rich, so long as what is made by domestic industry is

512 Whether our natural Irish are not partly Spaniards and partly Tartars, and whether they do not bear

signatures of their descent from both these nations, which is also confirmed by all their histories?

513 Whether the Tartar progeny is not numerous in this land? And whether there is an idler occupation under

514 Whether the wisdom of the State should not wrestle with this hereditary disposition of our Tartars, and

515 Whether once upon a time France did not, by her linen alone, draw yearly from Spain about eight

516 Whether the French have not suffered in their linen trade with Spain, by not making their cloth of due

breadth; and whether any other people have suffered, and are still likely to suffer, through the same

517 Whether the Spaniards are not rich and lazy, and whether they have not a particular inclination and

favour for the inhabitants of this island? But whether a punctual people do not love punctual dealers?

518 Whether about fourteen years ago we had not come into a considerable share of the linen trade with

519 Whether, if the linen manufacture were carried on in the other provinces as well as in the North, the

520 Whether the woollen manufacture of England is not divided into several parts or branches, appropriated

to particular places, where they are only or principally manufactured; fine cloths in Somersetshire, coarse in

Yorkshire, long ells at Exeter, saies at Sudbury, crapes at Norwich, linseys at Kendal, blankets at Witney, and

521 Whether the united skill, industry, and emulation of many together on the same work be not the way to

advance it? And whether it had been otherwise possible for England to have carried on her woollen

522 Whether it would not on many accounts be right if we observed the same course with respect to our linen

manufacture; and that diapers were made in one town or district, damasks in another, sheeting in a third, fine

wearing linen in a fourth, coarse in a fifth, in another cambrics, in another thread and stockings, in others

stamped linen, or striped linen, or tickings, or dyed linen, of which last kinds there is so great a consumption

523 Whether it may not be worth while to inform ourselves of the different sorts of linen which are in request

524 Whether we do not yearly consume of French wines about a thousand tuns more than either Sweden or

525 Whether it be not a custom for some thousands of Frenchmen to go about the beginning of March into

Spain, and having tilled the lands and gathered the harvest of Spain, to return home with money in their

526 Whether of late years our Irish labourers do not carry on the same business in England to the great

discontent of many there? But whether we have not much more reason than the people of England to be

527 Whether, notwithstanding the cash supposed to be brought into it, any nation is, in truth, a gainer by such

528 Whether the industry of our people employed in foreign lands, while our own are left uncultivated, be not

529 Whether it would not be much better for us, if, instead of sending our men abroad, we could draw men

530 Whether, nevertheless, we are not apt to think the money imported by our labourers to be so much clear

gains to this country, but whether a little reflexion and a little political arithmetic may not shew us our

531 Whether our prejudices about gold and silver are not very apt to infect or misguide our judgments and

532 Whether it be not a good rule whereby to judge of the trade of any city, and its usefulness, to observe

whether there is a circulation through the extremities, and whether the people round about are busy and

533 Whether we had not, some years since, a manufacture of hats at Athlone, and of earthenware at Arklow,

534 Why we do not make tiles of our own, for flooring and roofing, rather than bring them from Holland?

535 What manufactures are there in France and Venice of giltleather, how cheap and how splendid a

536 Whether we may not, for the same use, manufacture divers things at home of more beauty and variety

538 Whether, if our gentry used to drink mead and cider, we should not soon have those liquors in the utmost

539 Whether it be not wonderful that with such pastures, and so many black cattle, we do not find ourselves

540 Whether great profits may not be made by fisheries; but whether those of our Irish who live by that

541 Whether it be not folly to think an inward commerce cannot enrich a State, because it doth not increase

its quantity of gold and silver? And whether it is possible a country should? not thrive, while wants are

542 Whether plenty of all the necessaries and comforts of life be not real wealth?

543 Whether Lyons, by the advantage of her midland situation and the rivers Rhone and Saone, be not a great

magazine or mart for inward commerce? And whether she doth not maintain a constant trade with most parts

of France; with Provence for oils and dried fruits, for wines and cloth with Languedoc, for stuffs with

Champagne, for linen with Picardy, Normandy, and Brittany, for corn with Burgundy?

544 Whether she doth not receive and utter all those commodities, and raise a profit from the distribution

545 Whether the charge of making good roads and navigable rivers across the country would not be really

546 Whether, as our trade and manufactures increased, magazines should not be established in proper places,

fitted by their situation, near great roads and navigable rivers, lakes, or canals, for the ready reception and

distribution of all sorts of commodities from and to the several parts of the kingdom; and whether the town of

Athlone, for instance, may not be fitly situated for such a magazine, or centre of domestic commerce?

547 Whether an inward trade would not cause industry to flourish, and multiply the circulation of our coin,

548 Whether the benefits of a domestic commerce are sufficiently understood and attended to; and whether

the cause thereof be not the prejudiced and narrow way of thinking about gold and silver?

549 Whether there be any other more easy and unenvied method of increasing the wealth of a people?

550 Whether we of this island are not from our peculiar circumstances determined to this very commerce

above any other, from the number of necessaries and good things that we possess within ourselves, from the

extent and variety of our soil, from the navigable rivers and good roads which we have or may have, at a less

expense than any people in Europe, from our great plenty of materials for manufactures, and particularly

551 Whether annual inventories should not be published of the fairs throughout the kingdom, in order to

552 Whether there be not every year more cash circulated at the card tables of Dublin than at all the fairs of

553 Whether the wealth of a country will not bear proportion to the skill and industry of its inhabitants?

554 Whether foreign imports that tend to promote industry should not be encouraged, and such as have a

555 Whether the annual balance of trade between Italy and Lyons be not about four millions in favour of the

556 Whether the general rule, of determining the profit of a commerce by its balance, doth not, like other

557 Whether it would not be a monstrous folly to import nothing but gold and silver, supposing we might do

it, from every foreign part to which we trade? And yet, whether some men may not think this foolish

558 But whether we do not all see the ridicule of the Mogul's subjects, who take from us nothing but our

silver, and bury it under ground, in order to make sure thereof against the resurrection?

559 Whether he must not be a wrongheaded patriot or politician, whose ultimate view was drawing money

560 Whether it be not evident that not gold but industry causeth a country to flourish?

561 Whether it would not be a silly project in any nation to hope to grow rich by prohibiting the exportation

562 Whether there can be a greater mistake in politics than to measure the wealth of the nation by its gold and

563 Whether gold and silver be not a drug, where they do not promote industry? Whether they be not even

564 Whether gold will not cause either industry or vice to flourish? And whether a country, where it flowed

in without labour, must not be wretched and dissolute like an island inhabited by buccaneers?

565 Whether arts and virtue are not likely to thrive, where money is made a means to industry? But whether

566 Whether keeping cash at home, or sending it abroad, just as it most serves to promote industry, be not the

567 Whether commodities of all kinds do not naturally flow where there is the greatest demand? Whether the

greatest demand for a thing be not where it is of most use? Whether money, like other things, hath not its

proper use? Whether this use be not to circulate? Whether therefore there must not of course be money where

568 Whether it is not a great point to know what we would be at? And whether whole States, as well as

569 Whether gold may not be compared to Sejanus's horse, if we consider its passage through the world, and

570 Whether means are not so far useful as they answer the end? And whether, in different circumstances, the

571 If we are a poor nation, abounding with very poor people, will it not follow that a far greater proportion

of our stock should be in the smallest and lowest species than would suit with England?

572 Whether, therefore, it would not be highly expedient if our money were coined of peculiar values, best

fitted to the circumstances and uses of our own country; and whether any other people could take umbrage at

our consulting our own convenience, in an affair entirely domestic, and that lies within ourselves?

573 Whether every man doth not know, and hath not long known, that the want of a mint causeth many other

574 What harm did England sustain about three centuries ago, when silver was coined in this kingdom?

575 What harm was it to Spain that her provinces of Naples and Sicily had all along mints of their own?

576 Whether it may not be presumed that our not having a privilege which every other kingdom in the world

enjoys, be not owing to our want of diligence and unanimity in soliciting for it?

577 Whether it be not the interest of England that we should cultivate a domestic commerce among

ourselves? And whether it could give them any possible jealousy, if our small sum of cash was contrived to

go a little further, if there was a little more life in our markets, a little more buying and selling in our shops, a

little better provision for the backs and bellies of so many forlorn wretches throughout the towns and villages

578 Whether Great Britain ought not to promote the prosperity of her Colonies, by all methods consistent

with her own? And whether the Colonies themselves ought to wish or aim at it by others?

579 Whether the remotest parts from the metropolis, and the lowest of the people, are not to be regarded as

580 Whether, although the capillary vessels are small, yet obstructions in them do not produce great chronical

582 Whether the sum of the faculties put into act, or, in other words, the united action of a whole people, doth

583 Whether such momentum be not the real stock or wealth of a State; and whether its credit be not

584 Whether in every wise State the faculties of the mind are not most considered?

585 Whether the momentum of a State doth not imply the whole exertion of its faculties, intellectual and

586 Whether the divided force of men, acting singly, would not be a rope of sand?

587 Whether the particular motions of the members of a State, in opposite directions, will not destroy each

other, and lessen the momentum of the whole; but whether they must not conspire to produce a great effect?

588 Whether the ready means to put spirit into this State, to fortify and increase its momentum, would not be

589 Whether that which employs and exerts the force of a community deserves not to be well considered and

590 Whether the immediate mover, the blood and spirits, be not money, paper, or metal; and whether the soul

or will of the community, which is the prime mover that governs and directs the whole, be not the legislature?

591 Supposing the inhabitants of a country quite sunk in sloth, or even fast asleep, whether, upon the gradual

awakening and exertion, first of the sensitive and locomotive faculties, next of reason and reflexion, then of

justice and piety, the momentum of such country or State would not, in proportion thereunto, become still

592 Whether that which in the growth is last attained, and is the finishing perfection of a people, be not the

593 Whether force be not of consequence, as it is exerted; and whether great force without great wisdom may

594 Whether the force of a child, applied with art, may not produce greater effects than that of a giant? And

whether a small stock in the hands of a wise State may not go further, and produce more considerable effects,

29 Whether, nevertheless, the damage would be very considerable, if by degrees our money were brought

30 Whether the English crown did not formerly pass with us for six shillings? And what inconvenience

ensued to the public upon its reduction to the present value, and whether what hath been may not be?

52 Whether it be not a bull to call that making an interest, whereby a man spendeth much and gaineth

55 Whether cunning be not one thing and good sense another? and whether a cunning tradesman doth not

62 Whether, consequently, the fine gentlemen, whose employment is only to dress, drink, and play, be not a

73 Whether those specimens of our own manufacture, hung up in a certain public place, do not sufficiently

declare such our ignorance? and whether for the honour of the nation they ought not to be removed?

201 Whether any nation ever was in greater want of such an expedient than Ireland?

210 What would happen if two of our banks should break at once? And whether it be wise to neglect

211 Whether such an accident would not particularly affect the bankers? And therefore whether a national

212 Whether we may not easily avoid the inconveniencies attending the papermoney of New England,

which were incurred by their issuing too great a quantity of notes, by their having no silver in bank to

exchange for notes, by their not insisting upon repayment of the loans at the time prefixed, and especially by

213 Whether a combination of bankers might not do wonders, and whether bankers know their own strength?

214 Whether a bank in private hands might not even overturn a government? and whether this was not the

215 Whether we may not easily prevent the ill effects of such a bank as Mr Law proposed for Scotland,

which was faulty in not limiting the quantum of bills, and permitting all persons to take out what bills they

pleased, upon the mortgage of lands, whence by a glut of paper, the prices of things must rise? Whence also

the fortunes of men must increase in denomination, though not in value; whence pride, idleness, and beggary?

216 Whether such banks as those of England and Scotland might not be attended with great inconveniences,

as lodging too much power in the hands of private men, and giving handle for monopolies, stockjobbing,

217 Whether the national bank, projected by an anonymous writer in the latter end of Queen Anne's reign,

might not on the other hand be attended with as great inconveniencies by lodging too much power in the

218 Whether the bank projected by Murray, though it partake, in many useful particulars, with that of

Amsterdam, yet, as it placeth too great power in the hands of a private society, might not be dangerous to the

221 Whether those effects could have happened had there been no stockjobbing? And whether

stockjobbing could at first have been set on foot, without an imaginary foundation of some improvement to

the stock by trade? Whether, therefore, when there are no such prospects, or cheats, or private schemes

222 Whether by a national bank, be not properly understood a bank, not only established by public authority

as the Bank of England, but a bank in the hands of the public, wherein there are no shares: whereof the public

223 Whether, having considered the conveniencies of banking and papercredit in some countries, and the

inconveniencies thereof in others, we may not contrive to adopt the former, and avoid the latter?

224 Whether great evils, to which other schemes are liable, may not be prevented, by excluding the managers

226 Whether the bank proposed to be established in Ireland, under the notion of a national bank, by the

voluntary subscription of three hundred thousand pounds, to pay off the national debt, the interest of which

sum to be paid the subscribers, subject to certain terms of redemption, be not in reality a private bank, as

those of England and Scotland, which are national only in name, being in the hands of particular persons, and

228 Whether it is not worth while to reflect on the expedients made use of by other nations, papermoney,

banknotes, public funds, and credit in all its shapes, to examine what hath been done and devised to add to

our own animadversions, and upon the whole offer such hints as seem not unworthy the attention of the

230 Whether it may not be expedient to appoint certain funds or stock for a national bank, under direction of

certain persons, onethird whereof to be named by the Government, and onethird by each House of

231 Whether the directors should not be excluded from sitting in either House, and whether they should not

232 Whether such committee of inspectors should not be changed every two years, onehalf going out, and

233 Whether the notes ought not to be issued in lots, to be let at interest on mortgaged lands, the whole

number of lots to be divided among the four provinces, rateably to the number of hearths in each?

234 Whether it may not be expedient to appoint four countinghouses, one in each province, for converting

235 Whether a limit should not be fixed, which no person might exceed, in taking out notes?

236 Whether, the better to answer domestic circulation, it may not be right to issue notes as low as twenty

237 Whether all the bills should be issued at once, or rather by degrees, that so men may be gradually

238 Whether the keeping of the cash, and the direction of the bank, ought not to be in different hands, and

239 Whether the same rule should not alway be observed, of lending out money or notes, only to half the

value of the mortgaged land? and whether this value should not alway be rated at the same number of years'

240 Whether care should not be taken to prevent an undue rise of the value of land?

241 Whether the increase of industry and people will not of course raise the value of land? And whether this

242 Whether land may not be apt to rise on the issuing too great plenty of notes?

243 Whether this may not be prevented by the gradual and slow issuing of notes, and by frequent sales of

244 Whether interest doth not measure the true value of land; for instance, where money is at five per cent,

245 Whether too small a proportion of money would not hurt the landed man, and too great a proportion the

monied man? And whether the quantum of notes ought not to bear proportion to the pubic demand? And

246 Whether the exceeding this measure might not produce divers bad effects, one whereof would be the loss

247 Whether interest paid into the bank ought not to go on augmenting its stock?

248 Whether it would or would not be right to appoint that the said interest be paid in notes only?

249 Whether the notes of this national bank should not be received in all payments into the exchequer?

250 Whether on supposition that the specie should fail, the credit would not, nevertheless, still pass, being

251 Whether the pubic can become bankrupt so long as the notes are issued on good security?

252 Whether mismanagement, prodigal living, hazards by trade, which often affect private banks, are equally

253 Whether as credit became current, and this raised the value of land, the security must not of course rise?

255 Whether by degrees, as business and people multiplied, more bills may not be issued, without

augmenting the capital stock, provided still, that they are issued on good security; which further issuing of

256 Whether such bank would not be secure? Whether the profits accruing to the pubic would not be very

considerable? And whether industry in private persons would not be supplied, and a general circulation

257 Whether such bank should, or should not, be allowed to issue notes for money deposited therein? And, if

258 Whether, if the public thrives, all particular persons must not feel the benefit thereof, even the bankers

259 Whether, beside the bank company, there are not in England many private wealthy bankers, and whether

261 Whether we have not papermoney circulating among, whether, therefore, we might not as well have

that us already which is secured by the public, and whereof the pubic reaps the benefit?

262 Whether there are not two general ways of circulating money, to wit, play and traffic? and whether

263 Whether there are more than two things that might draw silver out of the bank, when its credit was once

264 Whether, if our trade with France were checked, the former of these causes could be supposed to operate

267 Whether papermoney or notes may not be issued from the national bank, on the security of hemp, of

linen, or other manufactures whereby the poor might be supported in their industry?

273 Whether banks raised by private subscription would be as advantageous to the public as to the

subscribers? and whether risks and frauds might not be more justly apprehended from them?

276 Whether an argument from the abuse of things, against the use of them, be conclusive?

278 Whether interest be not apt to bias judgment? and whether traders only are to be consulted about trade, or

280 Whether any man hath a right to judge, that will not be at the pains to distinguish?

281 Whether there be not a wide difference between the profits going to augment the national stock, and

being divided among private sharers? And whether, in the former case, there can possibly be any gaming or

289 Whether, therefore, it doth not greatly concern the State, that our Irish natives should be converted, and

the whole nation united in the same religion, the same allegiance, and the same interest? and how this may

291 Whether there have not been Popish recusants? and, if so, whether it would be right to object against the

292 Whether those of the Church of Rome, in converting the Moors of Spain or the Protestants of France,

have not set us an example which might justify a similar treatment of themselves, if the laws of Christianity

293 Whether compelling men to a profession of faith is not the worst thing in Popery, and, consequently,

whether to copy after the Church of Rome therein, were not to become Papists ourselves in the worst sense?

294 Whether, nevertheless, we may not imitate the Church of Rome, in certain places, where Jews are

tolerated, by obliging our Irish Papists, at stated times, to hear Protestant sermons? and whether this would

295 Whether the mere act of hearing, without making any profession of faith, or joining in any part of

worship, be a religious act; and, consequently, whether their being obliged to hear, may not consist with the

296 Whether, if penal laws should be thought oppressive, we may not at least be allowed to give premiums?

And whether it would be wrong, if the public encouraged Popish families to become hearers, by paying their

297 Whether in granting toleration, we ought not to distinguish between doctrines purely religious, and such

298 Whether the case be not very different in regard to a man who only eats fish on Fridays, says his prayers

in Latin, or believes transubstantiation, and one who professeth in temporals a subjection to foreign powers,

who holdeth himself absolved from all obedience to his natural prince and the laws of his country? who is

299 Whether, therefore, a distinction should not be made between mere Papists and recusants? And whether

300 Whether our Papists in this kingdom can complain, if they are allowed to be as much Papists as the

303 Whether every plea of conscience is to be regarded? Whether, for instance, the German Anabaptists,

304 Whether Popish children bred in charity schools, when bound out in apprenticeship to Protestant masters,

306 Whether if the parents are overlooked, there can be any great hopes of success in converting the

312 Whether there be any nation of men governed by reason? And yet, if there was not, whether this would

315 Whether one, whose end is to make his countrymen think, may not gain his end, even though they should

316 Whether he, who only asks, asserts? and whether any man can fairly confute the querist?

317 Whether the interest of a part will not always be preferred to that of the whole?

5 Whether it can be reasonably hoped, that our state will mend, so long as property is insecure among us?

7 Whether a few mishaps to particular persons may not throw this nation into the utmost confusion?

8 Whether the public is not even on the brink of being undone by private accidents?

24 Whether private ends are not prosecuted with more attention and vigour than the public? And yet, whether

26 Whether even our private banks, though attended with such hazards as we all know them to be, are not of

28 Whether the mystery of banking did not derive its original from the Italians? Whether this acute people

were not, upon a time, bankers over all Europe? Whether that business was not practised by some of their

noblest families who made immense profits by it, and whether to that the house of Medici did not originally

30 Whether at Venice all payments of bills of exchange and merchants' contracts are not made in the national

or pubic bank, the greatest affairs being transacted only by writing the names of the parties, one as debtor the

31 Whether nevertheless it was not found expedient to provide a chest of ready cash for answering all

32 Whether this offer of ready cash, instead of transfers in the bank, hath not been found to augment rather

33 Whether at Venice, the difference in the value of bank money above other money be not fixed at twenty

34 Whether the bank of Venice be not shut up four times in the year twenty days each time?

35 Whether by means of this bank the public be not mistress of a million and a half sterling?

37 Whether we may not hope for as much skill and honesty in a Protestant Irish Parliament as in a Popish

39 Whether besides coined money, there be not also great quantities of ingots or bars of gold and silver

41 Whether it be not true, that the bank of Amsterdam never makes payments in cash?

42 Whether, nevertheless, it be not also true, that no man who hath credit in the bank can want money from

43 Whether any man thinks himself the poorer, because his money is in the. bank?

44 Whether the creditors of the bank of Amsterdam are not at liberty to withdraw their money when they

45 Whether this bank be not shut up twice in the year for ten or fifteen days, during which time the accounts

53 Whether we are by nature a more stupid people than the Dutch? And yet whether these things are

54 Whether anything less than the utter subversion of those Republics can break the banks of Venice and

55 Whether at Hamburgh the citizens have not the management of the bank, without the meddling or

56 Whether the directors be not four principal burghers chosen by plurality of voices, whose business is to

57 Whether the bookkeepers are not obliged to balance their accounts every week, and exhibit them to the

58 Whether any besides the citizens are admitted to have compte en banc at Hamburgh?

59 Whether there be not a certain limit, under which no sum can be entered into the bank?

60 Whether each particular person doth not pay a fee in order to be admitted to a compte en banc at

61 Whether the effects lodged in the bank of Hamburgh are liable to be seized for debt or forfeiture?

62 Whether this bank doth not lend money upon pawns at low interest and only for half a year, after which

63 Whether the bookkeepers of the bank of Hamburgh are not obliged upon oath never to reveal what sums

of money are paid in or out of the bank, or what effects any particular person has therein?

64 Whether, therefore, it be possible to know the state or stock of this bank; and yet whether it be not of the

66 Whether an absolute monarchy be so apt to gain credit, and whether the vivacity of some humours could

67 Whether the bank called the general bank of France, contrived by Mr Law, and established by letters

patent in May, 1716, was not in truth a particular and not a national bank, being in the hands of a particular

68 Whether the Government did not order that the notes of this bank should pass on a par with ready money

69 Whether this bank was not obliged to issue only such notes as were payable at sight?

71 Whether this bank was not restrained from trading either by sea or land, and from taking up money upon

72 Whether the original stock thereof was not six millions of livres, divided into actions of a thousand crowns

73 Whether the proprietors were not to hold general assemblies twice in the year, for the regulating of their

75 Whether there were not two chests belonging to this bank, the one called the general chest containing their

specie, their bills and their copper plates for the printing of those bills, under the custody of three locks,

whereof the keys were kept by the director, the inspector and treasurer. also another called, the ordinary

chest, containing part of the stock not exceeding two hundred thousand crowns, under the key of the

76 Whether out of this last mentioned sum, each particular cashier was not to be intrusted with a share not

exceeding the value of twenty thousand crowns at a time, and that under good security?

77 Whether the Regent did not reserve to himself the power of calling this bank to account, so often as he

78 Whether in the beginning of the year 1719 the French King did not convert the general bank of France into

a Banque Royale, having himself purchased the stock of the company and taken it into his own hands, and

79 Whether from that time, all matters relating to the bank were not transacted in the name, and by the sole

80 Whether his Majesty did not undertake to receive and keep the cash of all particular persons, subjects, or

foreigners, in his said Royale Banque, without being paid for that trouble? And whether it was not declared,

that such cash should not be liable to seizure on any pretext, not even on the king's own account?

81 Whether the treasurer alone did not sign all the bills, receive all the stock paid into the bank, and keep

82 Whether there were not three registers for the enregistering of the bills kept in the Banque Royale, one by

83 Whether there was not also a fourth register, containing the profits of the bank, which was visited, at least

84 Whether, beside the general bureau or compter in the city of Paris, there were not also appointed five more

in the towns of Lyons, Tours, Rochelle, Orleans, and Amiens, each whereof was provided with two chests,

one of specie for discharging bills at sight, and another of bank bills to be issued as there should be demand?

85 Whether, in the above mentioned towns, it was not prohibited to make payments in silver, exceeding the

86 Whether all creditors were not empowered to demand payment in bank bills instead of specie?

87 Whether, in a short compass of time, this bank did not undergo many new changes and regulations by

88 Whether the untimely, repeated, and boundless fabrication of bills did not precipitate the ruin of this bank?

89 Whether it be not true, that before the end of July, 1719, they had fabricated four hundred millions of

livres in banknotes, to which they added the sum of one hundred and twenty millions more on the twelfth of

September following, also the same sum of one hundred and twenty millions on the twentyfourth of 3

October, and again on the twentyninth of December, in the same year, the farther sum of three hundred and

sixty millions, making the whole, from an original stock of six millions, mount, within the compass of one

90 Whether on the twentyeighth of February, 1720, the king did not make an union of the bank with the

united company of the East and West Indies, which from that time had the administration and profits of the

91 Whether the king did not still profess himself responsible for the value of the bank bills, and whether the

92 Whether sixteen hundred millions of livres, lent to his majesty by the company, was not a sufficient

93 Whether the new directors were not prohibited to make any more bills without an act of council?

94 Whether the chests and books of the Banque were not subjected to the joint inspection of a Counsellor of

State, and the Prevot des Marchands, assisted by two Echevins, a judge, and a consul, who had power to visit

95 Whether in less than two years the actions or shares of the Indian Company (first established for

Mississippi, and afterwards increased by the addition of other compares and further? and whether this

privileges) did not rise to near 2000 per cent must be ascribed to real advantages of trade, or to mere frenzy?

96 Whether, from first to last, there were not fabricated bank bills, of one kind or other, to the value of more

than two thousand and six hundred millions of livres, or one hundred and thirty millions sterling?

97 Whether the credit of the bank did not decline from its union with the Indian Company?

98 Whether, notwithstanding all the abovementioned extraordinary measures, the bank bills did not still

pass at par with gold and silver to May, 1720, when the French king thought fit, by a new act of council, to

make a reduction of their value, which proved a fatal blow, the effects whereof, though soon retracted, no

99 Whether, what no reason, reflexion, or foresight could do, this simple matter of fact (the most powerful

argument with the multitude) did not do at once, to wit, open the eyes of the people?

100 Whether the dealers in that sort of ware had ever troubled their heads with the nature of credit, or the true

use and end of banks, but only considered their bills and actions as things, to which the general demand gave

101 Whether the Government was not in great perplexity to contrive expedients for the getting rid of those

102 Whether notes to the value of about ninety millions were not sunk by being paid off in specie, with the

cash of the Compagnie des Indes, with that of the bank, and that of the Hotels des Monnoyes? Whether five

hundred and thirty millions were not converted into annuities at the royal treasury? Whether several hundred

millions more in bank bills were not extinguished and replaced by annuities on the City of Paris, on taxes

103 Whether, after all other shifts, the last and grand resource for exhausting that ocean, was not the erecting

104 Whether, when the imagination of a people is thoroughly wrought upon and heated by their own

example, and the arts of designing men, this doth not produce a sort of enthusiasm which takes place of

105 Whether this epidemical madness should not be always before the eyes of a legislature, in the framing of

106 Whether, therefore, it may not be fatal to engraft trade on a national bank, or to propose dividends on the

108 Whether it may not be as useful a lesson to consider the bad management of some as the good

109 Whether the rapid and surprising success of the schemes of those who directed the French bank did not

111 Whether, as the aim of industry is power, and the aim of a bank is to circulate and secure this power to

each individual, it doth not follow that absolute power in one hand is inconsistent with a lasting and a

115 Whether the mistaking of the means for the end was not a fundamental error in the French councils?

124 Whether, therefore, bank bills should at any time be multiplied but as trade and business were also

125 Whether it was not madness in France to mint bills and actions, merely to humour the people and rob

126 Whether we may not profit by their mistakes, and as some things are to be avoided, whether there may

127 Whether the way be not clear and open and easy, and whether anything but the will is wanting to our

128 Whether jobs and tricks are not detested on all hands, but whether it be not the joint interest of prince and

129 Whether, all things considered, a national bank be not the most practicable, sure, and speedy method to

130 Whether a compte en banc or current bank bills would best answer our occasions?

131 Whether a public compte en banc, where effects are received, and accounts kept with particular persons,

132 What effect a general compte en banc would have in the metropolis of this kingdom with one in each

133 Whether it may not be proper for a great kingdom to unite both expedients, to wit, bank notes and a

134 Whether, nevertheless, it would be advisable to begin with both at once, or rather to proceed first with

the bills, and afterwards, as business multiplied, and money or effects flowed in, to open the compte en banc?

135 Whether, for greater security, double books of compte en banc should not be kept in different places an d

136 Whether it would not be right to build the compters and public treasuries, where books and bank notes

are kept, without wood, all arched and floored with brick or stone, having chests also and cabinets of iron?

137 Whether divers registers of the bank notes should not be kept in different hands?

138 Whether there should not be great discretion in the uttering of bank notes, and whether the attempting to

139 Whether the main art be not by slow degrees and cautious measures to reconcile the bank to the public, to

wind it insensibly into the affections of men, and interweave it with the constitution?

141 Whether a national bank may not prevent the drawing of specie out of the country (where it circulates in

143 Whether tenants or debtors could have cause to complain of our monies being reduced to the English

value if it were withal multiplied in the same, or in a greater proportion? and whether this would not be the

144 If there be an open sure way to thrive, without hazard to ourselves or prejudice to our neighbours, what

145 Whether in so numerous a Senate, as that of this kingdom, it may not be easie to find men of pure hands

146 Whether a view of the precipice be not sufficient, or whether we must tumble headlong before we are

156 Whether, if we do not reap the benefits that may be made of our country and government, want of will in

165 Whether an assembly of freethinkers, petit maitres, and smart fellows, would not make an admirable

175 Whether there be really among us any parents so silly, as to encourage drinking in their children?

176 Whence it is, that our ladies are more alive, and bear age so much better than our gentlemen?

197 Whether it may not be right to appoint censors in every parish to observe and make returns of the idle

198 Whether a register or history of the idleness and industry of a people would be an useless thing?

199 Whether we are apprized, of all the uses that may be made of political arithmetic?

207 Why the workhouse in Dublin, with so good an endowment, should yet be of so little use? and whether

208 Whether that income might not, by this time, have gone through the whole kingdom, and erected a dozen

210 Whether the tax on chairs or hackney coaches be not paid, rather by the country gentlemen, than the

227 Whether there should not be a difference between the treatment of criminals and that of other slaves?

251 Whether when a motion was made once upon a time to establish a private bank in this kingdom by public

authority, divers gentlemen did not shew themselves forward to embark in that design?

252 Whether it may not now be hoped that our patriots will be as forward to examine and consider the

253 Whether any people upon earth shew a more early zeal for the service of their country, greater eagerness

to bear a part in the legislature, or a more general parturiency with respect to politics and public counsels?

254 Whether, nevertheless, a light and ludicrous vein be not the reigning humour; but whether there was ever

13 Whether the whole city of Amsterdam would not have been troubled to have brought together twenty

14 Whether it be not absolutely necessary that there must be a bank and must be a trust? And, if so, whether it

be not the most safe and prudent course to have a national bank and trust the legislature?

15 Whether objections against trust in general avail, when it is allowed there must be a trust, and the only

question is where to place this trust, whether in the legislature or in private hands?

16 Whether it can be expected that private persons should have more regard to the public than the public

17 Whether, if there be hazards from mismanagement, those may not be provided against in the framing of a

pubic bank; but whether any provision can be made against the mismanagement of private banks that are

18 Whatever may be said for the sake of objecting, yet, whether it be not false in fact, that men would prefer

19 Whether a national bank ought to be considered as a new experiment; and whether it be not a motive to try

20 If power followeth money, whether this can be anywhere more properly and securely placed, than in the

21 Whether there be more danger of abuse in a private than in a public management?

22 Whether the proper usual remedy for abuses of private banks be not to bring them before Parliament, and

subject them to the inspection of a committee; and whether it be not more prudent to prevent than to redress

24 Whether experience and example be not the plainest proof; and whether any instance can be assigned

where a national bank hath not been attended with great advantage to the public?

25 Whether the evils apprehended from a national bank are not much more to be apprehended from private

banks; but whether men by custom are not familiarized and reconciled to common dangers, which are

26 Whether it would not be very hard to suppose all sense, honesty, and public spirit were in the keeping of

27 Whether it be not ridiculous to suppose a legislature should be afraid to trust itself?

28 But, whether a private interest be not generally supported and pursued with more zeal than a public?

30 Whether, nevertheless, the community of danger, which lulls private men asleep, ought not to awaken the

31 Whether there be not less security where there are more temptations and fewer checks?

32 If a man is to risk his fortune, whether it be more prudent to risk it on the credit of private men, or in that

33 Where is it most reasonable to expect wise and punctual dealing, whether in a secret impenetrable recess,

where credit depends on secrecy, or in a public management regulated and inspected by Parliament?

34 Whether a supine security be not catching, and whether numbers running the same risk, as they lessen the

35 What real objection lies against a national bank erected by the legislature, and in the management of

36 What have we to fear from such a bank, which may not be as well feared without it?

37 How, why, by what means, or for what end, should it become an instrument of oppression?

38 Whether we can possibly be on a more precarious foot than we are already? Whether it be not in the power

of any particular person at once to disappear and convey himself into foreign parts? or whether there can be

39 Whether the establishing of a national bank, if we suppose a concurrence of the government, be not very

40 But, whether though a scheme be never so evidently practicable and useful to the pubic, yet, if conceived

to interfere with a private interest, it be not forthwith in danger of appearing doubtful, difficult, and

41 Whether the legislative body hath not already sufficient power to hurt, if they may be supposed capable of

43 Whether, if the legislature destroyed the public, it would not be felo de se; and whether it be reasonable to

44 Whether the objection to a pubic national bank, from want of secrecy, be not in truth an argument for it?

45 Whether the secrecy of private banks be not the very thing that renders them so hazardous? and whether,

46 Whether when all objections are answered it be still incumbent to answer surmises?

47 Whether it were just to insinuate that gentlemen would be against any proposal they could not turn into a

48 Suppose the legislature passed their word for any private banker, and regularly visited his books, would

49 In a country where the legislative body is not fit to be trusted, what security can there be for trusting any

50 If it be not ridiculous to question whether the pubic can find cash to circulate bills of a limited value when

private bankers are supposed to find enough to circulate them to an unlimited value?

53 Whether those hazards that in a greater degree attend private banks can be admitted as objections against a

54 Whether that which is an objection to everything be an objection to anything; and whether the possibility

55 Whether, in fact, all things are not more or less abused, and yet notwithstanding such abuse, whether many

56 Whether those things that are subject to the most general inspection are not the least subject to abuse?

57 Whether, for private ends, it may not be sometimes expedient to object novelty to things that have been

58 Whether some men will not be apt to argue as if the question was between money and credit, and not (as

59 Whether they will not prudently overlook the evils felt, or to be feared, on one side?

60 Whether, therefore, those that would make an impartial judgment ought not to be on their guard, keeping

both prospects always in view, balancing the inconveniencies on each side and considering neither

61 Whether wilful mistakes, examples without a likeness, and general addresses to the passions are not often

62 Whether there be not an art to puzzle plain cases as well as to explain obscure ones?

63 Whether private men are not often an overmatch for the public; want of weight being made up for by

64 If we suppose neither sense nor honesty in our leaders or representatives, whether we are not already

65 Suppose a power in the government to hurt the pubic by means of a national bank, yet what should give

them the will to do this? Or supposing a will to do mischief, yet how could a national bank, modelled and

66 Whether even a wicked will entrusted with power can be supposed to abuse it for no end?

67 Whether it be not much more probable that those who maketh such objections do not believe them?

68 Whether it be not vain to object that our fellowsubjects of Great Britain would malign or obstruct our

69 Whether it is to be supposed they should take delight in the dirt and nakedness and famine of our people,

70 What possible handle or inclination could our having a national bank give other people to distress us?

71 Whether it be not ridiculous to conceive that a project for cloathing and feeding our natives should give

78 Whether the Protestant colony in this kingdom can ever forget what they owe to England?

79 Whether there ever was in any part of the world a country in such wretched circumstances, and which, at

the same time, could be so easily remedied, and nevertheless the remedy not applied?

80 What must become of a people that can neither see the plainest things nor do the easiest?

81 Be the money lodged in the bank what it will, yet whether an Act to make good deficiencies would not

82 If it be objected that a national bank must lower interest, and therefore hurt the monied man, whether the

same objection would not hold as strong against multiplying our gold and silver?

83 But whether a bank that utters bills, with the sole view of promoting the public weal, may not so

proportion their quantity as to avoid several inconveniencies which might attend private banks?

85 Whether anything be more reasonable than that the pubic, which makes the whole profit of the bank,

88 Whether, in order to make men see and feel, it be not often necessary to inculcate the same thing, and

90 Whether the managers and officers of a national bank ought to be considered otherwise than as the

cashiers and clerks of private banks? Whether they are not in effect as little trusted, have as little power, are

91 Whether the mistaking this point may not create some prejudice against a national bank, as if it depended

on the credit, or wisdom, or honesty, of private men, rather than on the pubic, which is really the sole

93 Whether a national bank would not be the great means and motive for employing our poor in

94 Whether money, though lent out only to the rich, would not soon circulate among the poor? And whether

95 Whether both government and people would not in the event be gainers by a national bank? And whether

anything but wrong conceptions of its nature can make those that wish well to either averse from it?

96 Whether it may not be right to think, and to have it thought, that England and Ireland, prince and people,

97 Whether, if we had more means to set on foot such manufactures and such commerce as consists with the

interest of England, there would not of course be less sheepwalk, and less wool exported to foreign

102 Whether business in general doth not languish among us? Whether our land is not untilled? Whether its

104 Whether our circumstances do not call aloud for some present remedy? And whether that remedy be not

106 Whether, of all the helps to industry that ever were invented, there be any more secure, more easy, and

107 Whether medicines do not recommend themselves by experience, even though their reasons be obscure?

But whether reason and fact are not equally clear in favour of this political medicine?

117 Whether therefore a tax on all gold and silver in apparel, on all foreign laces and silks, may not raise a

fund for the bank, and at the same time have other salutary effects on the public?

118 But, if gentlemen had rather tax themselves in another way, whether an additional tax of ten shillings the

hogshead on wines may not supply a sufficient fund for the national bank, all defects to be made good by

120 Whether the stock and security of such bank would not be, in truth, the national stock, or the total sum of

121 Whether, nevertheless, there should not be a particular fund for present use in answering bills and

122 Whether for this end any fund may not suffice, provided an Act be passed for making good deficiencies?

123 Whether the sole proprietor of such bank should not be the public, and the sole director the legislature?

124 Whether the managers, officers, and cashiers should not be servants of the pubic, acting by orders and

125 Whether there should not be a standing number of inspectors, onethird men in great office, the rest

members of both houses, half whereof to go out, and half to come in every session?

126 Whether those inspectors should not, all in a body, visit twice a year, and three as often as they pleased?

127 Whether the general bank should not be in Dubin, and subordinate banks or compters one in each

128 Whether there should not be such provisions of stamps, signatures, checks, strong boxes, and all other

129 Whether these ten or a dozen last queries may not easily be converted into heads of a bill?

130 Whether any one concerns himself about the security or funds of the banks of Venice or Amsterdam?

133 Whether it be not the most obvious remedy for all the inconveniencies we labour under with regard to

134 Whether it be not agreed on all hands that our coin is on very bad foot, and calls for some present

135 Whether the want of silver hath not introduced a sort of traffic for change, which is purchased at no

136 Whether, though it be evident silver is wanted, it be yet so evident which is the best way of providing for

this want? Whether by lowering the gold, or raising the silver, or partly one, partly the other?

137 Whether a partial raising of one species be not, in truth, wanting a premium to our bankers for importing

138 Whether it be not just that all gold should be alike rated according to its weight and fineness?

139 Whether this may be best done by lowering some certain species of gold, or by raising others, or by

141 Whether the North and the South have not, in truth, one and the same interest in this matter?

143 But, whether a pubic benefit ought to be obtained by unjust methods, and therefore, whether any

reduction of coin should be thought of which may hurt the properties of private men?

144 Whether those parts of the kingdom where commerce doth most abound would not be the greatest

145 Whether, in case a reduction of coin be thought expedient, the uttering of bank bills at the same time may

146 But, whether any pubic expediency could countervail a real pressure on those who are least able to bear

147 Whether, nevertheless, the political body, as well as the natural, must not sometimes be worse in order to

150 What if our other gold were raised to a par with Portugal gold, and the value of silver in general raised

151 Whether the pubic ends may or may not be better answered by such augmentation, than by a reduction of

152 Provided silver is multiplied, be it by raising or diminishing the value of our coin, whether the great end

154 Whether, if a reduction be thought necessary, the obvious means to prevent all hardships and injustice be

155 Upon supposition that the cash of this kingdom was five hundred thousand pounds, and by lowering the

various species each onefifth of its value the whole sum was reduced to four hundred thousand pounds,

whether the difficulty of getting money, and consequently of paying rents, would not be increased in the

156 Whether such difficulty would not be a great and unmerited distress on all the tenants in the nation? But

if at the same time with the aforesaid reduction there were uttered one hundred thousand pounds additional to

the former current stock, whether such difficulty or inconvenience would then be felt?

158 Whether in any foreign market, twopence advance in a kilderkin of corn could greatly affect our trade?

159 Whether in regard of the far greater changes and fluctuations of prices from the difference of seasons and

162 Whether, setting aside the assistance of a national bank, it will be easy to reduce or lower our coin

without some hardship (at least for the present) on a great number of particular persons?

163 Whether, nevertheless, the scheme of a national bank doth not entirely stand clear of this question; and

whether such bank may not completely subsist and answer its ends, although there should be no alteration at

164 Whether, if the ill state of our coin be not redressed, that scheme would not be still more necessary,

inasmuch as a national bank, by putting new life and vigour into our commerce, may prevent our feeling the

165 Whether men united by interest are not often divided by opinion; and whether such difference in opinion

166 Whether two things are not manifest, first, that some alteration in the value of our coin is highly

expedient, secondly, that whatever alteration is made, the tenderest care should be had of the properties of the

167 Whether our taking the coin of another nation for more than it is worth be not, in reality and in event, a

168 Whether a particular coin overrated will not be sure to flow in upon us from other countries beside that

169 Whether, in case the wisdom of the nation shall think fit to alter our coin, without erecting a national

bank, the rule for lessening or avoiding present inconvenience should not be so to order matters, by raising

the silver and depressing the gold, as that the total sum of coined cash within the kingdom shall, in

denomination, remain the same, or amount to the same nominal value, after the change that it did before?

170 Whether all inconvenience ought not to be lessened as much as may be; but after, whether it would be

prudent, for the sake of a small inconvenience, to obstruct a much greater good? And whether it may not

sometimes happen that an inconvenience which in fancy and general discourse seems great shall, when

171 Whether in public councils the sum of things, here and there, present and future, ought not to be

176 Money being a ticket which entitles to power and records the title, whether such power avails otherWise

180 Whether beside that value of money which is rated by weight, there be not also another value consisting

205 Whether bad management may not be worse than slavery? And whether any part of Christendom be in a

212 Whether it be not true, that within the compass of one year there flowed from the South Sea, when that

commerce was open, into the single town of St. Malo's, a sum in gold and silver equal to four times the whole

specie of this kingdom? And whether that same part of France doth not at present draw from Cadiz, upwards

214 Whether it be true that the Dutch make ten millions of livres, every return of the flota and galleons, by

215 Whether it be true that England makes at least one hundred thousand pounds per annum by the single

218 Whether there be not a small town Or two in France which supply all Spain with cards?

222 Whether, about twentyfive years ago, they did not first attempt to make porcelain in France; and

whether, in a few years, they did not make it so well, as to rival that which comes from China?

226 Whether part of the profits of the bank should not be employed in erecting manufactures of several kinds,

which are not likely to be set on foot and carried on to perfection without great stock, public encouragement,

230 Whether it were not to be wished that our people shewed their descent from Spain, rather by their honour

and honesty than their pride, and if so, whether they might not easily insinuate themselves into a larger share

235 Whether we may not, with common industry and common honesty, undersell any nation in Europe?

242 Whether they are not the Swiss that make hay and gather in the harvest throughout Alsatia?

269 Whether commissioners of trade or other proper persons should not be appointed to draw up plans of our

commerce both foreign and domestic, and lay them at the beginning of every session before the Parliament?

270 Whether registers of industry should not be kept, and the pubic from time to time acquainted what new

286 Whether therefore Mississippi, South Sea, and such like schemes were not calculated for pubic ruin?

289 Whether all such princes and statesmen are not greatly deceived who imagine that gold and silver, any

292 Whether the effect is not to be considered more than the kind or quantity of money?

299 Whether those who have the interests of this kingdom at heart, and are concerned in the councils thereof,

ought not to make the most humble and earnest representations to his Majesty, that he may vouchsafe to grant

us that favour, the want of which is ruinous to our domestic industry, and the having of which would interfere

301 Whether his most gracious Majesty hath ever been addressed on this head in a proper manner, and had

the case fairly stated for his royal consideration, and if not, whether we may not blame ourselves?

302 If his Majesty would be pleased to grant us a mint, whether the consequences thereof may not prove a

311 Whether every kind of employment or business, as it implies more skill and exercise of the higher

316 Whether private endeavours without assistance from the public are likely to advance our manufactures

and commerce to any great degree? But whether, as bills uttered from a national bank upon private mortgages

would facilitate the purchases and projects of private men, even so the same bills uttered on the public

security alone may not answer pubic ends in promoting new works and manufactures throughout the

323 Whether as many as wish well to their country ought not to aim at increasing its momentum?