Econlib

The Library

Other Sites

 Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow Bentham to Dumont. - The Works of Jeremy Bentham, vol. 10 (Memoirs Part I and Correspondence)

Return to Title Page for The Works of Jeremy Bentham, vol. 10 (Memoirs Part I and Correspondence)

Search this Title:

Also in the Library:

Subject Area: Political Theory
Subject Area: Law

Bentham to Dumont. - Jeremy Bentham, The Works of Jeremy Bentham, vol. 10 (Memoirs Part I and Correspondence) [1843]

Edition used:

The Works of Jeremy Bentham, published under the Superintendence of his Executor, John Bowring (Edinburgh: William Tait, 1838-1843). 11 vols. Vol. 10.

Part of: The Works of Jeremy Bentham, 11 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


Bentham to Dumont.

“Q. S. P., 11th August, 1801.

“My dear Dumont,—

I was very glad to receive the paper you sent me from Lord Lansdowne—not only as a token of his lordship’s kind recollection, but also on its own account.

“Should the currency I have proposed be adopted by Government, and accepted to a sufficient extent in Ireland, it will be an effectual cure for the evil, and a more simple one than any other which has been or can be proposed. Whether it will be adopted, is more than I can as yet pretend to say; but they pay serious attention to it, and appearances are not unpromising. I need not say to you, I am sure, how sincere a satisfaction it would afford me, to find that, in the general accommodation, Lord Lansdowne’s particular accommodation, in a matter of such importance to him, were particularly included. I should be much obliged to him and you, for any further documents relative to the subject that may come to hand, or be easily procurable.

“The enormity of the discount spoken of, (10 per cent.—is it not? or thereabouts,) altogether passes my comprehension. A priori, I should have thought the impossibility of the fact demonstrable. The money, if it exists in Ireland, might be brought bodily (I should have said,) for a quarter of the money. It costs but £3, 12s. or thereabouts, per £100, to bring money from Hamburgh, including freight, insurance—everything, as per Lords’ stoppage of the Bank Report, March or April, 1797. I say, if it exists in Ireland, and if it does not exist there, I don’t well see how it is ever to get paid in England. Perhaps the case is, that it does not exist there, and so it becomes necessary that the value should be paid in goods; and that this discount is occasioned by the expenses upon the goods. Not having yet turned my thoughts to this particular branch of the subject, I feel myself as yet quite in the dark. You know it is my way, till I fancy myself to know more, I am always perfectly conscious of knowing a great deal less than other people. If the case should be as above, to be sure my currency can do nothing in it. If there is any money in the country, it will bring it free of expense; but if there is none, to be sure it cannot create it. I wonder how it was with Scotland in former days—soon after the Union, for example. Fifteen lords and forty-five commoners, must, though Scotchmen, have spent something. Any documents about the state of the country banks in Ireland would be highly valuable to me. Whether my currency be adopted or no, country bankers’ paper must be stopped from further increase, on pain of certain bankruptcy: though I cannot tell you exactly on what day, and at what o’clock.

“P. S. Your letter did not desire an answer, or I would have written one immediately.”

CHAPTER XIV.

1801—2. Æt. 53—4.

Correspondence continued: Robert Watts on Prices; Dumont, with Notices of Talleyrand and French Politics.—Sir William Pulteney and Wilberforce on the Panopticon.—Wilson.—Sir T. M. Eden.—Bentham’s Visit to Paris, Fontanes, Duke de Brancas, Garnier.—Correspondence with Romilly, Trowbridge, and Collins.

The correspondence of Bentham with the Rev. Robert Watts of Sion College, exhibits some curious examples of the rise of prices in the articles of clothing, which are worth recording, and may serve as means of comparison with the present state of things. What appears most remarkable, is—the low nominal value of labour: that a boy’s coat, with buttons, and all other materials, should be made for one shilling, appears almost incredible:—