gh, and invest it in the very
best shares or government funds, of which the value cannot fall much
during the coming collapse. The wisest men have been deluded during
manias; and in the Library of the Royal Society is shown a letter from
Sir Isaac Newton requesting a friend to buy shares for him in the South
Sea Company, just at the moment when the South Sea Bubble was at its
worst. Let people take warning by Sir Isaac Newton, and never speculate
in a thing because other people are doing the same; then these bubbles
and collapses will be prevented, or will become much less disastrous.
Credit cycles will go on until the public learn to look out for them,
and act accordingly. Business men must become bold during depressed
trade, careful during excited trade, instead of acting exactly in the
opposite way. It is only a knowledge of these credit cycles which can
prevent them, and this is the reason why I have said so much about them
in this Primer.

CHAPTER XV.

THE FUNCTIONS OF GOVERNMENT.

92. Functions mean performances (Latin, _fungi_, _functus_, to perform),
and the functions of government mean those things which a government
ought to do,--the duties which it undertakes to perform, or the services
which it may be expected to render to the people governed. These
functions are commonly divided into two classes--

(1) The necessary functions.
(2) The optional functions.

The #necessary functions# of a government are such as it is obliged to
undertake; thus it must defend the nation against foreign enemies, it
must keep the peace within the country, and prevent insurrections which
might threaten the existence of the government itself; it must also
punish evildoers who break the laws, and try to become rich by robbery;
it must also maintain law courts in which the disputes of its subjects
can be fairly decided, and set at rest. These are far from being all the
necessary functions.

The #optional functions# of government consist of those kinds of work
which a government can execute with advantage, such as providing a good
currency, establishing a uniform system of weights and measures,
constructing and maintaining the roads, carrying letters through a
national post office, keeping up a national observatory and a
meteorological office, &c. The optional functions are in fact very
numerous, and there is hardly any end to the things which one government
or another has provided for the people. It would be a most