schewing all juggling devices and sacrificing
everything to maintain a sound currency based on standards common to the
entire financial world.

And now was seen, taking possession of the nation, that idea which
developed so easily out of the fiat money system;--the idea that the
ordinary needs of government may be legitimately met wholly by the means
of paper currency;--that taxes may be dispensed with. As a result, it
was found that the _assignat_ printing press was the one resource left
to the government, and the increase in the volume of paper money became
every day more appalling.

It will doubtless surprise many to learn that, in spite of these evident
results of too much currency, the old cry of a "scarcity of circulating
medium" was not stilled; it appeared not long after each issue, no
matter how large.

But every thoughtful student of financial history knows that this cry
always comes after such issues--nay, that it _must_ come,--because
in obedience to a natural law, the former scarcity, or rather
_insufficiency_ of currency recurs just as soon as prices become
adjusted to the new volume, and there comes some little revival of
business with the usual increase of credit. [56]

In August, 1793, appeared a new report by Cambon. No one can read it
without being struck by its mingled ability and folly. His final plan
of dealing with the public debt has outlasted all revolutions since,
but his disposition of the inflated currency came to a wretched failure.
Against Du Pont, who showed conclusively that the wild increase of paper
money was leading straight to, ruin, Cambon carried the majority in
the great assemblies and clubs by sheer audacity--the audacity of
desperation. Zeal in supporting the _assignats_ became his religion. The
National Convention which succeeded the Legislative Assembly, issued in
1793 over three thousand millions of _assignats_, and, of these, over
twelve hundred millions were poured into the circulation. And yet Cambon
steadily insisted that the security for the _assignat_ currency was
perfect. The climax of his zeal was reached when he counted as assets
in the national treasury the indemnities which, he declared, France
was sure to receive after future victories over the allied nations
with which she was then waging a desperate war. As patriotism, it was
sublime; as finance it was deadly. [57]

Everything was tried. Very elaborately he devised a funding scheme
which, taken in connectio