proclaimed to be free and current, and let the State shut itself out to take any penalty for the same. This will preserve borrowing from any general stop or dryness-this will ease infinite borrowers in the country-this will, in good part, raise the price of land, because land purchased at sixteen years' purchase will yield six in the hundred, and somewhat more, whereas this rate of interest yields but five-this, by like reason, will encourage and edge industrious and profitable improvements, because many will rather venture in that kind, than take five in the hundred, especially having been used to greater profit. Secondly, let there be certain persons licenced to lend to known merchants upon usury, at a high rate, and let it be with the cautions following. Let the rate be, even with the merchant himself, somewhat more easy than that he used formerly to pay; for by that means all borrowers shall have some ease by this reformation, be he merchant or whosoever'-let it be no bank, or common stock, but every man be master of his own money; not that I altogether mislike2 banks, but they will hardly be brooked, in regard3 of certain suspicions. Let the State be answered* some small matter for the licence, and the rest left to the lender; for if the abatement be but small, it will no whit discourage the lender; for he, for example, that took before ten or nine in the hundred, will sooner descend to eight in the hundred, than give over this trade of usury, and go from certain gains to gains of hazard. Let these licenced lenders be in number indefinite, but restrained to certain principal cities and towns of merchandise; for then they will be hardly able to colour other men's monies in the country, so as the licence of

1 Whosoever. Whoever. "Whosoever should give the blow, the murder would be his. We are guilty of all the evil we might have hindered.'-Bishop Hall. 2 Mislike. Dislike.

3 In regard.

4 Answer.

'And Israel, whom I lov'd so dear,

Misliked me for his choice.'-Milton.

On account. See page 289.

To pay.

'Who studies day and night

To answer all the debts he owes to you.'-Shakespere.

5 Whit. In the least; in the smallest degree. I was not a whit behind the very chiefest apostles.'-2 Cor. xi. 5.

'We love, and are no whit regarded.'-Sidney.

6 Colour. To pass for their own. To colour a stranger's goods is, when a freeman allows a foreigner to enter goods at the Custom-house in his name.'— Phillips.

nine will not suck away the current rate of five; for no man will lend his monies far off, nor put them into unknown hands. If it be objected that this doth in any sort authorise usury, which before was in some places but permissive, the answer is, that it is better to mitigate usury by declaration than to suffer it to rage by connivance.

ANNOTATIONS.

It is wonderful how late right notions on this subject were introduced; and not even now have they been universally adopted. I have already remarked, in the notes to the Essay on Seditions and Tumults,' that the error of over-governing always prevails in the earlier stages of civilization, even as the young are more liable to it than the experienced. And that Bacon shared in this error is evident from his advocating sumptuary laws-the regulating of prices—the legislating against engrossers-prohibiting the laying down of land in pasture, &c. All these puerilities are to be found in the earlier laws of all countries. In this Essay on 'Usury,' he does not go the whole length of the prejudices existing in his time, though he partakes of them in a great degree. In his day, and long before, there were many who held it absolutely sinful to receive any interest for money, on the ground of the prohibition of it to the Israelites in their dealings with each other; though the Mosaic law itself proves the contrary, since it allows lending at interest to a stranger; and certainly the Israelites were not permitted to oppress and defraud strangers.

'Since there must be borrowing and lending, and men are so hard of heart as they will not lend freely

It seems strange that a man of Bacon's acuteness should not have perceived-but it is far more strange that legislators in the nineteenth century should not have perceived that there is no essential difference between the use of any other kind of property, and money, which represents, and is equivalent to,

any and all kinds. It never occurred to Bacon, seemingly, that no man is called hard-hearted for not letting his land or his house rent-free, or for requiring to be paid for the use of his horse, or his ship, or any other kind of property.

As for the lending of money making 'fewer merchants,' and causing money to lie still,' it is evident that this is the very reverse of the fact. Great part of the trade and manufactures in every prosperous country is carried on with borrowed capital, lent by those who have not the skill and leisure to carry on such business themselves; and who, if they were prevented from thus investing their capital, would be driven either to let their money lie still' in a strong box, or else to engage in a business for which they were not fitted.

If I build a mill or a ship, and let it to a manufacturer or merchant, every one would allow that this is a very fair way of investing capital; quite as fair and much wiser, than if, being ignorant of manufactures and trade, I were to set up as a manufacturer or merchant. Now if, instead of this, I lend a merchant money to buy or build a ship for himself, or advance money to the manufacturer to erect his buildings and machinery, he will probably suit himself better than if I had taken this on myself, without his experience.

No doubt, advantage is often taken of a man's extreme necessity, to demand high interest, and exact payment with rigour. But it is equally true that advantage is taken, in some crowded town, of a man's extreme need of a night's lodging. Again, it is but too well known, that where there is an excessive competition for land, as almost the sole mode of obtaining a subsistence, it is likely that an exorbitant rent will be asked, and that this will be exacted with unbending severity. But who would thereupon propose that the letting of land should be prohibited, or that a maximum of rent should be fixed by law? For, legislative interposition in dealings between man and man, except for the prevention of fraud, generally increases the evil it seeks to remedy. A prohibition of interest, or—which is only a minor degree of the same error-a prohibition of any beyond a certain fixed rate of interest, has an effect similar to that of a like interference between the buyers and sellers of any other commodity. If, for example, in a time of scarcity it were enacted, on the ground that cheap food is desirable, that bread and meat

should not be sold beyond such and such a price, the result would be that every one would be driven-unless he would submit to be starved-to evade the law; and he would have to pay for his food more than he otherwise would, to cover (1) the cost of the contrivances for the evasion of the law, and (2) a compensation to the seller for the risk, and also for the discredit, of that evasion. Even so, a man who is in want of money, and can find no one to lend it him at legal interest, is either driven (as Bacon himself remarks), to sell his property at a ruinous loss, or else he borrows of some Jew, who contrives to evade the law; and he has to pay for that evasion. Suppose, for instance, he could borrow (if there were no usury-laws) at eight per cent., he will have to pay, perhaps, virtually twelve per cent., because (1) he has to resort to a man who incurs disgrace by his trade, and who will require a greater profit to compensate for the discredit; and (2) he will have to receive part of his loan in goods which he does not want, at an exorbitant price, or in some other way to receive less, really, than he does nominally.

A

ESSAY XLII. OF YOUTH AND AGE.

MAN that is young in years may be old in hours, if he have lost no time; but that happeneth rarely. Generally, youth is like the first cogitations, not so wise as the second, for there is a youth in thoughts as well as in ages; and yet the invention of young men is more lively than that of old, and imaginations stream into their minds better, and, as it were, more divinely. Natures that have much heat, and great and violent desires and perturbations, are not ripe for action till they have passed the meridian of their years; as it was with Julius Cæsar and Septimius Severus, of the latter of whom it is said, 'Juventutem egit, erroribus, imo furoribus plenam :" and yet he was the ablest emperor almost of all the list; but reposed natures may do well in youth, as it is seen in Augustus Cæsar, Cosmus Duke of Florence, Gaston de Fois, and others. On the other side, heat and vivacity in age is an excellent composition3 for business. Young men are fitter to invent than to judge, fitter for execution than for counsel, and fitter for new projects than for settled business; for the experience of age, in things that fall within the compass of it, directeth them, but in new things abuseth them. The errors of young men are the ruin of business, but the errors of aged men amount but to this—that more might have been done, or sooner. Young men, in the conduct and manages of actions, embrace more than they can hold; stir more than they can quiet; fly to the end, without consideration of the means and degrees; pursue some few principles which they have chanced upon, absurdly; care not to innovate, which

1 'His youth was not only full of errors, but of frantic passions.'-Spartian, Vit. Sev.

2 Reposed. Calm. With wondrous reposedness of mind, and gentle words, Reputation answered.'-Translation of Boccalini, 1626.

3 Composition. Temperament. See page 309.

4 Abuse.

To deceive; to lead astray.

Nor be with all those tempting words abused.'-Pope.

5 Manage. Management.

'The manage of my state.'-Shakespere.

6 Care not. Are not cautious.