inexorable laws of finance which had brought heavy punishments upon
governments emitting an irredeemable currency in other lands, at other
times, might in some way at this time, be warded off from France.[13]

The question was brought up by Montesquieu's report on the 27th of
August, 1790. This report favored, with evident reluctance, an
additional issue of paper. It went on to declare that the original
issue of four hundred millions, though opposed at the beginning, had
proved successful; that _assignats_ were economical, though they had
dangers; and, as a climax, came the declaration: "We must save the
country."[14]

Upon this report Mirabeau then made one of his most powerful speeches.
He confessed that he had at first feared the issue of _assignats_, but
that he now dared urge it; that experience had shown the issue of
paper money most serviceable; that the report proved the first issue
of _assignats_ a success; that public affairs had come out of
distress; that ruin had been averted and credit established. He then
argued that there was a difference between paper money of the recent
issue and that from which the nation had suffered so much in John
Law's time; he declared that the French nation had now become
enlightened and he added, "Deceptive subtleties can no longer mislead
patriots and men of sense in this matter." He then went on to say:
"We must accomplish that which we have begun," and declared that there
must be one more large issue of paper, guaranteed by the national
lands and by the good faith of the French nation. To show how
practical the system was he insisted that just as soon as paper money
should become too abundant it would be absorbed in rapid purchases of
national lands; and he made a very striking comparison between this
self- adjusting, self-converting system and the rains descending in