will continue to suffer until the end of time. There are limitations
to the powers of governments and of peoples that inhere in the
constitution of things, and that neither despotisms nor democracies
can overcome.

Legislatures are as powerless to abrogate moral and economic laws as
they are to abrogate physical laws. They cannot convert wrong into
right nor divorce effect from cause, either by parliamentary
majorities, or by unity of supporting public opinion. The penalties
of such legislative folly will always be exacted by inexorable time.
While these propositions may be regarded as mere commonplaces, and
while they are acknowledged in a general way, they are in effect
denied by many of the legislative experiments and the tendencies of
public opinion of the present day. The story, therefore, of the
colossal folly of France in the closing part Of the eighteenth century
and its terrible fruits, is full of instruction for all men who think
upon the problems of our own time.

From among an almost infinite variety, there are four great and
fundamental facts that clearly emerge, namely,--

(1) Notwithstanding the fact that the paper currency issued was the
direct obligation of the State, that much of it was interest bearing,
and that all of it was secured upon the finest real estate in France,
and that penalties in the way of fines, imprisonments and death were
enacted from time to time to maintain its circulation at fixed values,
there was a steady depreciation in value until it reached zero point
and culminated in repudiation. The aggregate of the issues amounted
to no less than the enormous and unthinkable sum of $9,500,000,000,
and in the middle of 1797 when public repudiation took place, there