He affirms, that from the year 1726 to the year 1784, there was coined at the mint of France, in the species of gold and silver, to the amount of about one hundred millions of pounds sterling* 1.1.
It is impossible that Mr. Necker should be mis|taken in the amount of the bullion which has been coined in the mint. It is a matter of official record. The reasonings of this able financier, concerning the quantity of gold and silver which remained for circulation, when he wrote in 1785, that is about four years before the deposition and imprisonment of the French King, are not of equal certainty; but they are laid on grounds so apparently solid, that it is not easy to refuse a considerable de|gree of assent to his calculation. He calculates the numeraire, or what we call specie, then actually existing in France, at about eighty-eight millions of the same English money. A great accumula|tion of wealth for one country, large as that coun|try is! Mr. Necker was so far from considering this influx of wealth as likely to cease, when he wrote in 1785, that he presumes upon a future annual increase of two per cent. upon the money brought into France during the periods from which he computed.
Some adequate cause must have originally in|troduced all the money coined at its mint into that kingdom; and some cause as operative must have kept at home, or returned into its bosom, such a vast flood of treasure as Mr. Necker calcu|lates to remain for domestic circulation. Suppose any reasonable deductions from M. Necker's com|putation;
