And this scheme is substantially carried out in practice. These 100,000 men call themselves "_the business men_" of the country. By this it is meant, not that they are the producers of wealth, but only that they alone handle the money! Other persons are permitted to sell only to them! to buy only of them! to labor only for them! and to sell to, buy of, and labor for, them, only at such prices as these 100,000 shall dictate. These 100,000 so called "_business men_," not only own the government, but they _are_ the government. Congress is made up of them, and their tools. And they hold all the other departments of the government in their hands. Their sole purpose is power and plunder; and they suffer no constitutional or natural law to stand in the way of their rapacity. How many times, during the last presidential canvass, were we told that "_the business men_" of the country wished things to remain as they were? Having gathered all power into their own hands, having subjected all the property and all the labor of the country to their service and control, who can wonder that they were content with things as they were? That they did not desire any change? And their money and their frauds being omnipotent in carrying elections, there was no change. These 100,000 "business men," having secured to themselves the control of all bank credits, and thereby the control of all business depending on bank loans; having also obtained control of the government, enact that foreigners shall not be permitted to compete with them, by selling goods in our markets, except under a disadvantage of fifty to one hundred per cent. And this is the industrial and financial system which the "National" bank system establishes--so far as it can establish it. And this is the scheme by means of which these 100,000 men cripple, and more than half paralyze, the industry of forty millions of people, and secure to themselves so large a portion of the proceeds of such industry as they see fit to permit. CHAPTER IX. AMASA WALKER'S OPINION OF THE AUTHOR'S SYSTEM. As Mr. Amasa Walker is considered the highest authority in the country, in opposition to all paper currency that does not represent gold or silver actually on hand, it will not be impertinent to give his opinion of the system now proposed. He reviewed it in a somewhat elaborate article, entitled "_Modern Alchemy_," published in the _Bankers Magazine (N. Y.)_ for December, 1861. That he had no disposition to do any thing but condemn the system to the best of his ability, may be inferred from the following facts. After describing the efforts of the old alchemists to transmute the baser metals into gold, he represents all attempts to make a useful paper currency as attempts "_to transmute paper into gold_." He says that the idea that paper can be made to serve the purposes of money is "_a perfectly cognate idea_" with that of the old alchemists, that the baser metals can be transmuted into gold. (p. 407.)