We have said above, that the profits of banks consist in their enjoying the same interest for the notes they lend, as if the loan had been made in gold or silver. This is a very great object, no doubt; but the policy of nations has established it, and therefore we shall suppose it to be an uncontroverted principle. In which ever way, therefore, an optional clause is inserted, it should be such as to cut off all profit from the bank, upon all paper presented for payment, from the time of presentation; and every artifice used to suspend the liquidation of the paper, to the advantage of the bank, and prejudice of the bearer, should be considered as unfair dealing in the bank, and prohibited by law. When the optional clause has no tendency to procure advantage to the bank, in prejudice of the holder of the paper (except so far as the holder is thereby deprived of the use of coin, which on certain occasions cannot be supplied by the paper) it becomes the duty of a statesman to examine how far it is expedient to suffer such stipulations to be inserted, in a money which is calculated to carry on the mercantile interest of the nation. Banks, we have said, are the servants of the public, and they are well paid for their services. Although the notes issued by them are not commonly made a legal tender in payment; yet the consequence of a well established bank, is to render them so essential to circulation, that what is not a legal obligation becomes one, _in fact_, from the force of custom. Let us therefore examine the advantages which result to banks from this optional clause, and the loss which results to a nation from their use of it, and then compare the advantages with the inconveniencies, in order to determine whether or not it is expedient to permit such obstructions in the circulation of paper.