For the last thirty years, the liberal party have had the almost uncontrolled direction of the affairs of the nation. One by one, they have beat down all the ancient safeguards of British industry, and given effect to the whole theoretical doctrines of the political economists. So complete has been their ascendency in the national councils--so entire in general the acquiescence of the nation in their direction, that without one single exception ALL their doctrines have been carried into practice; and the year 1847 exhibits a fair, and it may be presumed average result of the liberal system when reduced into execution. The result is so curious, its lessons so pregnant with instruction, its warning of coming disaster so terrible, that we gladly avail ourselves of the opening of a new year, to portray them in a few paragraphs to our readers. The first great change which took place in British policy was in 1819, by the famous Bank Restriction Act, passed in that year. Everyone knows that the obligation on the Bank of England to pay in specie, was suspended by Mr Pitt in February 1797; and that under that system the empire continued to rise with all the difficulties with which it was surrounded, until in the latter years of the war it bore without difficulty an annual expenditure of from £110,000,000 to £120,000,000 annually. But under the new system introduced in 1819, the currency was restricted by imposing on the bank the obligation of paying its notes, when presented, not in gold _or silver_, but in GOLD ALONE. The currency was based on the article in commerce _most difficult to keep_, most easy of transport, most ready to slip away--the most precious of the precious metals. The result has been that the nation,--which, with a population of 18,000,000 of souls, raised without difficulty £71,000,000 annually by taxes, and from £30,000,000 to £40,000,000 annually by loans in 1813, 1814, and 1815, of which at least a half was sent abroad, and wholly lost to the nation--is now, with a population of 28,000,000, not able to raise in round numbers above £51,000,000 on an average of years by taxation, and is brought to the verge of ruin by the purchase of £33,000,000 worth of foreign grain in 1846 and 1847, and the expenditure of £35,000,000 in 1846, and £25,000,000 in the first six months of 1847 on domestic railways, every shilling of which last sum was spent at home, and puts in motion industry within the nation.