“So far from this national guarantee imparting credit to a bank, such an arrangement would have the effect of depriving of all credit the nation capable of adopting it. Who would place confidence in a nation which should be imprudent enough to entrust to a small number of individuals the management of a bank whose operations would necessarily be unlimited, and whereby all the national property would become mortgaged? “It may readily be imagined that every possible precaution would be taken to prevent the managers of the bank from being unfaithful to their trust; but still the possibility will always remain, that, should a misfortune befal the bank, it would be necessary either to levy enormous contributions on the property of the country, or to declare the nation itself bankrupt. Would any prudent nation incur the risk of reducing itself to such an alternative? Would any honest nation, valuing a character for integrity, offer a responsibility which might prove illusory? “The nation, then, cannot, ought not, to become guarantee for the bank. “Still less ought the nation to establish the bank on its own account; for, to all the inconveniences resulting from responsibility, there would be added many others. The nation would have only two methods to choose between, either to entrust the administration of the bank to salaried officials, or to personally interested managers. In the first case, there would be too much reason to fear that the management of the bank would not receive due attention; while, in the second case, there would be an equal risk of the directors seeking immoderate profits, under the pretence of serving the interests of the nation with which they would be associated. In either case, should any misfortune befal the bank, the representatives of the country would, with much less freedom, deliver their opinion on events in which the interest of the whole nation would be compromised, than if they had merely to judge the conduct of private directors. And, finally, in both cases the annual expenses of management would be increased, and the portion of profits which the nation might directly claim from the operations of the bank, would certainly not indemnify it for the incalculable loss resulting from the diminished interest of money in the kingdom. “The nation, therefore, cannot become guarantee for the bank, nor can the bank be established on account of the nation.” “It has been proposed to establish banks of discount (_caisses d’escompte_) in different towns of the kingdom, and this plan certainly looks somewhat plausible; for it would seem at first sight that if banks of discount are useful, they cannot be too much multiplied, and that if they are favourable to commerce, they ought, above all, to be established in commercial towns.