I omit many considerations of detail because they will occur to yourself, and my letter is too long already. I can refer you to no book as treating of this subject fully and suitably to our circumstances. Smith gives the history of the public debt of England, and some views adapted to that; and Dr. Price, in his book on annuities, has given a valuable chapter on the effects of a sinking fund. But our business being to make every loan tax a sinking fund for itself, no general one will be wanting; and if my confidence is well founded that our original import, when freed from the revolutionary debt, will suffice to embellish and improve our country in peace, and defend her in war, the present may be the only occasion of perplexing ourselves with sinking funds.
Should the injunctions under which I laid you, as to my former letter, restrain any useful purpose to which you could apply it, I remove them; preferring public benefit to all personal considerations. My original disapprobation of banks circulating paper is not unknown, nor have I since observed any effects either on the morals or fortunes of our citizens, which are any counterbalance for the public evils produced; and a thorough conviction that, if this war continues, that circulation must be suppressed, or the government shaken to its foundation by the weight of taxes, and impracticability to raise funds on them, renders duty to that paramount to the love of ease and quiet.
When I was here in May last, I left it without knowing that Francis was at school in this neighborhood. As soon as I returned, on the present occasion, I sent for him, but his tutor informed me that he was gone on a visit to you. I shall hope permission for him always to see me on my visits to this place, which are three or four times a year.
[5] [A lapse of memory, not having the letter to recur to.]
DEAR SIR,--I owe you a thousand thanks for your favor of August 22d and its enclosures, and for Dr. Priestley's doctrines of Heathen Philosophy compared with those of Revelation. Your letter to Dr. Rush and the syllabus, I return enclosed with this according to your injunctions, though with great reluctance. May I beg a copy of both?
They will do you no harm; me and others much good.