and highways of the commercial world may afford still stronger instances of the necessity and utility of conducting commerce on the original principle of barter, without much assistance from the operations of credit and exchange.  All I would be understood to say is, that it by no means follows that we can carry on nothing but a losing trade with a country from which we receive more of her products than she receives of ours.  Since I was supposed, the other day, in speaking upon this subject, to advance opinions which not only this country ought to reject, but which also other countries, and those the most distinguished for skill and success in commercial intercourse, do reject, I will ask leave to refer again to the discussion which I first mentioned in the English Parliament, relative to the foreign trade of that country.  “With regard,” says the mover[5] of the proposition, “to the argument employed against renewing our intercourse with the North of Europe, namely, that those who supplied us with timber from that quarter would not receive British manufactures in return, it appeared to him futile and ungrounded.  If they did not send direct for our manufactures at home, they would send for them to Leipsic and other fairs of Germany.  Were not the Russian and Polish merchants purchasers there to a great amount?  But he would never admit the principle, that a trade was not profitable because we were obliged to carry it on with the precious metals, or that we ought to renounce it, because our manufactures were not received by the foreign nation in return for its produce.  Whatever we received must be paid for in the produce of our land and labor, directly or circuitously, and he was glad to have the noble Earl’s[6] marked concurrence in this principle.”

Referring ourselves again, Sir, to the analogies of common life, no one would say that a farmer or a mechanic should buy only where he can do so by the exchange of his own produce, or of his own manufacture.  Such exchange may be often convenient; and, on the other hand, the cash purchase may be often more convenient.  It is the same in the intercourse of nations.  Indeed, Mr. Speaker has placed this argument on very clear grounds.  It was said, in the early part of the debate, that, if we cease to import English cotton fabrics, England will no longer continue to purchase our cotton.  To this Mr. Speaker replied, with great force and justice, that, as she must have cotton in large quantities, she will buy the article where she can find it best and cheapest; and that it would be quite ridiculous in her, manufacturing as she still would be, for her own vast consumption and the consumption of millions in other countries, to reject our uplands because we had learned to manufacture a part of them for ourselves.  Would it not be equally ridiculous in us, if the commodities of Russia were both cheaper and better suited to our wants than could be found elsewhere, to abstain from commerce with her, because she will not receive in return other commodities which we have to sell, but which she has no occasion to buy?