Page:Bankers and Credit (1924).pdf/258

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than the moral right of everybody to all the credit that he wanted—and Professor Soddy join hands with some of the most distinguished exponents of economic science, Irving Fisher who for years has been hammering away like a Trojan at his plan for "stabilizing" the dollar, Gustav Cassel, the great Swedish master who ever since the Brussels Conference has been imploring mankind not to add the folly of deflation to the crime of inflation, and J. M. Keynes and R. G. Hawtrey, the brilliant English champions of stabilization. What we humbler mortals have to consider is firstly whether stabilization is as simple a matter as it seems: secondly, whether, even if it were all that its admirers claim, it is wise to widen the power of Government, especially in a field in which it has blundered with unusual vigour and recklessness; and even though the actual regulation were put into the hands of the Bank of England, Parliament would, I think, certainly claim the ultimate nght of control. Thirdly, if we do decide to stabilize, at what point we should steady our price level.

After giving the above list of names in favour of stabilization, it seems almost profane to suggest that this doctrine involves big assumptions; but surely the Quantity. Theory, as any complete statement of it must show, depends