New-York tribune., 1870-11-16
THE PAPER AGE.

bronzc. and those who dig deep amid prim-
evol strata tell lis also of an age Of flint ante
dating known epOchs, involved In much log
and uncertainty, and not very useiul 10 con-
template. We have heard somewhat of certain
golden ages 80 called, wherein nature seemed
attuned to human needs and wherein joyous
generations lived without hunger and without
toll, drinking the wine of life without planting
its vineyards or treading its press. We don't
believe much in these latter epOchs.
It is quite likely that they were very much
like others of less smiling renOwn. People
strove and wrangled, and got into debt, waxed
lean and cursed their luck in those days as i'll
these But we will let the tradition stand Tor
what it is worth We are not so much inter
ested in the brazen or the iron or the golden
age as in that wherein we live, and which un-
luckily belongs to none of these metallic cate
cories. but is in sad fact merely an age OF
Paper.
What tremendously rich people we should
be if debt were only property How prosperous
if che written or printed promise to pay
created the wherewithal to pay! Unhappily,
debt is not property, but rather Its negation
OF counterfOil and promise to pay, instead
of being wealth. is q confession and certificate
of present poverty. Printing presses may
print never so cOpiously solvent-lOOking docu-
ments, decorated with waterfalls and god
desses and fringed with flattering coupons;
and a plausible President, a snug Secretary,
may append signatures with never 30 much
diligence. But we don't get any richer by
these procedures. Nay, we even wax poorer;
paper is wasted and 80 is the time OF
those who aflix its inscriptions. We have
been turning out good deal of this orna-
mental sort of paper for the last decade; our
promises to pay of one sort or another amount,
perhaps, to more than we care soberly to con-
template. Some of us may nOurish the delu-
sion that these promises to pay OF themselves
constitute wealth and carry with them an in
herent capacity of solution. They don't. They
are so many mortgages on the toll of the fu-
ture-so many liens on the wheat ungrOwn;
the cotton unwoven; the iron unsmelted We
have got to face this not altogether enlivening
music some day, and 1t may be well enough
TO begin now. Already, there are signs that
the paper edilice which we have been build
ing. with about as much confusion of tongues
and general lack Of wisdom as the builders OF
Babel evinced, has got as high as 1t can be
carried without topping over, so that 1t IL full
time to stand aloof and contemplate the pro-
portions and estimate the soldity of the srchi-
lecture we have wrought.
If some shrewd cypherer would take pencil
and slate and set down in due succession, first
what the nation collectively owes I; then what
the States separately owe; then what the
municipalities, greater and lesser, have
respectively promised to hand over at stated
times and seasons, and add up the same, the
sum total would probably astonsh him. ii he
could add to this what the counties owe for
court houses, jails and the like; and the towns
for bridges, and roads, and alms-houses; the
railroads for their iron, ties, and rolling
stock the schoOl-houses for their shingles, and
the churches for their steeples and stained-glass
archanges, and, carrying the inquiry to its final
limit, what proportion of the individuals who
comprise the nation eat to-day the meat and
wear the raiment which they hope to pay for
out of the labor of tomorrow and
next day, he would have a glimpse of
a bog of debt to which the Slough of
Despond was pudde-a bog in which
we are all wallOwing, and from which
we shall find it no holiday task to extricate
ourselves. We can't float out of it on paper
life-preservers, nor be lifted out of it by paper
balloons Only stern, diligent toll will avail
us; sober and useful labor, long endured; the
chastisement of that irrational desire to be rich
grown of late into a disease among us-only
these will lead us out upon the solid ground of
prosperity; and to these, whether we like it or
not, we have one and all got to come.
There is proverb, somewhat weatbG-won
and out at elbows, which declares that it is
easy to go to the devil. Time continually
attests the truth of this apOthegm in the
cases not only of individuals, but of peoples.
| The road thither is quite apt to be paved with
debt; slippery causeway growing ever slip
perier and sleeper, and whereon the back
track is taken with pain and difficulty. Giles
borrows q hundred dollars, and goes comfort
ably in the direction of the devil while a
shilling of it remains in his pocket. rail-
road issues its bonds for ten millions, and,
while that sum lasts, it is surprising hsv easy
it is to open up branch lines and build
new depots where they are not wanted.
1t is surprising how easy the book
keeping is and how liberal and san
| guine are Presidents, Boards of Direction and so
on. A State gets short of cash. There are
river-courses to be improved, canals to be ex-
tended, edifces to be built, and other desira-
bic objects to be promoted. The State goes
into the market with its promises to pay, gets
a part of their nominal value (perhaps), and is
as enterprising and progressive as you please
while q cent remains in the treasury. But
the time comes when individual and railroad
and State find out that they have got to settle,
and that it is much easier to spend money
| than TO pay it. If the individual has spent his