The first French translation of John Law’s Money and Trade Consider’d, his main work of monetary theory, published in the same year as the spectacular fall of his System in the Mississippi Bubble.
John Law’s most important - and infamous - work of monetary theory, first published in Scotland in 1705, proposes a system of paper money backed by land, which, Law argues, is more stable than the comparably more volatile and less predictable silver and gold. “The central thrust in his argument was that an expansion in the money supply would lead to an expansion in output” (ODNB). Though rejected by the Scottish government, Law received permission to implement elements of his plan in France in 1716, in particular, the issuing of paper credit as part of an attempt to relieve the national debt through investment schemes.
Publication of this first French translation of Law’s proposal is conspicuous in its timing. The same year, 1720 saw the collapse of his so-called ‘System’ - the Mississippi Bubble - with ruinous consequences for the French economy: unprecedented speculation, hyperinflation, a stock market crash, and subsequently high taxation, following the state’s absorption of Law’s debt. Law is referred to on the title page here as ‘Controlleur Géneral des Finances’, a position he held from 5 January 1720 until temporary dismissal on 27 May following the first of his scheme’s crises (though reappointed, dismissal became permanent on 9 December). This indicates that publication took place early in the year when his scheme still appeared to be watertight, and public opinion in France was buoyant.
John Law’s work is bound together with French translations of David Hume’s main writings on economics, extracted from his Political Discourses (1752), and Joshua Gee’s The Trade and Navigation of Great Britain Consider’d, one of the main works of English mercantilism.
Provenance: Nineteenth-century ownership inscription at head of flyleaf, ‘Louis Curvalle’, with note in Spanish ‘de las cosas mas seguras la mas segura es dudan’, from Simon Bolivar. ‘Table de recueil’ noted on verso of front flyleaf and on rear pastedown in different hand.
Carpenter IX (4); Einaudi, 3274; Goldsmiths’, 5820; Kress 3235.
