A.D. 1689 —1776. and changed the centre of gravity in the State : h12 PARLIAMENTARY COLBERTISM monarchical responsibility. It had long been notorious, too, ‘hat the possession of wealth gave the command of power?; the concentration of wealth in the hands of the Directors of the Bank enabled them to exercise an economic influence; the resources at their command were not exceeded by the sums which the King could control; it was hardly too much to say that the Bank overbalanced the Crown as a power in the State. Hitherto the continuity of the govern. ment had depended chiefly on the succession to the throne; and there were possibilities of violent reaction with each new accession; but the existence of the Bank gave an important guarantee for the maintenance of the same general principles of rule under any monarch; national bank- ruptey, rather than the dangers of disputed succession to the Crown, became an object of dread. The Bank proved itself to be compatible with monarchy, only because the monarchy was now greatly limited by the provisions of the constitution® Hence it came about that the moneyed men, whose pro- sperity was involved in the maintenance of credit, were intensely afraid of the return of the Stuarts, and lent the whole of their influence to the Whig party and the Hanoverian succession. They were thus in a position® to expect that attention should be paid to their views on economic questions, during the period of Whig ascendancy, and they were not disappointed. The foundation of the Bank of England was by far the most striking incident of the period, in the economic history of the country internally. We have seen, during the seven- teenth century, the importance of new opportunities for the 1 This Aristotelian principle is applied to the internal affairs of modern countries by Harington in his Oceana. He traced a connection between the distribution of wealth and the distribution of power within any country. His treatise was suggested by considering the changes (Toland's Life, prefixed to Harington’s Works (1787), p. xvii} of property and power which had occurred since the time of Henry VII. The rise of a moneyed class, in the latter part of this period, with the rivalry between the landed and moneyed interest which snsued, is an interesting illustration of his principle. In accordance with re- oublican doctrines, to which he was strongly attached, it followed that a wide Jistribution of wealth was a necessary condition for good popular government [Harington’s Works (1737), 78], so that the possessions of the many might over- balance those of the few. 3 Addison, Spectator, March 3, 1711. 3 Compare the influence of moneyed citizens under Richard IT. Vol. 1. p. 381.