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One Blames Politicians, Not For Inconsistency But For Obstinacy. They Are The Interpreters, Not The Masters, Of Our Fate. It Is Their Job, In Fact, To Register The Fact Accompli.

Nevertheless, If We Contemplate A Society With A Somewhat Stable Wage-unit, With National Characteristics Which Determine The Propensity To Consume And The Preference For Liquidity, And With A Monetary System Which Rigidly Links The Quantity Of Money To The Stock Of The Precious Metals, It Will Be Essential For The Maintenance Of Prosperity That The Authorities Should Pay Close Attention To The State Of The Balance Of Trade. For A Favourable Balance, Provided It Is Not Too Large, Will Prove Extremely Stimulating; Whilst An Unfavourable Balance May Soon Produce A State Of Persistent Depression.

The Spectacle Of Modern Investment Markets Has Sometimes Moved Me Towards The Conclusion That To Make The Purchase Of An Investment Permanent And Indissoluble, Like Marriage, Except By Reason Of Death Or Other Grave Cause, Might Be A Useful Remedy For Our Contemporary Evils. For This Would Force The Investor To Direct His Mind To The Long-term Prospects And To Those Only.

Businessmen Have A Different Set Of Delusions From Politicians; And Need, Therefore, Different Handling. They Are, However, Much Milder Than Politicians, At The Same Time Allured And Terrified By The Glare Of Publicity....you Could Do Anything You Like With Them, If You Would Treat Them (even The Big Ones) Not As Wolves And Tigers, But As Domestic Animals By Nature, Even Though They Have Been Badly Brought Up And Not Trained As You Would Wish.

If The Treasury Were To Fill Old Bottles With Bank-notes, Bury Them At Suitable Depths In Disused Coal-mines Which Are Then Filled Up To The Surface With Town Rubbish, And Leave It To Private Enterprise On Well-tried Principles Of Laissez-faire To Dig The Notes Up Again (the Right To Do So Being Obtained, Of Course, By Tendering For Leases Of The Note-bearing Territory), There Need Be No More Unemployment And, With The Help Of Repercussions, The Real Income Of The Community, And Its Capital Wealth, Would Probably Become A Good Deal Greater Than It Actually Is.