My father in a great measure had concentrated all his investments in the national debt! Now, beyond all cavil, he loved the funds intensely; grew violent when they were assailed; cried out for bayonets when the mass declaimed against taxation; eulogized the gallows when there were menaces of revolt, and in a hundred other ways prove that "where the treasure is, there will the heart be also." The instance of my father, therefore, like all exceptions, only went to prove the excellence of the rule.

He had merely fallen into the error of contraction, when the only safe course was that of expansion.

I resolved to expand; to do that which probably no political economist had ever yet thought of doing--in short, to carry out the principle of the social stake in such a way as should cause me to love all things, and consequently to become worthy of being intrusted with the care of all things.
On reaching town my earliest visit was one of thanks to my Lord Pledge.
At first I had felt some doubts whether the baronetcy would or would not aid the system of philanthropy; for by raising me above a large portion of my kind, it was in so much at least a removal from philanthropical sympathies; but by the time the patent was received and the fees were paid, I found that it might fairly be considered a pecuniary investment, and that it was consequently brought within the rule I had prescribed for my own government.
The next thing was to employ suitable agents to aid in making the purchases that were necessary to attach me to mankind.

A month was diligently occupied in this way.

As ready money was not wanting, and I was not very particular on the subject of prices, at the end of that time I began to have certain incipient sentiments which went to prove the triumphant success of the experiment.