If we then take an account of stock, is it not certain that we shall find more iron in the country, more coffee, more everything else?
Choose then, fellow-countrymen, between scarcity and abundance, between much and little, between Protection and Free Trade.

You now know which theory is the right one, for you know the fruits they each bear.
But, it will be answered, if we are inundated with foreign goods and produce, our specie, our precious product of California, our dollars, will leave the country.
Well, what of that?
Man is not fed with coin.

He does not dress in gold, nor warm himself with silver.

What does it matter, then, whether there be more or less specie in the country, provided there be more bread in the cupboard, more meat in the larder, more clothes in the wardrobe, and more fuel in the cellar?
Again, it will be objected, if we accustom ourselves to depend upon England for iron, what shall we do in case of a war with that country?
To this I reply, we shall then be compelled to produce iron ourselves.
But, again I am told, we will not be prepared; we will have no furnaces in blast, no forges ready.

True; neither will there be any time when war shall occur that the country will not be already filled with all the iron we shall want until we can make it here.