18 SEPTEMBER 1869, Page 3

Commend us to " practical men," " men of business,"

for discussing any question whatever which seems familiar to them because it happens just to touch their sphere, on false data, by false principles, in a prolix method, and of course there- fore with conspicuously false, often manifoldly false conclusions. Just consider this terrible controversy in the Times about Mr. Lowe's gold changes. Till Sir John Lubbock's concise and lucid letter of Thursday, there has hardly been a grain of clear sense to a hundredweight of type in these verbose columns of argumentation. 'Take " Par," who is, we conclude, by his signature, a man of busi- mess, and who has indulged himself in something like four columns of the Times' small print, and yet whose only contribution to the con- troversy has been to call the proposed and diminished sovereign a

• " Lowe." He argues first on false premisses—at least if Mr. Lowe's -own speech can be relied on—assuming that France does not 'intend to increase her charge of 2-10ths per cent. for coining, Mr. Lowe's assumption having been that she does, and to make it pre- -cisely equal to that of England. And then he goes on to assume that the "Lowe," if it were used to pay foreigners with, who don't want British coin, but only gold, would only be worth the gold in it, while the charge for coining would be lost,—that is, that it would always be depreciated to that extent in relation to all foreign goods, and indeed to all goods manufactured of imported raw material! Why, the man might just as well assume that because a ship, if it is sold for the value of its old timber, is only worth the timber in it, therefore in relation to most of the merchandise of England it is only worth the same. Is there no possibility of selling a manufactured article to the people who want it, and who will pay for the manufacture, and using the proceeds to buy from those who don't want it? " Par " may be a right signature, after all. But what would "Below Par " be