Twistleton's opinion,
might show "severe distress," inasmuch as when times begin to grow hard,
deposits would increase for the following reasons:
1. People in employment, who were thoughtless before and did not
deposit, would begin to be depositors in bad times.
2. People in employment, who were depositors before, would increase
their deposits.
3. Thrifty people, who would at other times have gone into little
speculations, would now be afraid to do so, and they would become
depositors instead.
4. Persons of a higher class, say employers, in such times cease to be
employers and become depositors.
An increase of deposits, Mr. Twistleton admits, may arise from
prosperity; he only wishes to show that such increase is not always a
certain sign of it. We know too well now, that the increase of deposits
in some of our Savings' Banks during the Famine, was no sign whatever of
prosperity; yet the _journals_ named above, at once built upon the fact
a theory most damaging to the existing destitution of our people, and
most injurious to their moral character; basing this theory on one of
those general principles of political economy, which often admits of
grave exceptions, and sometimes breaks down utterly, when put to the
test of practical experience.
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