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The Mississippi Scheme and Its Antecedents: India

The following list will typify. Of all these John Law had knowledge sufficient to judge of difficulties to be encountered in the early stages, of dangers not only incidental to the things themselves, but based deep in human nature. The East India Company founded in 1600 The Bank of England founded in 1694 The Africa Company founded in 1695 The Darien Company founded in 1695 A glance at each of these, all of which were within the scope and knowledge of Law, their aims, formation and development, up to the time spoken of, can hardly fail to be illuminative. The sixteenth century had been an age of adventure and discovery; the seventeenth of the foundation of great commercial enterprise, of conception of ideas, of the constructive beginnings of things. The time for development had come with the eighteenth; and now care and forethought, prudence and resource, were the preparations for success.

The East India Company was in reality the pioneer of corporate trading, and as for nearly a hundred years it was in a measure alone in its scale of magnitude, its experiences could well serve as exemplar, guide, and danger signal. It was based on that surest of all undertakings, natural growth.

It came into existence because it was wanted, and from no other cause. Its very name, its modest capital, its self-protective purpose make for understanding. In its Charter of Incorporation its purpose was indicated in the name: "The Governor and Company of Merchants of London trading to the East Indies." Its capital was £70,000, which though a large sum for those days, was, according to our modern lights, an almost ridiculously small sum for the object then before it, and to which it ultimately attained. The time was ripe for just such an undertaking. The Peace of Vervins (1598) which left both France and Spain free to look after their domestic concerns, was immediately followed by the Edict of Nantes (1599) which gave religious liberty to France, and such a new freedom is always followed by national expansion. By this time Spain-the explorer or conqueror-and Holland-the patient organiser-held Eastern commerce in their hands.