Then I say, the earth belongs to each of these generations during its course, fully and in its own right.  The second generation receives it clear of the debts and incumbrances of the first, the third of the second, and so on.  For if the first could charge it with a debt, then the earth would belong to the dead and not to the living generation.  Then no generation can contract debts greater than may be paid during the course of its own existence.  At twenty-one years of age, they may bind themselves and their lands for thirty-four years to come; at twenty-two, for thirty-three; at twenty-three, for thirty-two; and at fifty-four, for one year only; because these are the terms of life which remain to them at the respective epochs.  But a material difference must be noted, between the succession of an individual and that of a whole generation.  Individuals are parts only of a society, subject to the laws of the whole.  These laws may appropriate the portion of land occupied by a decedent, to his creditor rather than to any other, or to his child, on condition he satisfies the creditor.  But when a whole generation, that is, the whole society, dies, as in the case we have supposed, and another generation or society succeeds, this forms a whole, and there is no superior who can give their territory to a third society, who may have lent money to their predecessors, beyond their faculties of paying.  What is true of generations succeeding one another at fixed epochs, as has been supposed for clearer conception, is true for those renewed daily, as in the actual course of nature.  As a majority of the contracting generation will continue in being thirty-four years, and a new majority will then come into possession, the former may extend their engagements to that term, and no longer.  The conclusion, then, is, that neither the representatives of a nation, nor the whole nation itself assembled, can validly engage debts beyond what they may pay in their own time, that is to say, within thirty-four years from the date of the engagement.

To render this conclusion palpable, suppose that Louis the XIV. and XV. had contracted debts in the name of the French nation, to the amount of ten thousand milliards, and that the whole had been contracted in Holland.  The interest of this sum would be five hundred milliards, which is the whole rent-roll or nett[sp.] proceeds of the territory of France.  Must the present generation of men have retired from the territory in which nature produces them, and ceded it to the Dutch creditors?  No; they have the same rights over the soil on which they were produced, as the preceding generations had.  They derive these rights not from them, but from nature.  They, then, and their soil are, by nature, clear of the debts of their predecessors.  To present this in another point of view, suppose Louis XV. and his cotemporary generation had said to the money-lenders of Holland, Give us money, that we may eat, drink, and be merry in our day; and on condition you will demand no interest till the end of thirty-four years, you shall then, for ever after, receive an annual interest of fifteen per cent.  The money is lent on these conditions, is divided among the people, eaten, drunk, and squandered.  Would the present generation be obliged to apply the produce of the earth and of their labor, to replace their dissipations?  Not at all.