John Law, Esq. the Mississippi projector, was descended from a Scotch family: the Rev. Andrew Law, his grandfather, was minister of Neilsbon in that kingdom, whose youngest son, William, a goldsmith or banker in Edinburgh, purchased an estate at Lauriston, four miles from that city, and died in Paris. He had issue by Jean Campbell, John the projector; Andrew, who died without issue; William, director-general of the East India Company, and the royal bank in France, who died at Paris, in 1752, aged 77; Robert and Hugh, who both died unmarried.

The well-known schemer, John, the eldest brother, was born in 1671; and obtained possession of Lauriston, in 1704, by his father’s death. Brought up to no profession, he commenced the man of pleasure; but Scotland did not yield sufficient scope for the fertility of his genius. Passing the Tweed, he brought with him to England the fame of his gallantries. Young and graceful, he claimed the attention of the fair. Beau Law, as he was called, became the rival of Beau Wilson; and, as rivals seldom agree, the beau of Scotland endeavoured to eclipse the beau of England, and upon English ground. This was more than Wilson could bear. They quarrelled: a challenge passed , they fought , and Wilson fell. Flight became necessary; and Law fled. But fame softened justice; and mercy permitted the duellist to return, in 1721. The arts of the gamester had long been resorted to, and the scene began to require changing.

The continent had witnessed his adventures in the annals of Venus and Mercury; and at Turin, his fertile brain suggested a lottery, which would have eased the pockets of the Piedmontese, had not the Duke of Savoy told him, that, as his dominions were too small for the plans of so extensive a genius, he recommended him to go to Paris. He went, gained the ear of the regent Duke of Orleans, already prepared by his “Discourse concerning Money and Trade” published by him in Scotland, and now to be acted upon. He suggested the establishment of a national bank, by the operation of which the national debt of France was to be swept away; the kingdom enriched; and gold to become as common in Paris, as silver was in Jerusalem in the days of Solomon. The Mississippi scheme flourished: Law lent it all he had saved, as a new gambling stock. The Parisians saw nothing, in the transports of their infatuation, but the transportation of the mines of Mexico and Peru to their own city; when, behold! the bubble broke, ruin ensued, and Law fled, who, after all his visionary schemes of wealth, and occasional possession of it, died at last at Venice, in 1729, a fugitive from his native country, and in distressed circumstances.

Quoted from: Mark Noble, James Granger: A Biographical History of England, from the Revolution to the End of George I’s Reign. Vol. III. London, 1806.