This discredit means, "an opinion that you have not got any money", and to dissipate that opinion, you must, if possible, show that you have money: you must employ it for the public benefit in order that the public may know that you have it. The time for economy and for accumulation is before.
A good banker will have accumulated in ordinary times the reserve he is to make use of in extraordinary times. (p. 24) And what are the terms at which the central bank should lend freely? Bagehot argues that "these loans should only be made at a very high rate of interest" (p. 99).