which act is the greater profit is on a par with an attempt to determine which of two equal quantities is the larger.

Not content with asserting that goods can be more readily obtained for money than money for goods, Smith proceeds immediately to prove the converse of this proposition. "Though goods," he says, "do not always draw money so readily as money draws goods, in the long run they draw it more readily than it draws them. Goods can serve many other purposes beside purchasing money; but money can serve no other purpose beside the purchase of goods. Money, therefore, necessarily runs after goods; but goods do not always, or necessarily, run after money. The man who buys does not always mean to sell again; whereas he who sells always means to buy again. It is not for its own sake that men desire money; but for the sake of what they can purchase with it." As in all transactions for the sale of merchandise equivalents are exchanged, or are assumed to be exchanged, and as each party equally assents thereto, it is difficult to see that the running which he describes is more on one side than the other. The illustration is simply an attempt to prove that of two equally strong motives, or inclinations, one is stronger than the other; or that the tide flows inland with more strength than it flows outward. His assertion, that goods can serve many other purposes than the purpose of money, while money can serve no other purpose than the purchase of goods, shows that he had not the least comprehension of the matter upon which he wrote. The exchange of money for goods, or goods for money, is simply an exchange of one kind of merchandise for another. To assert that one of the subjects of exchange can have no use but to serve as the instrument of exchange, is equivalent to asserting that it has no value in itself, or that it is, like a yardstick, the mere instrument of exchange. It is the old story which Smith is always repeating under all possible forms, that money is not merchandise, and that value is no necessary attribute of it. The exact opposite to his assertion is the truth. Money gold and silver-serves vastly wider uses than any other kind of merchandise. Food can have no other purpose than to be eaten; cloth, no other than for making garments. The precious metals, on the other hand, enter into almost every department of social economy. It is the variety of their uses which renders their value more uniform than that of any other

serves.

articles. They are the only articles which can serve as reIt is these, with other qualities which they possess, that fit them to serve as money. No other articles of property have such a wide range of use. Smith and the Economists have adopted exactly the opposite theory, that the precious metals, of all articles, had the narrowest range of use; that their possession was to be avoided, was to be discouraged rather than encouraged, and that the only way to turn them to account was to send them abroad in exchange for what was useful. In reply to his assertion, that it is not for its own sake that men desire money, it may be replied that it is for its own sake that they do desire it; as by means of its intrinsic value they can always obtain that of which they stand in need. It frequently happens when money is acquired its possessor has no notion of the objects for which he may expend it; or he may intend never to expend it, but to invest it for the income it will yield. A man labors for money just as diligently when he has a hundred times more than he knows how to spend, as he does when he is pinched with hunger.

Money, Smith tells us, is the least valuable part of the capital of a community. In the same breath, almost, he tells us that the great thing is to get money. That got, every thing else follows. If money be the master of every thing else, and if it secure by direct exchange whatever its possessor may wish to purchase, how is it that it is the least valuable and least productive part of a person's capital? What constitutes value but demand and uses?

"Although," says Smith, "gold and silver could not be had" [to serve as money] "in exchange for goods destined to purchase them, the nation would not be ruined. It might, indeed, suffer some loss and inconveniency, and be forced upon some of those expedients which are necessary for supplying the place of money. The annual produce of its land and labor, however, would be the same, or very nearly the same, as usual; because the same, or very nearly the same, consumable capital would be employed in maintaining it." What expedients would he use? Not legal tender surely? That he never contemplated. He could not have a symbolic currency without reserves of coin. The nation, consequently, would be without any currency whatever. Its industries, notwithstanding, were to go on as before. Some inconvenience,

but no considerable loss, would result. It has been shown that life without money is the life of the savage. To give it up is, at the same moment, to give up our cvilization. Smith would have all our present conditions maintained, throwing away the very foundation upon which they rest. Such were his ignorance and incapacity that he could hardly venture upon an assertion that did not involve him in the grossest contradictions and absurdities.

ent.

The reason why the dogmas of Aristotle and Smith have had such universal acceptance is the absence of all attempt at proof in their support. They are pure assumptions. Had it been attempted to establish them by any process of reasoning, the utter inadequacy of the evidence would have been fatal to the attempt. To offer a reason is always a dangerous expediIf one would command assent, his words must be those of an oracle. He must transcend the vulgar processes of reason and induction, of proof. The public do not want to be told how a thing is true, but that it is true. A mere charlatan, consequently, will often for a time find wider acceptance than a man of the most solid qualities. An affirmation without a reason may be above the reach of reason. How is it to be demonstrated that Aristotle's fifth element or essence does not exist? how that all diseases do not operate through the fluids rather than through the solids? All that is wanting, often, to the perpetuation of a theory or error, no matter how gross, is its mere statement. The moment assent is secured, it may defy for ages all assault; for the reason that the methods likely to be brought to its attack have no adaptation to their object.

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The doctrines of the Economists in reference to "Balance of Trade" are the necessary sequence of those held by them in reference to money. What could be more absurd than to make that the object of commerce which was the least valuable subject of commerce, or which was not even a subject of commerce? The premises admitted, the conclusions were inevitable. With them, the suggestion of the importance of a favorable balance of trade was the red rag to the bull: it was enough to throw them into paroxysms of rage and fury. The welfare of a nation was to be measured by the amount of the precious metals it could get rid of. In parting with them,

it parted with that which was comparatively valueless for that which might be highly valuable. Better to part with them for silks and wines than to keep them; as some use and satisfaction, at least, could be got out of the former, while little or nothing could be got out of the latter. If, on the other hand, gold and silver be the highest, instead of the lowest, form of capital, then the greater the amount accumulated the richer the nation becomes. As they are capital, a favorable balance payable in them is that for which every individual and nation has always been and is constantly striving. The amount of such balances measures the degree of their acquisition or wealth. It is not necessary that the balances arising should be immediately paid over, or paid over at all, in coin. If the immediate payment of such balances be forborne, the party in whose favor they are found is compensated by receiving interest on the amount. Such interest or income makes a part of his wealth. Even Huskisson, one of the most intelligent of Englishmen, and hardly to be named in connection with the Economists, fell into their common error. In his essay in vindication of the Report of the Bullion Committee, of which he was a distinguished member, he uses the following language:

"Two very erroneous opinions on this subject are most generally received in the theory of the mercantile world :

"1st. That, whenever the exchange is against any country, the natural and general course of balancing the account is by a payment in bullion.

"2dly. That the balance of these payments in favor of any country is finally to be measured by what is called the balance of trade, or the excess of exports above imports. . . . Such is affirmed to be the present situation of this country, and the true explanation of the very depressed state of our foreign exchanges.

"The first of these positions is so little conformable to truth, and to the real course of business between nations, that there is, perhaps, no one article of general consumption and demand which forms the foundation of so few operations of trade between the different countries of Europe as bullion; and that the operations which do take place originate almost entirely in the fresh supplies which are yearly poured in from the mines of the New World, and are chiefly confined to the distribution of those supplies through the different parts of Europe. If this supply were to cease altogether, the dealings in gold and silver, as objects of foreign trade, would be very few, and those of short duration.” 1

I Huskisson on the Depreciation of the Currency, pp. 48-50.

Huskisson could not have written so carelessly, but for the acceptance of dogmas the truth of which it never occurred to him to examine. He had been told that gold and silver were not the subjects-only the instruments-of commerce; that the only way in which a nation could avail itself of their value was to export them. No man knew better than he "that," to repeat him, "whenever the exchange is against any country, the natural and obvious course of balancing the account is by payment in bullion." No man more often asserted, in general terms, such fact or law. It was the great theme and conclusion of the Bullion Report: yet, when he sat down to write upon it, he fell into the grossest of errors, simply for the reason that, from the want of a little reflection, he adopted the language and nomenclature in common use; and, in doing so, he asserted what he must have known to be exactly contrary to the fact. From the phenomena - from the sale of every thing for coin-it might well be inferred that the possession of gold and silver was the only object of commerce, instead of being, as he tells us, "the one article of general consumption and demand which forms the foundation of the fewest operations of trade between the different countries of Europe;" and that, "were it not for the supply constantly coming in from the New World, dealings in bullion would in great measure cease." Was there ever an instance of a man of such real ability and originality so completely mastered by Bacon's "idol

of the theatre "?1

There can be no doubt that the welfare of each nation is best promoted by the distribution of the precious metals the world over in proper equilibrium. Such equilibrium tends to a harmonious condition of production and trade; and, as all civilized nations form one great commercial community, the

1 There are idols which have crept into men's minds from the various dogmas of peculiar systems of philosophy, and also from the perverted rules of demonstration; and these we denominate idols of the theatre. For we regard all the systems of philosophy hitherto received or imagined as so many plays brought out and performed, creating fictitious and theatrical worlds. Nor do we speak only of the present systems, or of the philosophy and sects of the ancients; since numerous other plays of a similar nature can be still composed and made to agree with each other, the causes of the most opposite errors being generally the same. Nor, again, do we allude merely to general systems, but also to many elements and axioms of sciences, which have become inveterate by tradition, implicit credence, and neglect. — Novum Organum, Book i. 44.