their own value) was not debased."[1] Steuart thought that the nation would prove more alert with the further development of commerce. He was mistaken. About 120 years later the same quid pro quo was repeated.
It was just in the order of things that Bishop BERKELEY, the representative of a mystical idealism in English philosophy, should have given a theoretical turn to the doctrine of the ideal unit of measure of money, something which the practical "Secretary to the Treasury" had failed to do. He asks: "Whether the terms Crown, Livre, Pound Sterling, etc., are not to be considered as Exponents or Denominations of such Proportion? [namely proportions of abstract value as such.] And whether Gold, Silver, and Paper are not Tickets or Counters for Reckoning, Recording and Transferring thereof? (of the proportion of value). Whether Power to command the Industry of others be not real Wealth? And whether Money be not in Truth, Tickets or Tokens for conveying and recording such Power, and whether it be of great consequence what Materials the Tickets are made of?"[2] Here we find a confusion, first of the measure of
- ↑ Steuart, l. c., v. II., p. 154.
- ↑ The Querist, l. c. (p. 5–6–7.) The "Queries on Money" are generally clever. Among other things Berkeley is perfectly
the delicate economic question, viz., the depreciation of the currency out of proportion to its real loss of silver, as was shown by the rate of exchange and the ratio of silver bullion to silver coin. We shall return to this question in its general form in the chapter on the Medium of Circulation. Nicholas Barbon in "A Discourse Concerning Coining the New Money Lighter, in Answer to Mr. Locke's Considerations, etc.," London, 1696, tried in vain to entice Locke to difficult ground.
