as e. g. in China, legal tender paper money is found at an early date.[1]. Early advocates of paper money expressely point out the fact that metallic coin is transformed into a token of value in the very process
- ↑ Mandeville, Sir John, "Voyages and Travels," London, 1705, p. 105: "This Emperor (of Cattay or China) may dispende ols muche as he wile withouten estymacion. For he despendethe not, nor makethe no money, but of lether empredeth, or of papyre. And when that money hathe ronne so longe that it begynethe to waste, than men beren it to the Emperoure Tresorye, and then they taken newe Money for the old. And that money gothe thorghe out all the contree, and thorge out all his Provynces. . . . They make no money nouther of Gold nor of Sylver," and "therefore," thinks Mandeville, "be may despende ynew and outrageously."
("When the inhabitants of one country became more dependent on those of another, and they imported what they needed and exported the surplus, money necessarily came into use . . . and hence men agreed to employ in their dealings with each other something which was intrinsically useful and easily applicable to the purposes of life, for example, iron, silver and the like." Trans, by B. Jowett, "The Politics of Aristotle, Oxford, 1885, p. 16). This passage is quoted by Michel Chevalier, who either has not read Aristotle or did not understand him, to prove that in Aristotle's opinion currency must consist of a substance having intrinsic value. On the contrary, Aristotle says expressly that money as a mere medium of circulation seems to owe its existence to agreement or law, as is shown by its name νόμισμα, and that in reality it owes its utility as coin to its function and not to any intrinsic use-value of its own. λῆρος εἶναι δοκεῖ τὸ νόμισμα καὶ νόμος παντάπασι, φύσει δ᾽ οὐθέν, ὅτι μεταθε ένων τε τῶν χρωμένων οὐθενὸς ἄξιον οὐδὲ χρήσιμον πρὸς οὐδὲν τῶν ἀναγκαίων ἐστί. ("Others maintain that coined money is a mere sham, a thing not natural, but conventional only, which would have no value or use for any of the purposes of daily life if another commodity were substituted by the users." (l. c. sec. 11.)
