does not become money, just as gold in Holland, as soon as it had been dethroned as a measure of value, ceased to be money. A commodity thus becomes money only in its combined capacity of a measure of value and medium of circulation; or, the unity of the measure of value and medium of circulation is money. As such a unity, however, gold has a separate existence independent of its existence in the two functions. As a measure of value it is only ideal money and ideal gold; as a mere medium of circulation it is symbolic money and symbolic gold; but in its plain metallic bodily form gold is money or money is real gold.
Let us now consider for a moment the commodity gold when it is in a state of rest, and plays the part of money in its relation to other commodities. All commodities represent in their prices a certain quantity of gold, that is to say, they are merely imaginary gold or imaginary money, representatives of gold, just as, on the other hand, money in the form of a token of value appeared as a mere representative of prices of commodities.[1] Since all commodities are thus but imaginary money, money is the only real commodity. Contrary to commodities, which only represent the independently existing exchange value, i. e., universal social labor, or abstract wealth, gold is the material form of abstract
- ↑ "Non solo i metalli ricchi son segni delle cose …; ma viccndevolmente le cose … sono segni dell'oro e dell'argento." (A. Genovesi, "Lezioni di Economia Civile," 1765, p. 281 in Custodi, Parte Mod. l. VIII.) ("Not only are precious metals tokens of things, but vice versa, things are tokens of gold and silver.")
