TII 10 WEALTH OF NATIONS. 233

been more or less affected by the abundance of the mines ofAmerica .

So far as their quantity in any particular country dependsupon the former ot those two circumstances (the power ofpurchasing), their real price, like that of all other luxuries andsuperfluities, is likely to rise with the wealth and improve-ment of the country, and to fall with its poverty and depression.Countries which have a great quantity of labour and subsist-ence to spare, can afford to purchase any particular quan-tity of those metals at the expense of a greater quantity of la-bour and subsistence, than countries which have less to spare.

So far as their quantity in any particular country dependsupon the latter of those two circumstances (the fertility orbarrenness of the mines which happen to supply the commer-cial world) their real price, the real quantity of labour andsubsistence which they will purchase or exchange for, will,no doubt, sink more or less in proportion to the fertility, andrise in proportion to the barrenness of those mines.

The fertility or barrenness of the mines, however, whichmay happen at any particular time to supply the commercialworld, is a circumstance which, it is evident, may have no sortof connexion with the state of industry in a particular country.It seems even to have no very necessary connexion with thatof the world in general. As arts and commerce, indeed, gra-dually spread themselves over a greater and a greater part ofthe earth, the search for new mines, being extended over awider surface, may have somewhat a better chance for being-successful, than when confined within narrower bounds.The discovery of new mines, however, as the old ones cometo be gradually exhausted, is a matter of the greatest uncer-tainty, and such as no human skill or industry can ensure.All indications, it is acknowledged, are doubtful, and the ac-tual discovery and successful working of a new mine canalone ascertain the reality of its value, or even of its existence.In this search there seem to be no certain limits either to thepossible success, or to the possible disappointment of humanindustry. In the course of a century or two, it is possiblethat new mines may be discovered more fertile than any thathave ever yet been known; and it is just equally possible thatthe most fertile mine then known may be more barren thanany that was wrought before the discovery of the mines ofAmerica . Whether the one or the other of those two eventsmay happen to take place, is of very little importance to the

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