CHAP. XX.

INCREASED PRICES.

101

the same effect on the labour on which he isengaged at every seed time. The same mode ofacting on analogy would be applied to otheroperations of industry. The weaver would per-ceive that cloth had been constantly rising in itsmoney price; he would conclude it would continueto rise, because it had done so ; and this wouldquicken his exertions, and induce him to bringmore cloth into the market. The same would bethe case with the producers of other articles, andthus an impulse would be given to the productivepowers, which would continue as long as the increaseof the precious metals should continue to lessentheir relative value to other commodities.

There seems no other way in which the increaseof the sold and silver can be beneficial to a wholecommunity. The intrinsic value of it bears buta small proportion to the various other kinds ofwealth which communities possess, and the valueof it, like that of all other commodities, is regulatedby the common principles of supply and demand.

It is probable that in all ages those metals havecost more in their production than their value everrepaid. And if the amount of human sufferingsin the earlier ages of the world could be reduced toa money valuation, and to them were to be addedthe evils derived from them by their derangement°f existing conditions in society, it would becomedoubtful if the increase of industry, which at par-ticular periods has been caused by it, has been