That gold and silver now have, and can be made to have, no higher value, as a currency, than they have as metals for uses in the arts, is proved by the fact that doubtless not more than one tenth, and very likely not more than a twentieth, of all the gold and silver in the world (out of the mines), is in circulation as currency. In Asia, where these metals have been accumulating from time immemorial, and whither all the gold and silver of Europe and America--except what is caught up, and converted into plate, jewelry, &c.--is now going, and has been going for the last two thousand years, very little is in circulation as money. For the common traffic of the people, coins made of coarser metals, shells, and other things of little value, are the only currency. It is only for the larger commercial transactions, that gold and silver are used at all as a currency. The great bulk of these metals are used for plate, jewelry, for embellishing temples and palaces. Large amounts are also hoarded. But that gold and silver coins now stand, and that they can be made to stand, as currency, only at their true and natural values as metals, for uses in the arts; and that neither the use, nor disuse, of any possible amount of paper currency, in any one country--the United States, for example--can sensibly affect their values in that country, or raise them above, or reduce them below, their values in the markets of the world, the author hopes to demonstrate more fully at a future time, if it should be necessary to do so. SECTION 3. Another argument--or rather assertion--of those who say that any increase of the currency, by means of paper--though the paper be equal in value to gold--depreciates the value of the gold, or inflates prices relatively to gold, is this: They assert that, where no other circumstances intervene to affect the prices of particular commodities, such increase of the currency raises the prices of _all_ kinds of property--relatively to gold--in a degree precisely corresponding with the increase of the currency. This is the universal assertion of those who oppose a _solvent_ paper currency; or a paper currency that is equal in value to gold. But the assertion itself is wholly _untrue_. It is wholly _untrue_ that an abundant paper currency--that is equal in value to gold--raises the prices of _all_ commodities--relatively to gold--in a proportion corresponding to the increase of the currency. _Instead of doing so, it causes a rise only in agricultural commodities, and real estate; while it causes a great fall in the prices of manufactures generally._ Thus the increased currency produces _a directly opposite effect_ upon the prices of agricultural commodities and real estate, on the one hand, and upon manufactures, on the other. The reasons are these: