Putting the corn and the circulating medium of a country out of the question, the relations of which to labour and the costs of producing various commodities are tolerably well known, I think no one, in ordinary conversation, has ever been heard to express the general power of purchasing by the power of purchasing some one particular commodity. I certainly, at least, myself never recollect to have heard these two very distinct meanings confounded. It would, indeed, sound very strange, if a person returning from India, on being asked what was the value of money in that country, were to mention the quantity of English broad cloth which a given quantity of money would exchange for, and to infer, in consequence, that the value of money was lower in India than in England. In regard to the opinions and practice of other writers on political economy, most of them have considered the general power of purchasing, and the power of purchasing a particular commodity as so essentially distinct, that they have given them different names. The only authority quoted with approbation by the author, is Colonel Torrens, whose views, as to the nature of value, appear to him, he says, to be sounder than those of any other writer. Yet, what does Colonel Torrens say on this subject?—“The term exchangeable value expresses the power of purchasing with respect to commodities in general. The term price denotes the same power with respect to some particular commodity, the quantity of which is given. Thus, when I speak of the _exchangeable value_ of cotton as rising or falling, I imply, that it will purchase a greater or less quantity of corn, and wine, and labour, and other marketable commodities; but when I talk of the _price_ of cotton as rising or falling, I mean, that it will purchase a greater or less quantity of some one particular commodity, such as corn, or wine, or labour, or money, which is either expressed or understood. Exchangeable value may rise, while price falls, or fall while price rises. For example; if cotton were, from any cause, to acquire twice its former power of purchasing, with respect to goods in general, while gold, the particular commodity in which the price of cotton is expressed, rose in a still higher ratio, and acquired four times its former power in the market, then, though the exchangeable value of cotton would be doubled, its price would fall one half. Again; if cotton would purchase only half the former quantity of commodities, while it purchased twice the quantity of some particular commodity, such as corn, or wine, or labour, or money, then its exchangeable value would have sunk one half, while its price, as expressed in corn, or wine, or labour, or money, became double. And again; if cotton, and the particular commodity in which price is expressed, should rise or fall in the same proportion with each other, then the exchangeable value of cotton, or its general power of