The Regulating Silver Coin, Made Practicable and Easie, to the Government and SubjectPratt, Samuel
History
The Regulating Silver Coin, Made Practicable and Easie, to the Government and Subject
Pratt, Samuel
Coinage -- Great Britain -- Early works to 1800; Great Britain. Parliament -- Early works to 1800
And to them who think the Badness of our Coin the greatest Reason of the
present high Valuation of Gold, I shall in the mean time say, that if
the Price of Gold hath risen, suppose 4 _s._ or 5 _s._ in a Guinea, upon
the Account only of the Baseness of our Silver Coin; then in handling
that Notion we must look upon Gold not so much a Coin as a Commodity,
and so indeed it is at this Present; because the Price of Gold in the
Oar or Ingott hath risen almost proportionably to that which is coin’d;
so that a Man doth not take a Guinea rather than 29 clipp’d Shillings,
because the King’s Impress is upon it; for so ’tis upon the Shillings;
or because Authority has made it pass so, for that Authority is wanting;
but because it is of a greater intrinsic Value than is in 29 Shillings
of clipp’d or counterfeit Money, which is now most current: So that the
Valuation of the Commodity Gold hath encreased as the intrinsic Value of
our Silver Coin hath decreased.
And if so, then it is to be suspected that the Price of all staple
Commodities have encreased in equal Proportion, or that they are in such
a Proportion now higher than they wou’d have been; for Gold and Silver
being reciprocally the Standards and Measures of Proportion of one
another, are so of every thing else; and if I can now buy as many Ounces
and Peny-Weights of Silver for a Guinea, as I could have done formerly,
then is not Silver Risen more than Gold: and if I can buy as many Grains
of Gold now with an Ounce of Silver as I could formerly, then is not
Gold risen more than Silver. And this is, perhaps more than a
Supposition: For when Silver was 5 _s._ an Ounce, I cou’d buy 4 Ounces 6
Peny-wt. with a Guinea, and so I can now, that Silver is 6 _s._ 6 _d._
_per_ Ounce. Again when Gold was about 3 _l._ 14 _s._ an Ounce, I cou’d
buy an Ounce of Gold with 15 Ounces of Silver, and so I can now, or near
the Matter: So that the Commodities of Gold and Silver answer one
another as they did, or near thereabout, abating only for the
Portableness of Gold and its Coinage; whereas no Coinage is now
allowable for those Pieces of Silver wherein the Coinage is defaced and
spoiled; and if those two Commodities are so much higher than they would
have been: For they are the Measure and Rule of Proportion of all. Then
when the Value of Gold and Silver rises, the intrinsic Value of all
Commodities rise with ’em:
For suppose an _Eastland_ or _Hamburgh_ Merchant brings over a Barrel of
Mum, which he (when our Money was old Standard) sold for 3 _l._ he
disliking our Money now, sells his Mum, not according to the extrinsic
Valuation of our Money, which is risen since he was here last; because
the Intrinsic is diminished, but according to the common Value of Gold
and Silver in the World; and therefore requires now 4 _l._ because he
judges our Silver to be a fourth Part worse than it was, or if at 5 _l._
he judges it to be 2 Parts in 5 worse.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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