The money-claim made by the landlord on the peasants ceases to influence the prices of the articles only when the peasants of this landlord live separately from other people and have no connection with any one; and secondly, when the landlord employs money, not in purchasing things in his own village, but elsewhere. Only under these two conditions would the prices of things, though changed nominally, remain relatively the same, and money would become a measure of value and a medium of exchange. But if the peasants have any business connections with the inhabitants surrounding them, the prices of their produce, as sold to their neighbours, would depend on the sum required from them by their landlord. (If less money is required from their neighbours than from themselves, then their products would be sold cheaper than the products of their neighbours, and _vice versa_.) Again, the landlord's money-demand would cease to influence the prices of the articles, only when the sums collected by the landlord were not spent in buying the products of his own peasants. But if he spends the money in purchasing from them, it is plain that the prices of various articles will constantly vary among them according as the landlord buys more of one thing than another. Suppose one landlord has fixed a very high poll-tax, and his neighbour a very low one: it is clear that on the estate of the first landlord every thing will be cheaper than on the estate of the second, and that the prices on either estate will depend only upon the increase and decrease of the poll-taxes. This is one effect of violence on value. Another, rising out of the first, consists in relative values. Suppose one landlord is fond of horses, and pays a high price for them; another is fond of towels, and offers a high figure for them. It is obvious that on the estate of either of these two landlords, the horses and the towels will be dear, and the prices of these articles will be out of proportion to those of cows or of corn. If to-morrow the collector of towels dies, and his heirs are fond of poultry, then it is obvious that the price of towels will fall and that of poultry will rise. Wherever in society there is the mastery of one man over another, there the meaning of money as the measure of value at once yields to the will of the oppressor, and its meaning as a medium of exchange of the products of labour is replaced by another,--that of the most convenient means of utilizing other people's labour. The oppressor wants money neither as a medium of exchange,--for he takes whatever he wants without exchange,--nor as a measure of value,--for he himself determines the value of everything,--but only for the convenience it affords of exercising violence; and this convenience consists in the fact that money may be stored up, and is the most convenient means of holding in slavery the majority of mankind.