Remember the players. In the
social order, the useful things are what the workers place under the
candlestick, and the crowns which circulate from hand to hand are the
counters. If you multiply the francs without multiplying the useful
things, the only result will be, that more francs will be required for
each exchange, just as the players required more counters for each
deposit. You have the proof of this in what passes for gold silver, and
copper. Why does the same exchange require more copper than silver, more
silver than gold? Is it not because these metals are distributed in the
world in different proportions? What reason have you to suppose that if
gold were suddenly to become as abundant as silver, it would not require
as much of one as of the other to buy a house?
B. You may be right, but I should prefer your being wrong. In the
midst of the sufferings which surround us, so distressing in themselves,
and so dangerous in their consequences, I have found some consolation in
thinking that there was an easy method of making all the members of the
community happy.
F. Even if gold and silver were true riches, it would be no easy
matter to increase the amount of them in a country where there are no
mines.
B. No, but it is easy to substitute something else. I agree with you
that gold and silver can do but little service, except as a mere means
of exchange.
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