The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Introduction
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• General Note
• Advertisement By the Translator.
• Juventuti Academicae Salutem.
• To the Students In Universities.
• Philosophiae Moralis Institutio Compendiaria With a Short Introduction to Moral Philosophy
• Philosophiae Moralis Institutio Compendiaria
• Liber I: Ethices Elementa.
• Caput I: De Hominis Natura Ejusque Partibus.
• Caput II: De Summo Bono Et Virtute.
• Caput III: De Variis Virtutum Divisionibus.
• Caput IV: De Virtutibus Et Officiis Erga Deum.
• Caput V: De Officiis Erga Alios Homines Exercendis.
• Caput VI: De Officiis Cujusque Erga Se, Et De Animi Cultura.
• 1 {caput VII: De Virtutis Studio Excitando Et Retinendo.
• Liber II: Jurisprudentiae Naturalis Elementa.
• Caput I: De Lege Naturali.
• Caput II: De Juris Natura Et Divisionibus.
• Caput III: De Virtutum Et Vitiorum Gradibus, Inter Se Comparatis{; Iisque Quae Speciem Moralem Afficiunt}.
• Caput IV: De Jure Privato Naturali.
• Caput V: De Jure Adventitio Reali, Et Rerum Dominio.
• Caput VI: De Dominii Acquirendi Rationibus.
• Caput VII: De Jure Derivato, Ejusque Causis.
• Caput VIII: De Dominii Transferendi Rationibus, Per Contractus, Successiones, Aut Testamenta.
• Caput IX: De Contractibus.
• Caput X: De Sermocinantium Officiis.
• Caput XI: De Jurejurando Et Votis.
• Caput XII: De Rerum Pretio.
• Caput XIII: De Variis Contractuum Generibus Post Pretia Rerum Constituta.
• Caput XIV: De Obligationibus Quasi Ex Contractu Ortis.
• Caput XV: Jura Ex Damno Dato, Atque Ex Aliorum Injuriis Orta. Jura Belli.
• Caput XVI: De Jure Extraordinario Ex Necessitate, Omniumque Jure Communi.
• Caput XVII: De Juris Interitu. De Litibus In Libertate Dirimendis, Et Interpretatione.
• Liber III: Oeconomices Et Politices Elementa.
• Caput I: De Conjugio.
• Caput II: De Parentum Et Liberorum Officiis.
• Caput III: De Herorum Et Servorum Jure.
• Caput IV: De Civitatum Origine Et Causis.
• Caput V: De Interna Civitatum Structura, Et Summi Imperii Partibus.
• Caput VI: De Variis Rerumpublicarum Formis.
• Caput VII: De Summi Imperii Jure, Ejusque Acquirendi Rationibus.
• Caput VIII: De Legibus Condendis, Et De Jurisdictione.
• Caput IX: De Jure Belli.
• Caput X: De Foederibus, Legatis, Et Civitatum Interitu [deletione].
• A Short Introduction to Moral Philosophy.
• Book I: The Elements of Ethicks.
• Chapter I: Of Human Nature and Its Parts.
• Chapter II: Concerning the Supreme Good.
• Chapter III: Concerning the Chief Divisions of Virtue.
• Chapter IV: Our Duties Toward God.
• Chapter V: Our Duties Toward Mankind.
• Chapter VI: Concerning Our Duties Toward Ourselves, and the Improvement of the Mind.
• Chapter VII: Some Practical Considerations to Excite and Preserve the Study of Virtue.
• Book II: Elements of the Law of Nature.
• Chapter I: Of the Law of Nature.
• Chapter II: Of the Nature of Rights, and Their Several Divisions.
• Chapter III: Concerning the Various Degrees of Virtue and Vice, and the Circumstances On Which They Depend.
• Chapter IV: Concerning the Natural Rights of Individuals.
• Chapter V: Of Real Adventitious Rights and Property.
• Chapter VI: The Methods of Acquiring Property.
• Chapter VII: Of Derived Property.
• Chapter VIII: The Methods of Transferring Property, Contracts, Succession, Testaments.
• Chapter IX: Of Contracts In General.
• Chapter X: Our Obligations In Speech.
• Chapter XI: Of Oaths and Vows.
• Chapter XII: Concerning the Values Or Prices of Goods.
• Chapter XIII: Of the Several Sorts of Contracts.
• Chapter XIV: * Obligations Resembling Those From Contracts.
• Chapter XV: Of Rights Arising From Damage Done, and the Rights of War.
• Chapter XVI: Extraordinary Rights In Cases of Necessity, and the Common Rights of Mankind.
• Chapter XVII: How Rights and Obligations Cease: How Controversies Are to Be Decided In Natural Liberty: and the Rules of Interpretation.
• Book III: The Principles of Oeconomicks and Politicks.
• Chapter I: Concerning Marriage.
• Chapter II: The Duties of Parents and Children.
• Chapter III: The Rights of Masters and Servants.
• Chapter IV: The Original of Civil Government.
• Chapter V: The Internal Structure of States: and the Several Parts of Supreme Power.
• Chapter VI: Of the Various Plans of Government.
• Chapter VII: The Rights of the Supreme Power: and the Methods of Acquiring It.
• Chapter VIII: Of Civil Laws and Their Execution.
• Chapter IX: The Laws of War.
• Chapter X: Of Treaties and Ambassadors, and the Entire Dissolution of States.
• Bibliography of Modern Literature

CHAPTER XII

Concerning the Values or Prices of Goods.

I. To maintain any commerce among men in interchanging of goods or services, the values of them must be some way estimated: for no man would give away things of important and lasting use or pleasure in exchange for such as yielded little of either; nor goods which cost much labour in acquiring, for such as can easily be obtained.

The ground of all price must be some fitness in the things to yield some use or pleasure in life; without this, they can be of no value. But this being presupposed, the prices of things will be in a compound proportion of the demand for them, and the difficulty in acquiring them. The demand will be in proportion to the numbers who are wanting them, or their <agreeableness or> necessity to life. The difficulty may be occasioned many ways; if the quantities of them in the world be small; if any accidents make the quantity less than ordinary; if much toil is required in producing them, or much ingenuity, or a more elegant genius in the artists; if the persons employed about them according to the custom of the country are men in high account, and live in a more splendid manner; for the expence of this must be defrayed by the higher profits of their labours{, and few can be thus maintained}.1

Some goods of the highest use, yet have either no price or but a small one. If there’s such plenty in nature that they are acquired almost without any labour, they have no price; if they may be acquired by easy common labour, they are of small price. Such is the goodness of God to us, that the most useful and necessary things are generally very plentiful and easily acquired.

Other things of great use have no price, either because they are naturally destined for community, or cannot come into commerce but as appendages of something else, the price of which may be increased by them, tho’ they cannot be separately estimated;{* } or because some law natural or positive prohibits all buying or selling of them. Of this last sort are all religious offices, actions, or privileges; and even the salaries of religious offices, which are either deemed only what is necessary for the support of persons in such offices, or are committed to their trust as funds of liberality and charity toward the indigent. Buying and selling of such things from a well known piece of history is called simony.

II. But as it may often happen that I want some goods of which my neighbour has plenty, while I have plenty of other goods beyond my own use, and yet he may have no need of any of my superfluous stores; or that the goods I am stored with beyond my occasions, may be quite superior in value to all I want from my neighbour, but my goods cannot be divided into parcels without great loss: for managing of commerce there must some sort of standard goods [outstanding price] be agreed upon; something settled as the measure of value to all others; which must be so generally demanded, that every one will be willing to take it in exchange for other goods, since by it he may obtain whatever he desires. And indeed as soon as any thing is thus made the standard of all values, the demand for it will become universal{, as it will serve every purpose}.

The goods which are made the standard, should have these properties; first, they should be of high value, that so a small portable quantity of them may be equal in value to a great quantity of other things; again, they should not be perishable, or such as wear much in use; and lastly they should admit of all manner of divisions without loss. Now these three properties are found only in the two more rare mettals, silver and gold; which therefor have been made the standards of commerce in all civilized nations.2

III. {At first they have dealt in them by* weight;} but to prevent the trouble of making accurate divisions of the several barrs or pieces of mettal, and to prevent frauds by mixing them with baser mettals, coinage has been introduced. For when the coining of money is committed under proper regulations to trusty hands, there’s security given to all for the quantities of pure mettal in each piece, and any broken sums agreed upon can be exactly paid without any trouble.

But the real value of these mettals and of money too{, like that of all other goods,} is lessened as they are more plentiful; and increase when they grow scarcer{, tho’ the pieces keep the same names}. The common necessaries of life have a more stable natural price, tho’ there are some [not] little changes of their values according to the fruitfulness of the several seasons. Were one to settle perpetual salaries to certain offices, <or secure revenues,> which should support men perpetually in the same station in respect to their neighbours, these {salaries} should be constituted in certain quantities of such necessary goods as depend upon the plain inartificial labours of men, such as grain, or other necessaries in a plain simple way of living.

IV. No state which holds any commerce with its neighbours can at pleasure alter the values of their coin in proportion to that of goods. Foreigners pay regard, not to the names we give, but to the real quantities of pure mettal in our coin, and therefor the rates of goods must be proportioned to these quantities. But after a legal settlement of the denominations of coins, and many contracts and obligations settled in these legal sums or denominations, a decree of state raising the nominal values of the pieces will be a fraud upon all the creditors{, and do much gain to the debtors}; and the lowering their nominal values will have just the contrary effects [will be a fraud upon the debtors].3

The values too of these two mettals may alter their proportions to each other; if an extraordinary quantity of either of them be brought from the mines; or a great consumption made only of one of them in the ornaments of life, or great quantities of it exported. And unless the legal denominations or values of the pieces be changed in like manner, such coin as is valued with us too low in proportion to the natural value of the mettal, will be exported; and what is valued with us too high will remain, or be imported, to the great detriment of the country.

Wheresoever a coinage is made in baser mettals, the quantities in each piece must be made so much the greater; otherways the trade with foreigners must be lost. When notes or tickets pass for money, their value depends on this, that they give good security for the payment of certain sums of gold or silver.

[1. ]See System 2.11.1, pp. 53–54, and Pufendorf, De officio 1.14.4.

[* ]{Examples of these sorts are the air, the light of the sun, wholesome air in certain situations, fine prospects.} [These examples are derived from Pufendorf, De officio 1.14.3.]

[2. ]See Pufendorf, De officio 1.14.8, and System 2.2.2, vol. II, p. 56.

[* ]{This appears both by history, and the Roman word impendere, expendere, &c.} [This added sentence and footnote are derived from System 2.2.2, p. 56 and note.]

[3. ]Hutcheson is much more detailed on the bad effects of any artificial change to the value of money by government in System 2.2.4 and 5, vol. II, pp. 58–62.