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41.: ricardo to malthus2 - David Ricardo, The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, Vol. 6 Letters 1810-1815 [1810]

Edition used:

The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, ed. Piero Sraffa with the Collaboration of M.H. Dobb (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2005). Vol. 6 Letters 1810-1815.

Part of: The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, 11 vols (Sraffa ed.)

About Liberty Fund:

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41.

ricardo to malthus2

My dear Sir—

I have left you quite free for friday, but I regret that your engagements will not conveniently allow you to come to us on that day. We shall expect you on saturday morning. I hope Mrs. Malthus’ visit will not be deferred longer than the next meeting of the King of Clubs.

It appears to me that you ascribe the difference in the variations of price, which would probably be the effect of doubling the quantity of Coffee, Sugar, and Indigo, on one hand; or of doubling the quantity of the precious metals on the other, to a wrong cause. Coffee, sugar and Indigo are commodities for which, although there would be an increased use, if they were to sink much in value, still as they are not applicable to a great variety of new purposes, the demand would necessarily be limited; not so with gold and silver. These metals exist in a degree of scarcity, and are applicable to a great variety of new uses;—the fall of their price, in consequence of augmented quantity, would always be checked, not only by an increased demand for those purposes to which they had before been applied, but to the want of them for entirely new employments. If they were in sufficient abundance we might even make our tea kettles and saucepans of them. It is to this essential difference between these commodities, and not to the circumstance of one of them being employed as a circulating medium, that I should attribute the different effects which would follow from the augmentation of their quantity. In any point of view however I do not see how it bears materially on the question between us, namely whether the precious metals are frequently resorted to for the payment of debts between countries when no disturbance has taken place in the amount or proportion of the currency.—

I wonder as you do that the stocks have not felt the effects of Mr. Vansittart’s vigorous system. The delay which has taken place in creating new stock; the good news from abroad; and above all the want of reflection in the mass of stockholders may be considered as the cause.

Ever truly Yours

David Ricardo

[2 ]Addressed: ‘To / The Revd. TR Malthus / East India College / Hertford’; postmark, 1813.

MS at Albury.—Letters to Malthus, III, where it is misdated 1810.