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Money's the life and soul of mortal man.
Who has it not, nor has acquired it,

Is but a dead man, walking 'mongst the quick.

How greatly everywhere

Prevails the power of the two oboli.

-TIMOCLES

-ARISTOPHANES

Cursed be he above all others
Who's enslaved by love of money.
Money takes the place of brothers,
Money takes the place of parents,

Money brings us war and slaughter.
-ANACREON

What power has law where only money rules ?-PETRONIUS ARBITER.

For the love of money is the root of all evil.-Paul of Tarsus.

'Tis money makes the man; and he who 's none

Is counted neither good nor honorable.

-DIOGENES LAERTIUS

Money alone sets all the world in motion.-PUBLIUS SYRUS.

I . . found him whom I left a foe, my friend.

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What will not money do?

-PLAUTUS

Money, the sinews of war.-CICERO.

There is no sanctuary so holy that money cannot profane it, no fortress so strong that money cannot take it by storm.--CICERO.

Men dig the earth for gold, seed of unnumbered ills. OVID.

Make money, money, man;

Well, if so be, if not, which way you can.

-HORACE

All things, human and divine, renown,
Honor, and worth, at money's shrine bow down.

-HORACE

None questions whence it comes, but come it must.-JUVENAL.

"The beautiful eyes of my money-box!"
He speaks of it as a lover of his mistress.

-MOLIÈRE

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For I did dream of money-bags to-night.-SHAKESPEARE.

If money go before, all ways do lie open.-SHAKESPEARE.

Whilst that for which all virtue now is sold,

And almost every vice-almighty gold.
-BEN JONSON

Money brings honor, friends, conquest, and realms.-MILTON.
Get money, get money still,

And then let virtue follow if she will.

-POPE

But the jingling of the guinea helps the hurt that honor feels.— TENNYSON.

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The measure under consideration affects the people I have the honor to represent more than any question that has come before this Congress. It is a measure cognate with the tariff. By this and kindred acts the money is passed from the Government to the people. Money is as old as civilization and its existence is necessary to society. The use of money is all the advantage there is in having it, yet money makes up in a measure all other wants in man. The greatest want of the commercial and business life of this country today is money. It is needed alike by the merchants, farmers, and laborers. The demand is for more money, and of course it should be of the best.

Money is power, and so acknowledged the world over. It is the force that underlies our civilization and pushes it to the greatest possible activity. Money impels the merchant to his most venturesome daring, the mechanic to exploiting his most inventive genius, the farmer to endure the summer's heat and the winter's cold, and the toiler in every direction to the accomplishment of the most earnest effort for success. The power of money and the hope of its attainment is the incentive to nearly all humanity's most earnest and most honorable exertion.

What, then, is money and what are its uses? It may be stated in general that money is crystallized labor, labor accumulated and massed, and when so accumulated and massed it has the power of

1 Adapted from a speech in the House of Representatives, June 6, 1890, Congressional Record, XXI, Appendix A, p. 347.

labor, or, in other words, money is a medium of exchange created by law by which the value of all commodities produced by labor is represented and exchanged. Labor creates wealth and money represents labor, but the value of money must be fixed by law.

I will repeat that nearly all wealth is produced by labor, and the laborers would possess it if something did not exist to prevent this natural result. In this country, where the reward of labor is greater than in any other, some cause is operating with continued and growing effect to separate production from the producer. It is admitted on every hand that we are the most powerful country on earth; no ancient or modern empire can compare with our Republic in resources or extent. It is occupied by 65,000,000 of bright, brave, free, intelligent, industrious, and energetic people. It is filled with the natural resources of every zone: gold, and silver, and copper, and lead, and iron from the mountains; cattle and sheep from the plains; cotton from the South; corn and wheat from the West.

Our farmers ought to be the most happy and prosperous in the world, as they under the circumstances ought to be the wealthiest. But do the people share in this bounty? Are the laborers of the land satisfied with existing conditions? Are they free from apprehension of the future? Does the farmer find his brow unfurrowed by the plow of care? Are the highways free from tramps and the poorhouses and prisons tenantless? Is the tax-collector driven from the door and want from the home? Alas! no; and what is the reason? Mr. Speaker, the wrong is evident, and as a plain business man I wish to trace what I believe to be the cause to its proper source.

The figures show that there should be $21.75 per capita in circulation, and this may be true, averaging the whole country over, but as a matter of fact there is not $10 per capita in circulation in the West, and I think that amount much too small.

Why is this? Has anyone ever observed any calamity resulting from the circulation of too much money? Is there any locality or era where there was too great activity among the producing classes? I never knew or read of any country where there were too many houses in process of erection, or too plentiful raiment, or too abundant food, nor where transportation of products was too cheap and rapid. Does anyone recognize high prices of labor as leading to disastrous results anywhere? I presume no one would question the fact that if we had more money now in circulation among the people we would have much better times. Who, then, is to blame for the scarcity of

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money? Clearly Congress; and, if so, the Republican party, for the Democratic party has not had full charge of the Government for many years.

The market prices of land, of labor, and of commodities are regulated by the amount of money in circulation. When money is plentiful prices advance, and when money is scarce prices recede. The leading economic thinkers of the nineteenth century agree that a decrease in the quantity will always cause the wages of labor and the prices of land and all commodities to sink in proportion.

The law which experience has graven upon the tablets of time is that values must be measured by money and money must be measured by its own quantity in relation to values.

John Stuart Mill, the greatest economic thinker of Europe, says: "If the whole money in circulation was doubled, the prices would double. If it was only increased one-fourth, prices would rise onefourth."

One of the greatest American writers on this subject has said: "The truth is that the most enormous power ever known to man or that ever can be his lies in money, in the increase or decrease of its quantity." Mr. Speaker, I could furnish a hundred or more of such testimonials if I had the time; but it is wholly unnecessary, as every man who has been in business for the last twenty-five years is a witness for himself; and if he will divest himself of prejudice he will admit the truth of all I say.

(2) MONEY AND THE REGULATION OF TRADE 12. POVERTY AND THE EXPORT OF PRECIOUS METALS' BY MARTIN LUTHER

Foreign merchandise which brings from Calicut and India, and the like places, wares such as precious silks, and jewels, and spices, which serve only love of show and no useful purpose, and drain the land and people of their money, should not be permitted. But I do not propose now to speak of these things; for I think that these things will needs be dropped of themselves finally when our money is all gone, as well as the display and gluttony; indeed, no writing or teaching else will do any good until need and poverty force us.

Adapted from an essay On Trade and Usury (1524). Printed in The Open Court, XI, pp, 17-18. The Oper Court Publishing Company.

God has brought us Germans to that pitch that we must needs scatter our gold and silver into foreign lands, and make all the world rich and ourselves remain beggars. England would indeed have less gold if Germany left her her cloth; and the king of Portugal also would have less, if we left him his spices. Reckon thou how much money is taken out of German land without need or cause in one Frankfort fair, then wilt thou wonder how it comes that there is a penny left in Germany. Frankfort is the silver-and-gold hole through which everything that sprouts and grows among us, or is coined and stamped, runs out of German lands. If this hole were stopped, we perchance would not hear the complaint how on all hands there is nought but debts and no money, and all provinces and cities are burdened and exhausted by interest-paying.

13. THE ADVANTAGE OF A FAVORABLE TRADE

BALANCE'

BY JOSIAH TUCKER

In foreign trade, if one nation pays the other a quantity of gold or silver over and above its property of other kinds, this is called a balance against that nation in favour of the other. And the science of gainful commerce principally consists in the bringing this single point to bear. Now there can be but one general method for putting it in practice; and that is, since gold and silver are become the common measure for computing the value and regulating the price of the commodities or manufactures of both countries, to export larger quantities of our own, and import less of theirs, so that what is wanting in the value of their merchandise, compared with ours, may be paid in gold and silver. The consequence of which will be that these metals will be continually increasing with us, as far as relates to that particular trade and nation, and decreasing with them. And in what proportion soever their money comes into our country, in that proportion it may truly be affirmed that our sailors, freighters, merchants, tradesmen, manufacturers, tenants, landlords, duties, taxes, excises, &c. are paid at their expense.

Or to put the matter in another light: when two countries are exchanging their produce or manufactures with each other, that nation which has the greatest number employed in this reciprocal trade, is

1 Adapted from A Brief Essay on Trade. (London, 1753.) Reprinted in Select Tracts on Commerce.

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