such men, observe, that you must never use the terms "money" and "wealth"
as synonymous. Wealth consists of the good, and therefore useful, things
in the possession of the nation; money is only the written or coined sign
of the relative quantities of wealth in each person's possession. All
money is a divisible title-deed, of immense importance as an expression
of right to property, but absolutely valueless as property itself. Thus,
supposing a nation isolated from all others, the money in its possession
is, at its maximum value, worth all the property of the nation, and no
more, because no more can be got for it. And the money of all nations
is worth, at its maximum, the property of all nations, and no more, for
no more can be got for it. Thus, every article of property produced
increases, by its value, the value of all the money in the world, and
every article of property destroyed, diminishes the value of all the
money in the world. If ten men are cast away on a rock, with a thousand
pounds in their pockets, and there is on the rock, neither food nor
shelter, their money is worth simply nothing, for nothing is to be had
for it. If they built ten huts, and recover a cask of biscuit from the
wreck, then their thousand pounds, at its maximum value, is worth ten
huts and a cask of biscuit. If they make their thousand pounds into two
thousand by writing new notes, their two thousand pounds are still worth
ten huts and a cask of biscuit. And the law of relative value is the
same for all the world, and all the people in it, and all their property,
as for ten men on a rock. Therefore, money is truly and finally lost in
the degree in which its value is taken from it (ceasing in that degree to
be money at all); and it is truly gained in the degree in which value is
added to it. Thus, suppose the money coined by the nation be a fixed
sum, and divided very minutely (say into francs and cents), and neither
to be added to nor diminished. Then every grain of food and inch of
lodging added to its possessions makes every cent in its pockets worth
proportionally more, and every gain of food it consumes, and inch of roof