If the Law should put down all Silver Money but of such a Weight, then certainly all Money above that Weight would be clipp’d down to it, and every Man must carry a pair of Scales in his Pocket, and we are still subject to the Consequence of the former Paragraph, as that former Paragraph would be to the first Conclusion of this, _viz._ _That all Money would be soon clipp’d down to the publick Standard._
Let the matter be canvas’d never so much, it must at last come to this Conclusion.
_We cannot subsist either in War or Peace if the Coin of_ England _be not speedily regulated_.
CHAP. II. _Of the present_ Scarcity _of Silver Coin in_ England.
Now let us consider, that if all the current Silver Coin of _England_ were passable and unalterable, yet we have vastly too little in Tale for carrying on the Trade of the Nation.
And this will appear several Ways, but chiefly by the high Price or Guineas and the Causes thereof.
Guineas have risen from 21 _s._ 6 _d._ to 30 _s._ either because the intrinsic Value of Gold hath risen near in Proportion to the Diminution of the intrinsic Value of Silver Coin, or by reason of the Scarcity of the Silver Coin, or the Uncertainty of it, or partly by Reason of one, and partly t’other, which I believe is the Truth, that the Badness and Scarcity of Silver Coin hath occasioned an extravagant Rise of Gold.
Now if so much as concerns the Scarcity of Silver be granted me, then I have nothing to do upon this Article, but shew that the present high Price of Gold is dangerous to the Nation, and more dangerous will a farther Advance of the Price thereof be.
And to them who think the Badness of our Coin the greatest Reason of the present high Valuation of Gold, I shall in the mean time say, that if the Price of Gold hath risen, suppose 4 _s._ or 5 _s._ in a Guinea, upon the Account only of the Baseness of our Silver Coin; then in handling that Notion we must look upon Gold not so much a Coin as a Commodity, and so indeed it is at this Present; because the Price of Gold in the Oar or Ingott hath risen almost proportionably to that which is coin’d; so that a Man doth not take a Guinea rather than 29 clipp’d Shillings, because the King’s Impress is upon it; for so ’tis upon the Shillings; or because Authority has made it pass so, for that Authority is wanting; but because it is of a greater intrinsic Value than is in 29 Shillings of clipp’d or counterfeit Money, which is now most current: So that the Valuation of the Commodity Gold hath encreased as the intrinsic Value of our Silver Coin hath decreased.