mo
“

ON THE NATURE
ducing labour. There is no meaning certainly
in this last proposition, but there is so much of
the appearance of it, that the most cautious in-
vestigator might be led astray by the semblance.

After these critical strictures, it is a plea-
sure to cite a passage from an author, whose
views as to the nature of value appear to me
to be sounder than those of any other writer.

“ Even if a commodity,” says he, “could
be found, which always required the same ex-
penditure for its production, it would not there-
fore be of invariable exchangeable value, so as
to serve as a standard for measuring the value
of other things. Exchangeable value is deter-
mined, not by the absolute, but by the relative
cost of production. If the cost of producing
gold remained the same, while the cost of pro-
ducing all other things should be doubled, then
would gold have a less power of purchasing all
other things than before; or, in other words,
its exchangeable value would fall one half;
and this diminution in its exchangeable value
would be precisely the same in effect, as if the