138 PARLIAMENTARY COLBERTISM 
Jemonetised?, The cost, in the difference between the value 
of the defective coin that was accepted, and the new money 
that was issued, amounted to £2,400,000, and this was de- 
frayed by a house and window tax; but the administration 
at once felt the benefit from the improved rates at which 
they could remit money for the expenses of the war. 
The recoinage of 1696 had done away with the evils 
which arose from the existence of a cortupt silver currency; 
but, in so far as the disappearance of silver had been due to 
the high rate which it bore relatively to gold, the recoinage 
had made no difference. “Parliament had indeed called down 
the price of guineas from 30s. to 26s." It was further reduced 
bo 22s, but even at this rate merchants found it worth while 
to import gold, in order to buy English silver for export. 
Locke had maintained that the low rating of gold—which 
kept it from becoming the standard for ordinary payments— 
was in itself advantageous*, but common opinion regarded 
the effects of the arrangement as mischievous. It had been 
part of Lowndes’ scheme for raising the value of silver coins, to 
bring the nominal ratio of gold and silver pieces into closer 
who alse accord with the market rate of gold and silver bullion®. It 
attempted a3 left for Sir Isaac Newton to deal with this problem more 
a thoroughly®; as a consequence, the guinea was called down 
the rating to 21s. in 1717; but events showed that he had not been 
altogether successful in his calculations?, for English silver 
continued to be exported. Important steps were taken to- 
wards the solution of the difficulty in 1774, when there was 
a general recoinage of gold®, and silver coins ceased to be 
legal tender by tale for sums over £25° The demonetisation 
of silver, which was thus begun, was conclusively justified on 
grounds of principle by Lord Liverpool in his Treatise on the 
Coins of the Realm, and was carried out more thoroughly 
A.D. 1689 
—1776. 
L9gW. lc. 2 § 2. 
+ 7and 8 W. III. ¢. 10, § 18. 8 7and 8 W. IIL c. 19, § 12. 
\ Further Considerations concerning raising the Value of Money (1695), 21, 28. 
5 W(illiam) L(owndes), A further Essay for the Amendment of the Gold and 
Silver Coins (1695), p. 11. 
6 Sir Isaac Newton, Mint Reports, in Shaw, Writers on English Monetary 
History, p. 154. 
7 Shaw, History of Currency, 231. 
3 Tord Liverpool, Treatize, 194. 9 14 Geo. ITIL. c. 42, § 2.