CHAPTER XL

ON THE CAUSES OF VALUE,

IT may seem, that an inquiry into the causes of
value should have had an earlier place in the
present treatise ; but it is in reality the natural
method of proceeding to make ourselves acquainted
 with the nature of an effect, before we
attempt to investigate its causes. Although, in
point of time, a cause must precede its effect,
yet in the order of our knowledge the case is
commonly reversed, and we ascend from the
phenomena before us to the active principles
concerned in their production.

Our first object in this investigation must be
to ascertain what is really meant by a cause of
value, or what is its true nature, that we may
have some criterion which will show us, on the