159

I endeavoured in the third chapter to prove tliat the chapter
course of exchange afforded the practical means by which ^ ^^*
money was enabled to discliarge its functions as an uniform
measure; that in every instance where it incidentally
occurred that any one country employed a greater rela¬
tive currency than another, and that the same sum was
temporarily made to measure in the one a less value
than it measured in the other, tlie course of exchange
became unfavourable, and led to the departure of its sur¬
plus specie to rectify the disproportion ; and that the
interruption w^hich this temporary difference in the rela¬
tive amount of their currency occasioned to the uniformity
of mensuration, was the sole cause of the efflux and
influx of money.

I endeavoured in the fourth chapter to prove, that the
fluctuation in the market price of money above and below
its mint price exclusively arose from the same incidental
variation in the relative amount of the currency of diffe¬
rent countries, which caused a temporary departure from
the uniformity of mensuration, and occasioned a greater
quantity of the coin of one country to be given for a less
quantity of the coin of another, to reconcile the disparity.

I endeavoured in the fifth chapter to prove, that when
the coin of any given country ceased to constitute a
common standard, the depreciated coin necessarily became
the prevailing measure.

And I endeavoured in the sixth chapter to prove, that
the collective amount of the specie of this country, upon