"This Emperor (of Cattay or China)may dispende ols muche as he wile withouten estymacion.For he despendethe not,nor makethe no money,but of lether emprendeth,or of papyre.And when that money hathe ronne so longe that it begynethe to waste,then men beren it to the Emperoure Tresorye,and then they taken newe Money for the old.And that money gothe thorghe out all the contree,and thorge out all his Provynces....They make no money nouther of Gold nor of Sylver",and Mandeville adds,"therefore he may despende ynew and outrageously."[8.]Benjamin Franklin,Remarks and Facts Relative to the American Paper Money ,1764,op.cit.,p.348:"At this very time,even the silver money in England is obliged to the legal tender for part of its value;that part which is the difference between its real weight and its denomination.
Great part of the shillings and sixpences now current are by wearing become 6,10,20,and some of the sixpences even 50%,too light.For this difference between the real and the nominal you have no intrinsic value;you have not so much as paper,you have nothing.It is the legal tender,with the knowledge that it can easily be repassed for the same value,that makes three pennyworth of silver pass for a sixpence."[9.]Berkeley,op.cit.[p.81."Whether the denominations being retained,although the bullion were gone ...might not nevertheless ...a circulation of cornmerce (be)maintained?"Money Karl Marx's A CONTRIBUTION TO THE CRITIQUE OF POLITICAL ECONOMYMoney Money as distinguished from coin is the result of the circuit C--M --C and constitutes the starting point of the circuit M --C --M,that is the exchange of money for commodities so as to exchange commodities for money.In the form C --M --C it is the commodity that is the beginning and the end of the transaction;in the form M --C --M it is money.Money mediates the exchange of commodities in the first circuit,the commodities mediates the evolution of money into money in the second circuit.Money,which serves solely as a medium in the first circuit,appears as the goal of circulation in the second,whereas the commodity,which was the goal in the first circuit,appears simply as a means in the second.Because money itself is already the result of the circuit C --M --C,the result of circulation appears to be also its point of departure in the form M--C --M.The exchange of material is the content of C --M --C,whereas the real content of the second circuit,M --C --M,is the commodity in the form in which it emerged from the first circuit.
In the formula C --M --C the two extremes are commodities of the same value,which are at the same time however qualitatively different use-values.
Their exchange,C --C,is real exchange of material.On the other hand,in the formula M --C --M both extremes are gold and moreover gold of the same value.But it seems absurd to exchange gold for commodities in order to exchange commodities for gold,or if one considers the final result M --M,to exchange gold for gold.But if one translates M --C --M into the formula --to buy in order to sell ,which means simply to exchange gold for gold with the aid of an intermediate movement,one will immediately recognise the predominant form of bourgeois production.
Nevertheless,in real life people do not buy in order to sell,but they buy at a low price in order to sell at a high price.They exchange money for commodities in order then to exchange these for a larger amount of money,so that the extremes M,M are quantitatively different,even if not qualitatively.This quantitative difference presupposes the exchange of non-equivalents,whereas commodities and money as such are merely antithetical forms of the commodity,in other words,different forms of existence of the same value.Money and commodity in the circuit M --C--M therefore imply more advanced relations of production,and within simple circulation the circuit is merely a reflection of movement of a more complex character.Hence money as distinct from the medium of circulation must be derived from C --M --C,the immediate form of commodity circulation.
Gold,i.e.,the specific commodity which serves as standard of value and medium of circulation,becomes money without any special effort on the part of society.Silver has not become money in England,where it is neither the standard of value nor the predominant medium of circulation,similarly gold ceased to be money in Holland as soon as it was deposed from its position of standard of value.In the first place,a commodity in which the functions of standard of value and medium of circulation are united accordingly becomes money,or the unity of standard of value and medium of circulation is money.
But as such a unity gold in its turn possesses an independent existence which is distinct from these two functions.As the standard of value gold is merely nominal money and nominal gold;purely as a medium of circulation it is symbolic money and symbolic gold,but in its simple metallic corporeality gold is money or money is real gold.
Let us for a moment consider the commodity gold,that is money,in a state of rest and its relations with other commodities.All prices of commodities signify definite amounts of gold;they are thus merely notional gold or notional money,i.e.,symbols of gold,just as,on the other hand,money considered as a token of value appeared to be merely a symbol of the prices of commodities.[1]Since all commodities are therefore merely notional money,money is the only real commodity.Gold is the material aspect of abstract wealth in contradistinction to commodities which only represent the independent form of exchange-value,of universal social labour and of abstract wealth.
