Essays in Political Economy (Theoretical an Applied Aspects) Chapter 1. Essays on the Gold Question

In submitting to the judgment of the public that portion of the present volume which relates to the economic aspects of the Gold Question we are desirous at the outset to guard ourselves against two possible misapprehensions. In the first place we desire it to be understood that the question discussed in the Essays on that subject is, not the gold discoveries and their consequences, but the much narrower one involved in the economic effects of the increased supplies of gold. The two problems, though to some extent mutually implicated, are substantially distinct. To the one belongs the impulse given to the movement of population, which has resulted in the rapid peopling and definitive settlement of districts that without this stimulus might long have continued the slow and chequered career which up to that time had characterized their march, together with all the social and political consequences which have flowed from that movement both in Europe and in the scenes of the discoveries; to the other, the effects resulting from the increased abundance of money on the industry and trade of nations and the fortunes of individuals: and it is to the -solution of this latter problem alone that the Essays on the Gold Question are addressed.