mint price. Since that reformation, the market
price has been constantly below the mint
price. But that market price is the same
whether it is paid in gold or in silver coin.
The late reformation of the gold coin, therefore,
has raised not only the value of the gold
coin, but likewise that of the silver coin in
proportion to gold bullion, and probably, too,
in proportion to all other commodities; though
the price of the greater part of other commodities
being influenced by so many other
causes, the rise in the value of either gold or
silver coin in proportion to them may not be
so distinct and sensible.
In the English mint, a pound weight of
standard silver bullion is coined into sixty-two
shillings, containing, in the same manner, a
pound weight of standard silver. Five shillings
and twopence an ounce, therefore, is said
to be the mint price of silver in England, or
the quantity of silver coin which the mint
gives in return for standard silver bullion.
Before the reformation of the gold coin, the
market price of standard silver bullion was,
upon different occasions, five shillings and
fourpence, five shillings and fivepence, five
shillings and sixpence, five shillings and sevenpence,
and very often five shillings and eightpence
an ounce. Five shillings and sevenpence,
however, seems to have been the most
common price. Since the reformation of the
gold coin, the market price of standard silver
bullion has fallen occasionally to five shillings
and threepence, five shillings and fourpence,
and five shillings and fivepence an ounce,
which last price it has scarce ever exceeded.
Though the market price of silver bullion has
fallen considerably since the reformation of
the gold coin, it has not fallen so low as the
mint price.
In the proportion between the different metals
in the English coin, as copper is rated very
much above its real value, so silver is rated
somewhat below it. In the market of Europe,
in the French coin and in the Dutch coin, an
ounce of fine gold exchanges for about fourteen
ounces of fine silver. In the English
coin, it exchanges for about fifteen ounces,
that is, for more silver than it is worth, according
to the common estimation of Europe.
But as the price of copper in bars is not, even
in England, raised by the high price of copper
in English coin, so the price of silver in
bullion is not sunk by the low rate of silver
in English coin. Silver in bullion still preserves
its proper proportion to gold, for the
same reason that copper in bars preserves its
proper proportion to silver.
Upon the reformation of the silver coin, in
the reign of William III., the price of silver
bullion still continued to be somewhat above
the mint price. Mr Locke imputed this high
price to the permission of exporting silver bullion,
and to the prohibition of exporting silver
coin. This permission of exporting, he said,
rendered the demand for silver bullion greater
than the demand for silver coin. But the
number of people who want silver coin for the
common uses of buying and selling at home,
is surely much greater than that of those who
want silver bullion either for the use of exportation
or for any other use. There subsists at
present a like permission of exporting gold bullion,
and a like prohibition of exporting gold
coin; and yet the price of gold bullion has
fallen below the mint price. But in the English
coin, silver was then, in the same manner
as now, under-rated in proportion to gold;
and the gold coin (which at that time, too,
was not supposed to require any reformation)
regulated then, as well as now, the real value
of the whole coin. As the reformation of the
silver coin did not then reduce the price of
silver bullion to the mint price, it is not very
probable that a like reformation will do so
now.
Were the silver coin brought back as near
to its standard weight as the gold, a guinea,
it is probable, would, according to the present
proportion, exchange for more silver in coin
than it would purchase in bullion. The silver
coin containing its full standard weight, there
would in this case, be a profit in melting it
down, in order, first to sell the bullion for
gold coin, and afterwards to exchange this
gold coin for silver coin, to be melted down
in the same manner. Some alteration in the
present proportion seems to be the only method
of preventing this inconveniency.
The inconveniency, perhaps, would be less,
if silver was rated in the coin as much above
its proper proportion to gold as it is at present
rated below it, provided it was at the same time
enacted, that silver should not be a legal tender
for more than the change of a guinea, in
the same manner as copper is not a legal tender
for more than the change of a shilling.
No creditor could, in this case, be cheated in
consequence of the high valuation of silver in
coin; as no creditor can at present be cheated
in consequence of the high valuation of copper.
The bankers only would suffer by this
regulation. When a run comes upon them,
they sometimes endeavour to gain time, by
paying in sixpences, and they would be precluded
by this regulation from this discreditable
method of evading immediate payment.
They would be obliged, in consequence, to
keep at all times in their coffers a greater
quantity of cash than at present; and though
this might, no doubt, be a considerable inconveniency
to them, it would, at the same time,
be a considerable security to their creditors.
Three pounds seventeen shillings and tenpence
halfpenny (the mint price of gold) certainly
does not contain, even in our present
excellent gold coin, more than an ounce of
standard gold, and it may be thought, therefore,
should not purchase more standard bullion.
But gold in coin is more convenient
than gold in bullion; and though, in England,