326 EEl'OKT— 1891. 



nebulae, out of which detailed schemes are formed," or, as the 

 classic legend, transferred to the entablature of a gasworks in 

 England, runs, c,r/«7/to dare lucem. From the smoke that I 

 endeavour to raise to-day I encourage myself to believe that 

 some light may be evolved. 



I ask at this stage of the proceedings to be allowed to over- 

 look the huckstering process of money-changing, sometimes 

 called "money-making," in which the uppermost, and so often 

 the only, question is, " How much shall I gain in this transac- 

 tion from the labour of others?" I propose to consider, 

 briefly as I must, and as clearly as I can, that essential ques- 

 tion in social economics, the dynamic agency of money, as con- 

 tributing to the comfort and well-being of "all sorts and con- 

 ditions of men." With this view, I must not raise myself, as 

 if to the apex of the social pyramid, by means of a balloon, 

 only to descend more quickly than I went up ; but begin where 

 the builders do — on the bed-rock — and, by a steady aim, raise 

 the superstructure. I must discover where the use of money 

 first comes in as an aid to labour and in the necessary distribu- 

 tion of the products of labour. It goes without saying that 

 the sole source of human activity is the food-supply, and the 

 maximum of result is obtained when every member of the 

 human family is usefully employed, each one according to his 

 ability — a quantity continually to be increased by the exercise 

 of proper technical instruction. I ask that the total food- 

 supply of the population of the world shall be taken as a unit, 

 and that the sources whence it is obtained shall be noted. 

 This total supply is gained from the soil and from the sea by 

 no other means than by the output of human labour, and 

 ought, from year to year, to be equal to the sustenance of each 

 individual for the entire period. If each individual were so 

 located that he planted upon and gathered from the land or 

 gained from the sea his own food and no more, and was con- 

 tent to make his own clothing and construct his own dwelling 

 from materials raised or gathered by himself, there would be 

 no place for money, as no exchange of commodities would be 

 needed. But the instant any one, A, of the millions of human 

 beings desires to have something — say the product of a day's 

 labour — of another, he begins to bargain for exchange by offer- 

 ing something that he can spare for the article that he wishes 

 to have. It may happen that his neighbour, B, does not want 

 the proffered article in exchange for what A desires. Not- 

 withstanding, B supplies A with the commodity he asks for, 

 and receives a token, bearing the value of a day's labour on its 

 face, as representing the cost of the article that B has given to 

 A. By-and-by B desires to have from C something that cost 

 him a similar outlay of labour, and he passes over to C the 

 token he had received from A in payment. It is a recognised 



