360 Civilization and Decay 



producers to work, such as bankers who loan money 

 wisely, are all themselves to be classed as producers, 

 and often indeed as producers of the most effective 

 kind. 



The great mass of the population consists of pro- 

 ducers ; and in consequence the majority of the sales 

 by producers are sales to other producers. It re- 

 quires one set of producers to make a market for 

 any other set of producers; and in consequence the 

 rise or fall of prices is a good or a bad thing for 

 different bodies of producers according to the differ- 

 ent circumstances of each case. Mr. Adams says 

 that the period from the middle of the twelfth to 

 the middle of the thirteenth centuries was an inter- 

 val of "almost unparalleled prosperity/' which he 

 apparently ascribes to the expansion of the currency, 

 with which, he says, "went a rise in prices, all pro- 

 ducers grew rich, and for more than two genera- 

 tions the strain of competition was so relaxed that 

 the different classes of the population preyed upon 

 each other less savagely than they are wont to do in 

 less happy times." It is not exactly clear how a 

 rise in the prices both of what one producer sells 

 another, and of what he in return buys from that 

 other, can somehow make both of them rich, and re- 

 lax the strain of competition. Certainly in the pres- 

 ent century, competition has been just as severe in 

 times of high prices, and some of the periods of 

 greatest prosperity have coincided with the periods 

 of very low prices. There is reason to believe that 

 low prices are ultimately of great benefit to the wage- 



