146 ADAM SMITH. 



As society improves the demand of the market may 

 increase, while the produce of the mines remains the 

 same; or the produce may increase more than the 

 demand increases ; or the produce and demand may in- 

 crease together and equably. In the first case, the 

 money price of goods will fall, and the mine become 

 more valuable ; in the second, the money price will rise, 

 and the mine fall in value ; in the third case, the money 

 price of goods will remain stationary, and with it the 

 value of the mine. By the value of the mine, we, of 

 course, mean the value of the same amount of its produce 

 in the several cases. 



This leads Dr. Smith to enter at great length into the 

 important question, how far the value of silver, the 

 general medium of exchange in the market of the world, 

 has varied at different periods during the four last cen- 

 turies. 



(1.) The first period is from 1350 to 1570, and he 

 shows that the increased supply from the discovery of 

 America could not have sensibly affected the value of 

 silver during these two centuries. The progress of com- 

 merce of all kinds, internal and external, must have been 

 the retarding cause, which prevented the influx of the 

 additional quantity of metal from sensibly raising the 

 money price of commodities. 



(2.) From 1570 to 1640 the newly discovered mines 

 produced their full effect in raising all the prices, and 

 lowering the exchangeable value of silver. That effect 

 was completed between the years 1630 and 1640. 

 Prices had then risen to between three and four times 

 their former rate, although the increase of commerce had 

 increased also the demand for the metallic currency. 



