BOOK I. 17 



although these attacks against gold and silver may be directed especially 

 against money, yet inasmuch as the Poets one after another condemn it, 

 their criticism must be met, and this can be done by one argument alone. 

 Money is good for those who use it well ; it brings loss and evil to those who 

 use it ill. Hence, very rightly, Horace says : 



" Dost thou not know the value of money ; and what uses it serves ? 



It buys bread, vegetables, and a pint of wine." 

 And again in another place : 



" Wealth hoarded up is the master or slave of each possessor ; it 



should follow rather than lead, the ' twisted rope.' " 23 



When ingenious and clever men considered carefully the system of barter, 

 which ignorant men of old employed and which even to-day is used by 

 certain uncivilised and barbarous races, it appeared to them so troublesome 

 and laborious that they invented money. Indeed, nothing more useful 

 could have been devised, because a small amount of gold and silver is of as 

 great value as things cumbrous and heavy ; and so peoples far distant from one 

 another can, by the use of money, trade very easily in those things which 

 civilised life can scarcely do without. 



The curses which are uttered against iron, copper, and lead have no 

 weight with prudent and sensible men, because if these metals were done 

 away with, men, as their anger swelled and their fury became unbridled, 

 would assuredly fight like wild beasts with fists, heels, nails, and teeth. 

 They would strike each other with sticks, hit one another with stones, or 

 dash their foes to the ground. Moreover, a man does not kill another with 

 iron alone, but slays by means of poison, starvation, or thirst. He may 

 seize him by the throat and strangle him ; he may bury him ah' ve in the 

 ground ; he may immerse him in water and suffocate him ; he may burn 

 or hang him ; so that he can make every element a participant in the death 

 of men. Or, finally, a man may be thrown to the wild beasts. Another 

 may be sewn up wholly except his head in a sack, and thus be left to be 

 devoured by worms ; or he may be immersed in water until he is torn to 

 pieces by sea-serpents. A man may be boiled in oil ; he may be greased, 

 tied with ropes, and left exposed to be stung by flies and hornets ; he may 

 be put to death by scourging with rods or beating with cudgels, or struck 

 down by stoning, or flung from a high place. Furthermore, a man 

 may be tortured in more ways than one without the use of metals ; as when 

 the executioner burns the groins and armpits of his victim with hot wax ; 

 or places a cloth in his mouth gradually, so that when in breathing he 

 draws it slowly into his gullet, the executioner draws it back suddenly and 

 violently ; or the victim's hands are fastened behind his back, and he is 

 drawn up little by little with a rope and then let down suddenly. Or 

 similarly, he may be tied to a beam and a heavy stone fastened by a 

 cord to his feet, or finally his limbs may be torn asunder. From these 

 examples we see that it is not metals that are to be condemned, but our 

 vices, such as anger, cruelty, discord, passion for power, avarice, and lust. 



"Horace. Satires, I., 1. 73 ; and Epistle, i., 10, 1. 47. 



