Part 7

That if our English Money will pass in any other Country for as much as it doth here, ’tis impracticable to hinder the Exportation of it.

CHAP. VI. Of melting down the current Coyn of England by our Goldsmiths and other Artificers.

Another great grievance of the Nation in the matters of Coyn may be thought the melting of it down.

This hath been a vile and great practice for many Years.

The Criminals have been under two temptations:

1. The inequality of the Mint in all the hammered money; some milled Pieces were of more Intrinsick than Extrinsick Value, and some of less, so that in culling out of the bigest, they made an evident advantage.

But that sort of money being almost all gone and never like to be coyned again, I shall altogether wave the consideration of it.

2. The other Temptation is the great Intrinsick Value of our mill’d money, most of which was coyn’d when Silver was 5 s. 2 d. 5 s. 4 d. or 5 s. 6 d. per ounce, and the price of Silver rising, a Crown piece has now the intrinsick value of 6 s. or thereabouts, this is a mighty temptation to melt it down.

Titius owes Sempronius 10 l. and pays him in mill’d money, Sempronius owes a third man as much, but first melts it down and sells it to a Goldsmith for 12 l. and so puts 40 s. in his Pocket. This might have been prevented you’ll say before all the mill’d money was gone; by crying down all other money, for if the Goldsmiths had given 12 l. in mill’d money for an Ingot melted out of ten Pounds, they must at length have been ruined; and therefore the Crying down all other money must have brought down the price of Silver necessarily, or none could have been sold.

If 5 s. melted down would not have yielded a Crown Piece, who would have melted ’em; and if they would have yielded more, the money of the Nation how much soever must soon have vanished, for more could not have been coyn’d, till the price of Silver should fall: But how could the price of Silver have fallen so low in England, as not to be worth any mans while to melt down the milled money, if Silver should at the same time of its melting bear an higher price in other Countries than it did here at the time of its Coyning: So that the Coyning down of base money would at any time have been so far from helping us, that it would have immediately ruined us, it being impossible to Coyn more upon the old Standard, if the price of Silver is higher beyond Sea than it was when that old Standard was Coyned: And ’twill be impossible for us to Coyn new money after the old Standard (till we can bring down the Foreign Price of Silver) so fast as it will be melted down.

To make this plain upon which so much depends, put the Case thus.

Suppose you called in by compulsion and Coyned all the Plate of England, and suppose it never so many Millions, and all after the old Standard, when the Plate is all gone people will have more Plate, and Silversmiths must still have work, and Goldsmiths their Trade, unless by prohibiting the use of silver Plate we proclaim an hypocritical Beggary to all the world, and ruin many thousand Families of Artisans. The Silver then of which you coyn your new Plate must come from abroad, or be procured out of your money.

The Goldsmith will go the cheaper way to work, and rather than he’ll give 5 s. 10 d. to a Merchant for an ounce of Plate, he’ll fling in a Crown and 6 d. into the melting Pot, and though the Laws against melting down Coyn be never so severe yet people will venture any thing for gain, as you may see Clippers do daily; especially if their Consciences don’t check ’em, and few mens Consciences will scruple making the most of their own.

And as the accurate Mr. Lowndes observes, notwithstanding ever since Ed. 3d’s. time prohibitory Laws have been against melting down Coyn, pag. 68. and the profit of melting it sometimes very inconsiderable, pag. 69. the practice hitherto was never prevented. But it may be said money shall be coyned of an intrinsick value or near thereabouts (Coynage only allowed) in proportion to the present value of Silver, be it more or less as it shall alter from time to time, and so the abatement for Coynage shall always keep the Estimate of the Coyn above the Intrinsick value of the Silver, but instead of bringing remedy this will make the Case tentimes worse, for then upon every rise of Silver the Goldsmiths and others will melt down all that was Coyn’d at a lower Price, and if the form of the Coyn don’t direct ’em to be dextrous, the Prentices shall follow the old Trade of weighing money Night and Day too.

So that without going farther upon this Topick, I may lay it down as a Conclusion or Maxim.

That if the Intrinsick Value of Coyn be subject to alteration the Coyn is always in danger of being melted down.

CHAP. VII. Of Hoarding up of the Silver Coyn.

People who have several uneasinesses upon ’em at one and the same time, are very apt to attribute ’em all to one, which is the most hated, the most invidious, or at least the most visible cause, though in reality every one may have sprung from a several and very different root.

Thus our present War with France is to some few people odious, to many invidious, and to all visible, and this therefore must be the cause of all National Calamities.

Whereas many things are better with us now than if we had no War; a frequency of Parliaments, an universal vigilance, a care of Shiping; a choice of able Ministers, (and not unskilful Favorites in most places of greatest Trust;) an intire Allyance with the most useful Neighbours; an honest imployment for all dissolute Men; an honourable provision for younger Sons of Gentlemen; a perfect understanding between the King and his People; an almost total desistance from an unreasonable and disadvantageous Commerce with France; a more brotherly Correspondence with the Dissenters (being all equally engaged in the Publick danger). We have great Honour by the Bravery of our Arms, and the most important assistance we give to all Christendom against French and Turk. Our King is become the Generalissimo of Europe, and his Fleet give Laws in all Seas.

These and many more to the better part of the Nation are the advantages of this necessary tho’ expensive War.

But there are some that look upon it with an evil eye, and then the badness of money, and the scarcity of it, and the Exporting and melting down, and hoarding it, and the rise of Gold, and the dearness of Commodities, and the badness of Trade are all as evident effects of the War as the Taxes are.

Though in truth this is all Humour and Caprice, and none of it more ridiculous than when the hoarding up of Money is imputed to the War, which is the meer effect of the dearness of Silver, as the dearness of Silver in England is the natural effect of its dearness abroad, and its dearness abroad to the obstructions of Trade, which would be if only France and Spain were at War, since Spain is the Silver Market of the whole World.

Ever since the extraordinary abasement of Coyn by an unparalleled Counterfeit and Clipping, people have hoarded up Money apace, not knowing how far the debasement would run; and fearing if they put their good Money out they should at the long run be forced to be paid back in they know not what themselves.

Nor hath the beauty and rarity of uncorrupted and undiminished Coyn, added a little to the humour of hoarding it up.

Undefaced and weighty pieces are now as so many Medals, people think it a great happiness to have a store of ’em. And as the Coyn degenerates these are more charily preserved, and will be so till the intrinsick value of ’em diminishes. I could give a shrewd guess where this weighty Money is to be found in great quantities, but be it where it will as I said before, I think every man hath a right do what he will with his own, so far as it is his own.

All that I at present aim at is to show.

That Coyn which hath an Intrinsick value above the Extrinsick, and is withall rare or uncommon will inevitably be hoarded up, and continue so to be.