definable state, whereas it is a
graduated state, and indefinable. The sovereign in my pocket is
withdrawn from circulation as long as I choose to keep it there. It is
no otherwise withdrawn if I bury it, nor even if I choose to make it,
and others, into a golden cup, and drink out of them; since a rise in
the price of the wine, or of other things, may at any time cause me to
melt the cup and throw it back into currency; and the bullion operates
on the prices of the things in the market as directly, though not as
forcibly, while it is in the form of a cup as it does in the form of a
sovereign. No calculation can be founded on my humour in either case. If
I like to handle rouleaus, and therefore keep a quantity of gold, to
play with, in the form of jointed basaltic columns, it is all one in its
effect on the market as if I kept it in the form of twisted filigree,
or, steadily "amicus lamnae," beat the narrow gold pieces into broad
ones, and dined off them. The probability is greater that I break the
rouleau than that I melt the plate; but the increased probability is not
calculable. Thus, documents are only withdrawn from the currency when
cancelled, and bullion when it is so effectually lost as that the
probability of finding it is no greater than of finding new gold in the
mine.

[41] For example, suppose an active peasant, having got his ground into
good order and built himself a comfortable house, finding time still on
his hands, sees one of his neighbours little able to work, and
ill-lodged, and offers to build him also a house, and to put his land in
order, on condition of receiving for a given period rent for the
building and tithe of the fruits. The offer is accepted, and a document
given promissory of rent and tithe. This note is money. It can only be
good money if the man who has incurred the debt so far recovers his
strength as to be able to take advantage of the help he has received,
and meet the demand of the note; if he lets his house fall to ruin, and
his field to waste, his promissory note will soon be valueless: but the
existence of the note at all is a consequence of his not having worked
so stoutly as the other. Let him gain as much as to be able to pay back
the entire debt; the note is cancelled, and we have two rich
store-holders and no currency.

[42] [You need not trouble yourself to make out the sentence in
parenthesis, unless you like, but do not think it is mere metaphor. It
states a fact whi