specific commodity which serves as a measure of value and a medium of circulation, becomes money without any further assistance on the part of society. In England, where silver is neither the measure of value nor the prevailing medium of circulation, it does not become money, just as gold in Holland, as soon as it had been dethroned as a measure of value, ceased to be money. A commodity thus becomes money only in its combined capacity of a measure of value and medium of circulation; or, the unity of the measure of value and medium of circulation is money. As such a unity, however, gold has a separate existence independent of its existence in the two functions. As a measure of value it is only ideal money and ideal gold; as a mere medium of circulation it is symbolic money and symbolic gold; but in its plain metallic bodily form gold is money or money is real
Let us now consider for a moment the commodity gold when it is in a state of rest, and plays the part of money in its relation to other commodities. All commodities