He appreciated something of the function of exchange in society. It performed a very important service, as a mediator between producer and consumer.211 Like money, it served to equalize values, and thus acted as an aid to the satisfaction of needs.212 When limited to this primary function, it was of advantage to both parties to the exchange,213 and merchants and retailers had then a real part in the production of values.214
The sweeping assertion is too often made that the Greek people were hostile to trade, and therefore that their theorists were especially opposed to it. We have already seen how false this idea is for the Greeks themselves,215 but it also needs a great deal of qualification in the case of their writers.
Their hostility is directed especially against the more petty business of retail trade (καπηλική) rather than against the extensive operations of the merchant (ἔμπορος). But their opposition even to this is not entirely undiscriminating.
We have seen that Plato clearly understands the necessity of exchange to the life of the state.216 He admits that even retail trade is not necessarily evil.217 The chief reason why it appears so is because it gives free opportunity for the vulgar greed of unlimited gain, which is innate in man.218 If the noblest citizens, who are governed by rational interests, should become retailers and innkeepers, the business would soon be held in honor.219
Plato, however, would limit exchange to its primary function as defined above.220 Like Ruskin, he believes that, whenever it is pursued merely for private gain, it becomes a source of degeneration to individual and state. It is