the productive classes are great borrowers, and generally owe [pg 363] larger debts to the unproductive (if we include among the latter all persons not actually in business) than the unproductive classes owe to them, especially if the national debt be included. It is only thus that a general rise of prices can be a source of benefit to producers and dealers, by diminishing the pressure of their fixed burdens. And this might be accounted an advantage, if integrity and good faith were of no importance to the world, and to industry and commerce in particular.
§ 6. Résumé of the subject of money.
Before passing on to another branch of our subject, it may be a gain to clearer ideas to collect in the form of the following classification the main points discussed (in Chaps. IV to X) under money and credit, in continuance of a similar classification of value:
Of these substitutes for money, (1) Use of credit depends not on quality of coin and notes, and (2) Various kinds of credit.