Others maintain that coined money is a mere sham, a thing not
natural, but conventional only, because, if the users substitute
another commodity for it, it is worthless, and because it is not
useful as a means to any of the necessities of life, and, indeed, he
who is rich in coin may often be in want of necessary food. But how
can that be wealth of which a man may have a great abundance and yet
perish with hunger, like Midas in the fable, whose insatiable prayer
turned everything that was set before him into gold?
Hence men seek after a better notion of riches and of the art of
getting wealth than the mere acquisition of coin, and they are
right. For natural riches and the natural art of wealth-getting are
a different thing; in their true form they are part of the
management of a household; whereas retail trade is the art of
producing wealth, not in every way, but by exchange. And it is thought
to be concerned with coin; for coin is the unit of exchange and the
measure or limit of it. And there is no bound to the riches which
spring from this art of wealth getting. As in the art of medicine
there is no limit to the pursuit of health, and as in the other arts
there is no limit to the pursuit of their several ends, for they aim
at accomplishing their ends to the uttermost (but of the means there
is a limit, for the end is always the limit), so, too, in this art
of wealth-getting there is no limit of the end, which is riches of the
spurious kind, and the acquisition of wealth.
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