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168 ECONOMIC INQUIRIES AND STUDIES
may add, by the consideration which the recent Com-
mittee of the British Association gave to the subject,
and which found the practical difficulties to be such
that we may wait a long time for the adoption of an
official "index number" which can be used even for
the more limited purpose of determining the amount
of deferred annuities-an attainable object, I believe,
but a very different thing from a monetary standard to
be in daily use.
The fourth and final objection is that it is necessary
to a good monetary standard that the thing which is
the standard should itself be the medium in which
payments are made, or that the medium should consist
of currency readily convertible into the thing which is
standard, whereas the proposed standard, consisting
really of quantities of a great many articles, could
never be seen or handled.
For these reasons .Mr. Bagehot came to the con-
clusion that such standards could not be of any use in
practice.
This criticism appears to be altogether so destructive
as to make it unnecessary to go farther, but for practical
purposes I venture to add a few comments of my own,
mainly to enforce one or two elementary lessons about
money which are apt to be lost sight of by students
unacquainted with money market conditions.
First.-Money is not a subject which can be dis-
cussed to much profit from the academical point of
view alone. Matters of theory must of course be
academically considered, but when proposals are made
for practice, the main points which must be thought of
in practice require to be discussed. Mr. \Villiams, to
speak plainly, does not, from this point of view, discuss
the subject at all.
No change in a monetary standard, if it is a tolerably
good one, ought to be proposed or considered unless
upon grounds of overwhelming necessity. For a good
money is so very difficult a thing to get, and Govern-
ments, when they meddle with money, are so apt to