And in order to have a really universal equivalent it is necessary that use-value should be eliminated from it, since such an equivalent is required to express not the diverse qualities of all the various commodities, but the relative quantity of embodied human labour which they severally contain.
Paper money is promises to pay gold, which is directly exchangeable with all other commodities.
Paper money, therefore, is merely a symbol of the exchange really effected by gold. It now gives place to the first form of indirect exchange, in which a third term is interposed between the articles which are to be parted with and acquired. Now for the first time the above distinction takes shape. The seller has a commodity which he does not propose to consume, and therefore he acquires with it money, with which money he buys in turn another commodity equal in quantity to that with which he has parted, but different from it in quality. The habit of hoarding which is common amongst ancient societies, and also among barbarous peoples, is a natural concomitant of this stage of exchange, and is the first germ of Capital.