uncoined gold or silver in the mass.

Those metals are called so, either when melted from the native ore, and not perfectly refined; or when they are perfectly refined, but melted down in bars or ingots, or in any unwrought body, of any degree of fineness.

When gold and silver are in their purity, they are so soft and flexible, that they cannot well be brought into any fashion for use, without being first reduced and hardened with an alloy of some other baser metal.

To prevent these abuses which some might be tempted to commit in the making of such alloys, the legislators of civilized countries have ordained, that there shall be no more than a certain proportion of a baser metal to a particular quantity of pure gold or silver, in order to make them of the fineness of what is called the standard gold or silver of such a country.

According to the laws of England, all sorts of wrought plate in general ought to be made to the legal standard; and the price of our standard gold and silver is the common rule whereby to set a value on their bullion, whether the same be ingots, bars, dust, or foreign specie: whence it is easy to conceive that the value of bullion cannot be exactly known, without being first assayed, that the exact quantity of pure metal therein contained may be determined, and consequently whether it be above or below the standard. Silver and gold, whether coined or uncoined (though used for a common measure of other things), are no less a commodity than wine, tobacco, or cloth; and may, in many cases, be exported as much to the national advantage as any other commodity.