人自然地会竭力去创造能满足其需要的财物。人的需要繁多,无法脱离他人而独自满足。因此,人必然生活在社会之中,与他人交换彼此劳动的成果。于是,生活在社会中的人,既为自己直接使用(消费)而付出努力,也为交换而付出努力。由于他的需要繁多,他不会把全部努力都用于直接消费,因为他还需要自己所没有的财物。他必须直接受益于他人的努力,例如他对教育、医疗及类似事务的需要。

Man rushes naturally to spend effort in producing the property by which He fulfils his needs. Man’s needs are numerous and He cannot meet them in isolation of other people. Therefore, it becomes inevitable that man lives in a society in which He exchanges with others the products of their efforts. Therefore, man who lives in a society spends his effort to produce both for his direct use (consumption) and for exchange. Because his needs are numerous, He does not spend all his efforts for his direct consumption only, for He is in need of properties which He does not have. It becomes necessary for Him to benefit directly from the efforts of others, as in his need for education and medicine and the like.

因此,人所生产的各种财产,无论种类多么不同、数量多么庞大,都不足以满足他的全部需求。这是因为他无法仅凭自身努力生产出满足所有需求的物品,而必须依靠他人的努力。所以,他必须用自己的努力或财产,去交换他人努力的成果。因此,人与人之间努力的交换是必要的。由于这些努力可以用另一种努力或财产来补偿,就有必要设立一个尺度,用以界定各种努力成果彼此之间的价值,以便进行交换。这一尺度确定了财产的价值,使财产之间、财产与劳动之间得以相互交换。因此,用来界定努力价值的尺度与用来界定财产价值的尺度必须是同一个,以便实现财产与财产之间的交换、财产与努力之间的交换,以及努力与努力之间的交换。

Therefore, the types of properties which man produces, however different and numerous they are, are not enough to fulfil all his needs. This is because He cannot produce by his own effort the things that fulfil all his needs. Rather He must depend on the efforts of others. So He has to exchange his effort or his property with the fruits of the others efforts. Therefore, the exchange of people’s efforts is necessary. Since these efforts may be recompensed by another effort or property it becomes necessary to have a measure that defines the values of all the fruits of efforts, relative to each other, in order that they may be exchanged. This defines the values of properties, so that they can be exchanged with each other or for labour. Therefore it is necessary that the measure used to define the value of efforts, and the measure used to define the value of properties is the same, so as to enable the exchange of properties with each other, the exchange of property with effort and the exchange of effort with effort.