35
Chapter 1
In order to discover how the elementary expression of the value of a commodity lies hidden in the
value relation of two commodities, we must, in the first place, consider the latter entirely apart
from its quantitative aspect. The usual mode of procedure is generally the reverse, and in the
value relation nothing is seen but the proportion between definite quantities of two different sorts
of commodities that are considered equal to each other. It is apt to be forgotten that the
magnitudes of different things can be compared quantitatively, only when those magnitudes are
expressed in terms of the same unit. It is only as expressions of such a unit that they are of the
same denomination, and therefore commensurable.
17
Whether 20 yards of linen = 1 coat or = 20 coats or = x coats – that is, whether a given quantity of
linen is worth few or many coats, every such statement implies that the linen and coats, as
magnitudes of value, are expressions of the same unit, things of the same kind. Linen = coat is the
basis of the equation.
But the two commodities whose identity of quality is thus assumed, do not play the same part. It
is only the value of the linen that is expressed. And how? By its reference to the coat as its
equivalent, as something that can be exchanged for it. In this relation the coat is the mode of
existence of value, is value embodied, for only as such is it the same as the linen. On the other
hand, the linen’s own value comes to the front, receives independent expression, for it is only as
being value that it is comparable with the coat as a thing of equal value, or exchangeable with the
coat. To borrow an illustration from chemistry, butyric acid is a different substance from propyl
formate. Yet both are made up of the same chemical substances, carbon (C), hydrogen (H), and
oxygen (O), and that, too, in like proportions – namely, C
4
H
8
O
2
. If now we equate butyric acid to
propyl formate, then, in the first place, propyl formate would be, in this relation, merely a form of
existence of C
4
H
8
O
2
;
and in the second place, we should be stating that butyric acid also consists
of C
4
H
8
O
2
. Therefore, by thus equating the two substances, expression would be given to their
chemical composition, while their different physical forms would be neglected.
If we say that, as values, commodities are mere congelations of human labour, we reduce them by
our analysis, it is true, to the abstraction, value; but we ascribe to this value no form apart from
their bodily form. It is otherwise in the value relation of one commodity to another. Here, the one
stands forth in its character of value by reason of its relation to the other.
By making the coat the equivalent of the linen, we equate the labour embodied in the former to
that in the latter. Now, it is true that the tailoring, which makes the coat, is concrete labour of a
different sort from the weaving which makes the linen. But the act of equating it to the weaving,
reduces the tailoring to that which is really equal in the two kinds of labour, to their common
character of human labour. In this roundabout way, then, the fact is expressed, that weaving also,
in so far as it weaves value, has nothing to distinguish it from tailoring, and, consequently, is
abstract human labour. It is the expression of equivalence between different sorts of commodities
that alone brings into relief the specific character of value-creating labour, and this it does by
actually reducing the different varieties of labour embodied in the different kinds of commodities
to their common quality of human labour in the abstract.
18
There is, however, something else required beyond the expression of the specific character of the
labour of which the value of the linen consists. Human labour power in motion, or human labour,
creates value, but is not itself value. It becomes value only in its congealed state, when embodied
in the form of some object. In order to express the value of the linen as a congelation of human
labour, that value must be expressed as having objective existence, as being a something
materially different from the linen itself, and yet a something common to the linen and all other
commodities. The problem is already solved.
36
Chapter 1
When occupying the position of equivalent in the equation of value, the coat ranks qualitatively
as the equal of the linen, as something of the same kind, because it is value. In this position it is a
thing in which we see nothing but value, or whose palpable bodily form represents value. Yet the
coat itself, the body of the commodity, coat, is a mere use value. A coat as such no more tells us it
is value, than does the first piece of linen we take hold of. This shows that when placed in value-
relation to the linen, the coat signifies more than when out of that relation, just as many a man
strutting about in a gorgeous uniform counts for more than when in mufti.
In the production of the coat, human labour power, in the shape of tailoring, must have been
actually expended. Human labour is therefore accumulated in it. In this aspect the coat is a
depository of value, but though worn to a thread, it does not let this fact show through. And as
equivalent of the linen in the value equation, it exists under this aspect alone, counts therefore as
embodied value, as a body that is value. A, for instance, cannot be “your majesty” to B, unless at
the same time majesty in B’s eyes assumes the bodily form of A, and, what is more, with every
new father of the people, changes its features, hair, and many other things besides.
Hence, in the value equation, in which the coat is the equivalent of the linen, the coat officiates as
the form of value. The value of the commodity linen is expressed by the bodily form of the
commodity coat, the value of one by the use value of the other. As a use value, the linen is
something palpably different from the coat; as value, it is the same as the coat, and now has the
appearance of a coat. Thus the linen acquires a value form different from its physical form. The
fact that it is value, is made manifest by its equality with the coat, just as the sheep’s nature of a
Christian is shown in his resemblance to the Lamb of God.
We see, then, all that our analysis of the value of commodities has already told us, is told us by
the linen itself, so soon as it comes into communication with another commodity, the coat. Only it
betrays its thoughts in that language with which alone it is familiar, the language of commodities.
In order to tell us that its own value is created by labour in its abstract character of human labour,
it says that the coat, in so far as it is worth as much as the linen, and therefore is value, consists of
the same labour as the linen. In order to inform us that its sublime reality as value is not the same
as its buckram body, it says that value has the appearance of a coat, and consequently that so far
as the linen is value, it and the coat are as like as two peas. We may here remark, that the
language of commodities has, besides Hebrew, many other more or less correct dialects. The
German “Wertsein,” to be worth, for instance, expresses in a less striking manner than the
Romance verbs “valere,” “valer,” “valoir,” that the equating of commodity B to commodity A, is
commodity A’s own mode of expressing its value. Paris vaut bien une messe. [Paris is certainly
worth a mass]
By means, therefore, of the value-relation expressed in our equation, the bodily form of
commodity B becomes the value form of commodity A, or the body of commodity B acts as a
mirror to the value of commodity A.
19
By putting itself in relation with commodity B, as value in
propriâ personâ, as the matter of which human labour is made up, the commodity A converts the
value in use, B, into the substance in which to express its, A’s, own value. The value of A, thus
expressed in the use value of B, has taken the form of relative value.
(b.) Quantitative determination of Relative value
Every commodity, whose value it is intended to express, is a useful object of given quantity, as 15
bushels of corn, or 100 lbs of coffee. And a given quantity of any commodity contains a definite
quantity of human labour. The value form must therefore not only express value generally, but
also value in definite quantity. Therefore, in the value relation of commodity A to commodity B,
of the linen to the coat, not only is the latter, as value in general, made the equal in quality of the