Ricardo's critique of Bentham's French manuscript: Secure currency versus secure banks

<title>Abstract</title> After David Ricardo had argued against it, Jeremy Bentham's manuscript <italic>Sur les prix</italic> was never published. Our paper deals with the reasons of that disagreement. After having told the story of the manuscript, we compare its content and the critiques on both the positive analysis of the observed monetary situation and the normative analysis of an ideal monetary system. We show the theoretical divergence between two conceptions of money, Ricardo advocating a secure currency while Bentham favored secure banks. We conclude that Bentham's manuscript and Ricardo's comments may add to the present knowledge about these authors and classical monetary theory.