In Buchan's view, money is civilizations's greatest invention. All manner of things can be called money, and almost every culture has given money an ideal existence. Even so, Buchan points out, "money, which we see and hold every day, is diabolically hard to comprehend in words." It is this very elusiveness that is at the root of money's power to seduce.

As Buchan explains, money is "frozen desire" - and because money can fulfill any mortal purpose, for many people the pursuit of money becomes the point of life.

In a learned and elegant survey, Buchan illuminates the many different views of money across the centuries. Money was a subject in Homer and Herodotus. The Gospels glitter with money. The New World was colonized by men in search of money. The Age of Faith was followed by our present Age of Money, which, like the Age of Faith, is bound to end; and it was fear of the end that led to widespread panic after the stock market crashed in 1929 and 1987.

Whether or not money is humanity's greatest invention, its meanings reveal a great deal about human nature; in showing us what we think of money, James Buchan shows us who we are.