mariners had decoded the last great secrets of the planetary wind machine, allowing them to cross the vast expanses of the world’s oceans with relative ease. By 1650, goods of all kinds and people of all nations ranged over most of the globe. Third, the discovery of huge silver deposits in Peru and Mexico produced a new global monetary system (along with a fearsome inflation caused by the coining of too much silver money). The most common piece of currency, the Spanish eight-real coin, was as ubiquitous as the American hundred-dollar bill and the Visa card are today. Fourth, the seventeenth
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