IX. LANDED PROPERTY…

IX. LANDED PROPERTY

If the leading idea of this work is well founded, the relations of mankind with the external world must be viewed in this way:

God created the earth. On it, and within it, he has placed a multitude of things which are useful to man, inasmuch as they are adapted to satisfy his wants.

God has, besides, endued matter with forces—gravitation, elasticity, porosity, compressibility, heat, light, electricity, crystallization, vegetable life.

He has placed man in the middle of these materials and forces, which he has delivered over to him gratuitously.

Men set themselves to exercise their activity upon these materials and forces; and in this way they render service to themselves. They also work for one another, and in this way render reciprocal services. These services, compared by the act of exchange, give rise to the idea of Value, and Value to that of Property.

Each man, then, becomes an owner or proprietor in proportion to the services he has rendered. But the materials and forces given by God to man gratuitously, at the beginning, have continued gratuitous, and are and must continue to be so through all our transactions; for in the estimates and appreciations to which exchange gives rise, the ‹equivalents› are ‹human services›, not the ‹gifts of God›.

Hence it follows that no human being, so long as transactions are free, can ever cease to be the usufructuary of these gifts. A single condition is laid down, which is, that we shall execute the labour necessary to make them available to us, or, if any one makes this exertion for us, that we make for him an equivalent exertion.

If this account of the matter be true, Property is indeed unassailable. [p250]

The universal instinct of mankind, more infallible than the lucubrations of any individual, had adopted this view of the subject without refining upon it, when theory began to scrutinize the foundations of Property.

Theory unhappily began in confusion, mistaking Utility for Value, and attributing an inherent ‹value›, independent of all human service, to the materials or forces of nature. From that moment property became unintelligible, and incapable of justification.

For utility is the relation between commodities and our organization. It necessarily implies neither efforts, nor transactions, nor comparisons. We can conceive of it ‹per se›, and in relation to man in a state of isolation. Value, on the contrary, is a relation of man to man. To exist at all, it must exist in duplicate. Nothing isolated can be compared. Value implies that the person in possession of it does not transfer it except for an equivalent value. The theory, then, which confounds these two ideas, takes for granted that a person, in effecting an exchange, gives pretended value of natural creation for true value of human creation, utility which exacts no labour for utility which does exact it; in other words, that he can profit by the labour of another without working himself. Property, thus understood, is called first of all a ‹necessary monopoly›, then simply a ‹monopoly›,—then it is branded as ‹illegitimate›, and last of all as ‹robbery›.

Landed Property receives the first blow, and so it should. Not that natural agents do not bear their part in all manufactures, but these agents manifest themselves more strikingly to the eyes of the vulgar in the phenomena of vegetable and animal life, in the production of food, and of what are improperly called ‹matières premières› [raw materials], which are the special products of agriculture.

Besides, if there be any one monopoly more revolting than another, it is undoubtedly a monopoly which applies to the first necessaries of life.

The confusion which I am exposing, and which is specious in a scientific view, since no theorist I am acquainted with has got rid of it, becomes still more specious when we look at what is passing around us.

We see the landed Proprietor frequently living without labour, and we draw the conclusion, which is plausible enough, that “he must surely be remunerated for something else than his work.” And what can this something else be, if not the fecundity, the productiveness, the co-operation of the soil as an instrument? It is, then, the ‹rent of land› which we must brand, in the language [p251] of the times, with the names of necessary monopoly, privilege, illegitimacy, theft.

We must admit that the authors of this theory have encountered a fact which must have powerfully tended to mislead them. Few land estates in Europe have escaped from conquest and all its attendant abuses; and science has confounded the violent methods by which landed property has been acquired with the methods by which it is naturally formed.

But we must not imagine that the false definition of the word ‹value› tends only to unsettle landed property. Logic is a terrible and indefatigable power, whether it sets out with a good or a bad principle! As the earth, it is said, makes light, heat, electricity, vegetable life, etc., co-operate in the production of value, does not capital in the same way make gravitation, elasticity, the wind, etc., concur in producing value? There are other men, then, besides agriculturists who are paid for the intervention of natural agents. This remuneration comes to capitalists in the shape of Interest, just as it comes to proprietors in the shape of Rent. War, then, must be declared against Interest as it has been against Rent!

Property has had a succession of blows aimed at it in the name of this principle, false as I think, true according to the Economists and ‹Egalitaires›, namely, that ‹natural agents possess or create value›. This is a postulate upon which all schools are agreed. They differ only in the boldness or timidity of their deductions.

The Economists say that ‹property› (in land) ‹is a monopoly›, but a monopoly which is necessary, and which must be maintained.

The Socialists say that ‹property› (in land) ‹is a monopoly›, but a monopoly which is necessary, and which must be maintained,—and they demand compensation for it in the shape of right to employment [‹le droit au travail›].

The Communists and ‹Egalitaires› say that ‹property› (in general) ‹is a monopoly›, and must be destroyed.

For myself, I say most emphatically that «PROPERTY IS NOT A MONOPOLY». Your premises are false, and your three conclusions, although they differ, are false also. «Property is not a monopoly», and consequently it is not incumbent on us either to tolerate it by way of favour, or to demand compensation for it, or to destroy it.

Let us pass briefly in review the opinions of writers of various schools on this important subject.

The English Economists lay down this principle, upon which they appear to be unanimous, that ‹value comes from labour›. Were they consistent in their use of terms, it might be so; but are they consistent? The reader will judge. He will see whether they [p252] do not always and everywhere confound gratuitous Utility, which is incapable of remuneration, and destitute of Value, with onerous Utility, which we owe exclusively to labour, and which according to them is alone possessed of value.

«Adam Smith.»—“In agriculture nature labours along with man; and ‹although her labour costs no expense›, its produce ‹has its value›, as well as that of the most expensive workmen.”[55]

Here we have nature producing value. The purchaser of corn must pay for it, although it has cost nothing to anybody, not even labour. Who then dares come forward to demand this pretended ‹value›? Substitute for that word the word ‹utility›, and all becomes clear, Property is vindicated, and justice satisfied.

“This rent,” proceeds Smith, “may be considered as the produce of those ‹powers of nature›, the use of which the landlord lends to the farmer. . . . . It (rent!) is the ‹work of nature›, which remains after deducting or compensating ‹everything which can be regarded as the work of man›. It is seldom less than a fourth, and frequently more than a third of the whole produce. No equal quantity of productive labour employed in manufactures can ever occasion so great a reproduction. In them nature does nothing; man does all.”[56]

Is it possible in as few words to include a greater number of dangerous errors? At this rate a fourth or a third part of the ‹value› of human subsistence is due ‹exclusively› to the power of nature. And yet the proprietor is paid by the farmer, and the farmer by the corn-consumer, for this pretended value which remains after ‹the work of man› has been remunerated. And this is the basis on which it is desired to place Property! And, then, what becomes of the axiom that ‹all value comes from labour›?

Next, we have nature doing nothing in Manufactures! Do gravitation, the elasticity of the air, and animal force, not aid the manufacturer? These forces act in our manufactures just as they act in our fields; they produce gratuitously, not value, but utility. Were it otherwise, property in capital would be as much exposed to the attacks of Communism as property in land.

«Buchanan.»—This commentator, adopting the theory of his master on Rent, is pressed by logic to blame him for having represented it as advantageous:

“In dwelling on the reproduction of rent as so great an advantage to society, Smith does not reflect that rent is the effect of high price, and that what the landlord gains in this way, he gains ‹at the expense› of the community at large. There is no absolute gain to society by the reproduction of rent. It is only one class profiting at the expense of another class.”[57]

Here the logical deduction makes its appearance—rent is an injustice.

«Ricardo.»—“Rent is that portion of the produce of the earth ‹which is paid› to the landlord for the use of the ‹original and indestructible powers of the soil›.” [p253]

And, in order that there may be no mistake, the author adds:

“It is often confounded with the interest and profit of capital. . . . . It is evident that a portion only of the money annually to be paid for the improved farm would be for ‹the original and indestructible powers of the soil›, the other portion would be paid for the use of the capital which had been employed in ameliorating the quality of the land, and in erecting such buildings as were necessary to secure and preserve the produce. . . . In the future pages of this work, then, whenever I speak of the rent of land, I wish to be understood as speaking of that compensation which is paid to the owner of land ‹for the use of its original and indestructible powers›.”[58]

«M’Culloch.»—“What is properly termed Rent is the sum paid ‹for the use of the natural and inherent powers of the soil›. It is entirely distinct from the sum paid for the use of buildings, enclosures, roads, or other amelioration. ‹Rent is then always a monopoly›.”

«Scrope.»—“The value of land, and its power of yielding Rent, are due to two circumstances,—1st, The appropriation of ‹its natural powers›; 2d, The labour applied to its amelioration.”

We are not kept long waiting for the consequence:

“Under the first of these relations ‹rent is a monopoly›. It restricts our usufruct and enjoyment of the gifts which God has given to men for the satisfaction of their wants. This restriction ‹is just, only in as far as it is necessary› for the common good.”

In what perplexity must those good souls be landed who refuse to admit anything to be necessary which is not just?

Scrope ends with these words:

“When it goes beyond this point, it must be modified on the same principle which caused it to be established.”

It is impossible for the reader not to perceive that these authors lead us to a negation of Property, and lead us to it very logically, in setting out with the proposition that the proprietor is paid for the gifts of God. Here we have rent held up as an injustice established by Law under the pressure of necessity, and which laws may modify or destroy under the pressure of another necessity. The Communists have never gone farther than this.

«Senior.»—“The instruments of production are labour and natural agents. Natural agents having been appropriated, proprietors ‹charge for their use› under the form of Rent, which is the recompense of no sacrifice whatever, and is received by those who have neither laboured nor put by, but who merely hold out their hands to accept the offerings of the rest of the community.”

After giving this heavy blow to property, Mr Senior explains that one portion of Rent resolves itself into the Interest of Capital, and then adds:

“The surplus is taken by ‹the proprietor of the natural agent›, and is his reward, ‹not for having laboured or abstained›, but simply for not having withheld what he was able to withhold; for having permitted the gifts of nature to be accepted.”

You will observe that this is still the same theory. The proprietor is supposed to interpose himself between the hungry mouth and the food which God has vouchsafed under the condition of [p254] labour. The proprietor who has co-operated in the work of production, charges first of all for his co-operation, which is just, and then he makes a second charge for the work of nature, for the use of natural agents, for the indestructible powers of the soil, which is iniquitous.

This theory of the English Economists, which has been farther developed by Mill, Malthus, and others, we are sorry to find making its way also on the Continent.

“When a franc’s worth of seed,” says «Scialoja», “produces a hundred francs’ worth of corn, this augmentation of ‹value› is mainly due to the soil.”

This is to confound Utility with value; He might just as well have said, when water which costs only one sou at ten yards’ distance from the spring, costs ten sous at 100 yards, this augmentation of value is due in part to the intervention of nature.

«Florez Estrada.»—“Rent is that portion of the agricultural product which remains ‹after all the costs of production have been defrayed›.”

Then the proprietor receives something for nothing.

The English Economists all set out by announcing the principle that ‹value comes from labour›, and they are guilty of inconsistency when they afterwards attribute value to the inherent ‹powers of the soil›.

The French Economists in general make value to consist in utility; but, confounding gratuitous with onerous utility, they have not the less assisted in shaking the foundation of Property.

«J. B. Say.»—“Land is not the only natural agent which is productive, but it is the only one, or almost the only one, that man has been able to appropriate. The waters of the sea and of our rivers, by their aptitude to impart motion to machines, to afford nourishment to fishes, to float our ships, are likewise possessed of productive power. The wind and the sun’s rays work for us; but ‹happily› no one has been able to say, The wind and the sun are mine, and I must be paid for their services.”

M. Say appears from this to lament that any one should be able to say, The land belongs to me, and I must be paid for the service which it renders. ‹Happily›, say I, it is no more in the power of the proprietor to charge for the services of the soil than for the services of the sun and the wind.

“The earth,” continues M. Say, “is an admirable chemical workshop, in which are combined and elaborated a multitude of materials and elements which are produced in the shape of grain, fruit, flax, etc. Nature has presented to man, ‹gratuitously›, this vast workshop divided into a great number of compartments fitted for various kinds of production. But certain individual members of society have appropriated them, and proclaimed,—This compartment is mine,—that other is mine, and all that is produced in it is my exclusive property. And the astonishing thing is, that this ‹usurped privilege›, far from having been fatal to the community, has been found productive of advantage to it.”

Undoubtedly this arrangement has been advantageous; but why? Just because it is neither a privilege nor usurped, and [p255] that the man who exclaims, “This domain is mine,” has not had it in his power to add, “What has been produced on it is my exclusive property.” On the contrary, he says, “What has been produced is the exclusive property of whoever desires to purchase it, by giving me back simply the same amount of labour which I have undergone, and which in this instance I have saved his undergoing.” The co-operation of nature in the work of production, which is gratuitous for me, is gratuitous for him also.

M. Say indeed distinguishes, in the value of corn, the parts contributed by Property, by Capital, and by Labour. He has with the best intention been at great pains to justify this first part of the remuneration which accrues to the proprietor, and which is the recompense of no labour, either anterior or present; but he fails; for, like Scrope, he is obliged to fall back on the last and least satisfactory of all grounds of vindication, ‹necessity›.

“If it be impossible,” he remarks, “for production to be effected, not only without land and without capital, but without these means of production previously becoming ‹property›, may it not be said that proprietors of land and capital exercise a productive function, since, without the employment of these means, production would not take place?—a convenient function no doubt, but which, in the present state of society, presupposes accumulation, which is the result of production or saving,” etc.

The confusion here is palpable. The accumulation has been effected by the proprietor in his character of Capitalist—a character with which at present we have no concern. But what M. Say represents as convenient is the part played by the proprietor, in his proper character of proprietor, exacting a price for the gifts of God. It is this part which it is necessary to vindicate, and it has no connexion with either accumulation or saving.

“If, then, property in land and in capital” (why assimilate the two?) “be the fruit of production, I am warranted in representing such property as a working and productive machine, for which its author, although sitting with his hands across, is entitled to exact a recompense.”

Still the same confusion. The man who constructs a machine is proprietor of a ‹capital›, from which he legitimately derives an income, because he is paid, not for the labour of the machine, but for his own labour in constructing it. But ‹land›, or ‹territorial› property, is ‹not the result of human production›. What right, then, have we to be paid for its co-operation? The author has here mixed up two different kinds of property in the same category, in order that the same reasons which justify the one may serve for the vindication of the other.

«Blanqui.»—“The agriculturist who tills, manures, sows, and reaps his field, furnishes labour, without which nothing would be produced. But the action of the soil in making the seed germinate, and of the sun in bringing the plant to maturity, are independent of that labour, and co-operate in the formation of the ‹value› represented by the harvest. . . Smith and other Economists pretend that the labour of [p256] man is the exclusive source of value. Assuredly the industry of the labourer is not the exclusive source of the value of a sack of corn or a bushel of potatoes. His skill can no more succeed in producing the phenomenon of germination than the patience of the alchymist could succeed in discovering the philosopher’s stone. This is evident.”

It is impossible to imagine a more complete confusion than we have here, first between utility and value, and then between onerous and gratuitous utility.

«Joseph Garnier.»—“The rent of the proprietor differs essentially from the wages of the labourer and the profits of the capitalist, inasmuch as these two kinds of remuneration are the recompense, the one of trouble or pains taken, the other of a privation submitted to, and a risk encountered, whilst Rent is received by the proprietor ‹gratuitously, and in virtue alone of a legal convention› which recognises and maintains in certain individuals the right to landed property.”—(‹Eléments de l’Économie Politique›, 2^e edition, p. 293.)

In other words, the labourer and capitalist are paid, in the name of equity, for the services they render; and the proprietor is paid, in the name of law, for services which he does not render.

“The boldest innovators do not go farther than to propose the substitution of collective for individual property. ‹It seems to us that they have reason on their side as regards human right›; but they are wrong practically, inasmuch as they are unable to exhibit the advantages of a better Economical system.” . . . —(‹Ibid.›, pp. 377, 378.)

“But at the same time, ‹in avowing that property is a privilege, a monopoly›, we must add, that it is a natural and a useful monopoly. . . .

“In short, it seems to be admitted by Political Economy” [it is so, alas! and here lies the evil] “that property does not flow from divine right, demesnial right, or any other speculative right, but simply from its utility. ‹It is only a monopoly tolerated in the interest of all›,” etc.

This is precisely the judgment pronounced by Scrope, and repeated in modified terms by Say.

I think I have now satisfactorily shown that Political Economy, setting out with the false datum, that “natural agents possess or create value,” has arrived at this conclusion, “that property (in as far as it appropriates and is remunerated for this value, which is independent of all human service) is a privilege, a monopoly, a usurpation; but that it is a necessary monopoly, and must be maintained.”

It remains for me to show that the Socialists set out with the same postulate, only they modify the conclusion in this way: “Property is a necessary monopoly; it must be maintained, but we must demand, from those who have property, compensation to those who have none, in the shape of Right to Employment.”

I shall, then, dispose of the doctrine of the Communists, who, arguing from the same premises, conclude that “Property is a monopoly, and ought to be abolished.”

Finally, and at the risk of repetition, I shall, if I can, expose the fallacy of the premises on which all the three conclusions are based, namely, that ‹natural agents possess or create value›. If I succeed in [p257] this, if I demonstrate that natural agents, even when appropriated, produce, not Value, but Utility, which, passing from the hands of the proprietor without leaving anything behind it, reaches the consumer gratuitously,—in that case, all—Economists, Socialists, Communists—must at length come to a common understanding to leave the world, in this respect, just as it is.

«M. Considérant.»[59]—“In order to discover how and under what conditions ‹private property› may Legitimately manifest and develop itself, we must get possession of the ‹fundamental principle of the Right of Property›; and here it is:

“Every man «POSSESSES LEGITIMATELY THE THINGS» ‹which have been› «CREATED» ‹by his labour, his intelligence, or›, to speak more generally, «BY HIS ACTIVITY».

“This Principle is incontestable, and it is right to remark that it contains implicitly the acknowledgment of the Right of all to the Soil. The earth not having been created by man, it follows in fact, from the fundamental principle of Property, that the Soil, which is a common fund given over to the species, can in no shape legitimately become the absolute and exclusive property of this or that individual who has not created ‹this value›. Let us establish, then, the true Theory of Property, by basing it exclusively on the unexceptionable principle which makes ‹the legitimacy of Property› hinge upon the fact of ‹the› «CREATION» ‹of the thing, or of the value possessed›. To accomplish this we must direct our reasoning to the origin of industry, that is to say, to the origin and development of agriculture, manufactures, the arts, etc., in human society.

“Suppose that on a solitary island, on the territory of a nation, or on the entire surface of the earth (for the extent of the field of action makes no difference in our estimate of facts), a generation of mankind devotes itself for the first time to industry—for the first time engages in agriculture, manufactures, etc. Each generation, by its labour, by its intelligence, by the exertion of its own proper activity, ‹creates products, develops value›, which did not exist on the earth in its rude and primitive state. Is it not perfectly evident that, among the first generation of labourers, Property would conform to Right, «PROVIDED» ‹the value or wealth produced by the activity of all› were distributed among the producers «IN PROPORTION TO THE CO-OPERATION» of each in the creation of the general riches? That is beyond dispute.

“Now, the results of the labour of this generation may be divided into two categories, which it is important to distinguish.

“The ‹first category› includes the products of the soil, which belong to this first generation in its character of usufructuary, as having been increased, refined, or manufactured by its labour, by its industry. These products, whether raw or manufactured, consist either of objects of consumption or of instruments of labour. It is clear that these products belong, ‹in entire and legitimate property›, to those who have created them by their activity. Each of them, then, has «RIGHT», either to consume these products immediately, to store them up to be disposed of afterwards at pleasure, or to employ them, exchange them, give them away, or transmit them to any one he chooses, without receiving authority from anyone. On this hypothesis, this Property is evidently ‹Legitimate›, respectable, sacred. We cannot assail it without assailing ‹Justice›, ‹Right›, ‹individual liberty›,—without, in short, being guilty of Spoliation.

“‹Second category.› But the creations attributable to the industrious activity of this first generation are not all included in the preceding category. This generation has created not only the products which we have just described (objects of consumption and instruments of labour),—it has also added an ‹additional value› to the ‹primitive value› of the soil, by cultivation, by erections, by the permanent improvements which it has executed.

“This additional value constitutes evidently a product, a value, due to the activity of the first generation. Now, if by any means (we are not concerned at present with the question of means),—if by any means whatever the property of this additional value is equitably distributed among the different members of society, that is to say, is distributed among them proportionally to the co-operation of each in its creation, each will possess ‹legitimately› the portion which has fallen to him. He may, then, dispose of this individual Property, legitimate as he sees it to be, exchange it, give it away, or transmit it without control, society having over these values no right or power whatsoever. [p258]

“We may, therefore, easily conceive that when the second generation makes its appearance, it will find upon the land two sorts of Capital:

“1st, The ‹primitive or natural capital›, which has not been created by the men of the first generation—that is, the ‹value› of the land in its rough, uncultivated state.

“2d, The ‹capital created› by the first generation: including (1), the ‹products›, commodities, and instruments, which shall not have been consumed or used by the first generation; (2), the additional value which the labour of the first generation has added to the value of the rough, uncultivated land.

“It is evident, then, and results clearly and necessarily from the fundamental principle of the Right of Property, which I have just explained, that each individual of the second generation has an equal right to the ‹primitive or natural capital›, whilst he has no right to the other species of ‹capital› which has been ‹created› by the labour of the first generation. Each individual of the first generation may, then, dispose of his share of this ‹created capital› in favour of whatever individual of the second generation he may please to select, children, friends, etc., and no one, not even the State itself, as we have just seen, has the slightest right (on pretence of Property) to control the disposal which, as donor or testator, he may have made of such capital.

“Observe that on this hypothesis the man of the second generation is already in a better situation than the man of the first, seeing that, besides his right to the ‹primitive capital›, which is preserved to him, he has his chance of receiving a portion of the ‹created capital›, that is to say, of a value which he has not produced, and which represents anterior labour.

“If, then, we suppose things to be arranged in society in such a way that,

“1st, The right to the ‹primitive capital›, that is, the usufruct of the soil in its natural state, is preserved, or that an «EQUIVALENT RIGHT» is conferred on every individual born within the territory;

“2d, That the ‹created capital› is continually distributed among men, ‹as it is produced›, in proportion to the co-operation of each in the production of that capital;

“If, we say, the mechanism of the social organization shall satisfy these two conditions, «PROPERTY», under such a régime, would be established «IN ITS ABSOLUTE LEGITIMACY», and ‹Fact› would be in unison with ‹Right›.”—(‹Théorie du droit de propriété et du droit au travail›, 3^e edition, p. 17.)

We see here that the socialist author distinguishes between two kinds of value, ‹created value›, which is the subject of legitimate property, and ‹uncreated value›, which he denominates the ‹value of land in its natural state›, ‹primitive capital›, ‹natural capital›, which cannot become individual property but by usurpation. Now, according to the theory which I am anxious to establish, the ideas expressed by the words ‹uncreated›, ‹primitive›, ‹natural›, exclude radically these other ideas, ‹value›, ‹capital›. This is the error in M. Considérant’s premises, by which he is landed in this melancholy conclusion:

“That, under the régime of Property, in all civilized nations, the common fund, over which the entire species has a full right of usufruct, has been invaded—has been confiscated—by the few, to the exclusion of the many. Why, were even a single human being excluded from his Right to the Usufruct of this common fund, that very exclusion would of itself constitute an attack upon Right by the Institution of Property, and that institution, by sanctioning such invasion of right, would be unjust and illegitimate.”

M. Considérant, however, acknowledges that the earth could not be cultivated but for the institution of individual property. Here, then, is a ‹necessary monopoly›. What can we do, then, to reconcile all, and preserve the rights which the ‹prolétaires›, or men of no property, have to the primitive, natural, uncreated capital, and to the value of the land in its rough and uncultivated state? [p259]

“Why, let Society, which has taken possession of the land, and taken away from man the power of exercising, freely and at will, his four natural rights on the surface of the soil,—let this industrious society cede to the individual, in compensation for the rights of which it has deprived him, the ‹Right to Employment›.”—[«Le Droit au Travail.»]

Now, nothing in the world is clearer than that this theory, except the conclusion which it seeks to establish, is exactly the theory of the Economists. The man who purchases an agricultural product remunerates three things: 1st, The actual labour—nothing more legitimate; 2dly, the ‹additional value› imparted to the soil by anterior labour—still nothing more legitimate; 3dly, and lastly, the ‹primitive›, or ‹natural›, or ‹uncreated capital›,—that gratuitous gift of God, which M. Considérant denominates the ‹value of the land in its rough and natural state›; Adam Smith, the ‹indestructible powers of the soil›; Ricardo, the ‹productive and indestructible powers of the land›; Say, ‹natural agents›. ‹This› is the part which has been ‹usurped›, according to M. Considérant; ‹this› is what has been ‹usurped›, according to J. B. Say. It is ‹this› which constitutes ‹illegitimacy› and ‹spoliation› in the eyes of the Socialists; which constitutes ‹monopoly› and ‹privilege› in the eyes of the Economists. They are at one as to the ‹necessity› and the utility of this arrangement. Without it the earth would produce nothing, say the disciples of Smith; without it we should return to the savage state, re-echo the disciples of Fourier.

We find that in theory, and as regards right (at least with reference to this important question), the understanding between the two schools is much more cordial than we should have imagined. They differ only as to the legislative consequences to be deduced from the fact on which they agree. “Seeing that property is tainted with illegitimacy, inasmuch as it assigns to the proprietor a part of the remuneration to which he has no right; and seeing, at the same time, that it is necessary, let us respect it, but demand indemnities. No, say the Economists, although it is a monopoly, yet seeing that it is a necessary monopoly, let us respect it, and let it alone.” And yet they urge this weak defence but feebly; for one of their latest organs, M. J. Garnier, adds, “You have reason on your side, as regards human right, but you are wrong practically, inasmuch as you have failed to point out the effects of a better system.” To which the Socialists immediately reply, “We have found it; it is the Right to Employment—try it.”

In the meantime M. Proudhon steps in. You imagine, perhaps, that this redoubtable objector is about to question the premises on which the Economists and Socialists ground their agreement. Not at all. He can demolish property without that. [p260] He appropriates the premises, grasps them, closes with them, and most logically deduces his conclusion. “You grant,” he says, “that the gifts of God are possessed not only of utility but of ‹value›, and that these gifts the proprietor usurps and sells. Then Property is theft; and it is not necessary to maintain it; it is not necessary to demand compensation for it; what ‹is› necessary is to ‹abolish› it.”

M. Proudhon has brought forward many arguments against landed Property. The most formidable one—indeed the only formidable one—is that with which these authors have furnished him, by confounding utility with value.

“Who has the right,” he asks, “to charge for the use of the soil,—for that wealth which does not proceed from man’s act? Who is entitled to the rent of land? The producer of the land, without doubt. Who made it? God. Then, proprietor, begone.

“ . . . . But the Creator of the earth does not sell it—he gives it; and in giving it he shows no respect of persons. Why, then, among all his children, are some treated as eldest sons, and some as bastards? If equality of inheritance be our original right, why should our posthumous right be inequality of conditions?”

Replying to J. B. Say, who had compared land to an instrument, he says:

“I grant it that land is an instrument; but who is the workman? Is it the proprietor? Is it he who, by the efficacious virtue of the right of property, communicates to it vigour and fertility? It is precisely here that we discover in what consists the monopoly of the proprietor,—he did not make the instrument, and he charges for its use. Were the Creator to present Himself and demand the rent of land, we must account for it to Him; but the proprietor, who represents himself as invested with the same power, ought to exhibit his procuration.”

That is evident. The three systems in reality make only one. Economists, Socialists, Egalitaires, all direct against landed proprietors the same reproach, that of charging for what they have no right to charge for. This wrong some call ‹monopoly›, some ‹illegitimacy›, others ‹theft›—these are but different phases of the same complaint.

Now I would appeal to every intelligent reader whether this complaint is or is not well founded? Have I not demonstrated that there is but one thing which comes between the gifts of God and the hungry mouth, namely, human service?

Economists say, that “Rent is what we pay to the proprietor for the use of the productive and indestructible powers of the soil.” I say, No—Rent is like what we pay to the water-carrier for the pains he has taken to construct his barrow, and the water would cost us more if he had carried it on his back. In the same way, corn, flax, wool, timber, meat, fruits, would have cost us more if the proprietor had not previously improved the instrument which furnishes them.

Socialists assert that “originally the masses enjoyed their right [p261] to the land on condition of labour, but that now they are excluded and robbed of their natural patrimony.” I answer, No—they are neither excluded nor robbed—they enjoy, gratuitously, the utility contributed by the soil on condition of labour, that is to say, by repaying that labour to those who have saved it to them.

Égalitaires allege that “the monopoly of the proprietor consists in this, that not having made the instrument, he yet charges for its use.” I answer, No—the land-instrument, so far as it is the work of God, produces ‹utility›, and that utility is gratuitous; it is beyond the power of the proprietor to charge for it. The land-instrument, so far as it is prepared by the proprietor,—so far as he has laboured it, enclosed it, drained it, improved it, and furnished it with other necessary instruments, produces ‹value›, and that value represents actual human ‹services›, and for these alone is the proprietor paid. You must either admit the legitimacy of this demand, or reject your own principle—the ‹mutuality of services›.

In order to satisfy ourselves as to the true elements of the value of land, let us attend to the way in which landed property is formed—not by conquest and violence, but according to the laws of labour and exchange. Let us see what takes place in the United States.

Brother Jonathan, a laborious water-carrier of New York, set out for the Far-west, carrying in his purse a thousand dollars, the fruit of his labour and frugality.

He journeyed across many fertile provinces, where the soil, the sun, and the rain worked wonders, but which nevertheless ‹were entirely destitute of value› in the economical and ‹practical› sense of the word.

Being a little of a philosopher, he said to himself—“Let Adam Smith and Ricardo say what they will, ‹value› must ‹be something else than the natural and indestructible productive power of the soil›.”

At length, having reached the State of Arkansas, he found a beautiful property of about 100 acres, which the government had advertised for sale at the price of a dollar an acre.

A dollar an acre! he said—that is very little, almost nothing. I shall purchase this land, clear it, and sell the produce, and the drawer of water shall become a lord of the soil!

Brother Jonathan, being a merciless logician, liked to have a reason for everything. He said to himself, But why is this land worth even a dollar an acre? No one has yet put a spade in it, or has bestowed on it the least labour. Can Smith and Ricardo, and the whole string of theorists down to Proudhon, be right after all? Can land have a value independent of all labour, all service, [p262] all human intervention? Must I admit that the productive and indestructible powers of the soil ‹have value›? In that case, why should they have no value in the countries through which I have passed? And, besides, since the powers of the soil surpass so enormously the powers of men, which, as Blanqui well remarks, can never go the length of creating the phenomena of germination, why should these marvellous powers be worth no more than a dollar?

But he was not long in perceiving that this value, like all other values, is of human and social creation. The American government demanded a dollar for the concession of each acre; but, on the other hand, it undertook to guarantee to a certain extent the security of the acquirer; it had formed in a rough way a road to the neighbourhood, facilitated the transmission of letters and newspapers, etc. Service for service, said Jonathan;—the government makes me pay a dollar, but it gives me an adequate equivalent. With deference to Ricardo, I can now account naturally for the value of this land, which value would be still greater if the road were extended and improved, the post more frequent and regular, and the protection more efficacious and secure.

While Jonathan argued, he worked; for we must do him the justice to say that he always made thinking and acting keep pace.

He expended the remainder of his dollars in buildings, enclosures, clearances, trenching, draining, improving, etc.; and after having dug, laboured, sowed, harrowed, reaped, at length came the time to dispose of his crop. “Now I shall see,” said Jonathan, still occupied with the problem of value, “if in becoming a landed proprietor I have transformed myself into a monopolist, a privileged aristocrat, a plunderer of my neighbour, an engrosser of the bounties of divine Providence.”

He carried his grain to market, and began to talk with a Yankee:—Friend, said he, how much will you give me for this Indian corn?

The current price, replied the other.

The current price! but will that yield me anything beyond the interest of my capital and the wages of my labour?

I am a merchant, said the Yankee, and I know that I must content myself with the recompense of my present and former labour.

And I was content with it when I was a mere drawer of water, replied the other, but now I am a landed proprietor. The English and French Economists have assured me that in that character I [p263] ought, over and above the double remuneration you point at, to derive a profit from the ‹productive and indestructible powers of the soil›, and levy a tax on the gifts of God.

The gifts of God belong to all, said the merchant. I avail myself of the ‹productive power› of the wind for propelling my ships, but I make no one pay for it.

Still, as far as I am concerned, I expect that you will pay me something for these powers, in order that Messieurs Senior, Considérant, and Proudhon, should not call me a monopolist and usurper for nothing. If I am to have the disgrace, I may at least have the profit, of a monopolist.

In that case, friend, I must bid you good morning. To obtain the maize I am in quest of, I must apply to other proprietors, and if I find them of your mind, I shall cultivate it for myself.

Jonathan then understood the truth, that, under the empire of freedom, a man cannot be a monopolist at pleasure. As long as there are lands in the Union to clear, said he, I can never be more than the simple setter in motion of these famous ‹productive and indestructible forces›. I shall be paid for my trouble, that is all, just as when I was a drawer of water I was paid for my own labour, and not for that of nature. I see now very clearly that the true usufructuary of the gifts of God is not the man who raises the corn, but the man who consumes it.

Some years afterwards, another enterprise having engaged the attention of Jonathan, he set about finding a tenant for his land. The dialogue which took place between the two contracting parties was curious, and would throw much light on the subject under consideration were I to give it entire.

Here is part of it:

‹Proprietor.› What! you would give me no greater rent than the interest, at the current rate, of the capital I have actually laid out?

‹Farmer.› Not a cent more.

‹Proprietor.› Why so, pray?

‹Farmer.› Just for this reason, that, with the outlay of an equal capital, I can put as much land in as good condition as yours.

‹Proprietor.› That seems conclusive. But consider that when you become my tenant, it is not only my capital which will work for you, but also ‹the productive and indestructible powers of the soil›. You will have enlisted in your service the marvellous influences of the sun and the moon, of affinity and electricity. Am I to give you all these things for nothing?

‹Farmer.› Why not, since they cost you nothing, and since you derive nothing from them, any more than I do? [p264]

‹Proprietor.› Derive nothing from them? I derive everything from them. Zounds! without these admirable phenomena, all my industry could not raise a blade of grass.

‹Farmer.› Undoubtedly. But remember the Yankee you met at market. He would not give you a farthing for all this co-operation of nature any more than, when you were a water-carrier, the housewives of New York would give you a farthing for the admirable elaboration by means of which nature supplied the spring.

‹Proprietor.› Ricardo and Proudhon, however, . . . .

‹Farmer.› A fig for Ricardo. We must either treat on the basis which I have laid down, ‹or I shall proceed to clear land› alongside yours, where the sun and the moon will work for me gratis.

It was always the same argument, and Jonathan began to see that God had wisely arranged so as to make it difficult for man to intercept His gifts.

Disgusted with the trade of proprietor, Jonathan resolved to employ his energies in some other department, and he determined to put up his land to ‹sale›.

It is needless to say that no one would give him more for it than it cost himself. In vain he cited Ricardo, and represented the inherent value of the indestructible powers of the soil—the answer always was, “There are other lands close by;” and these few words put an extinguisher on his exactions and on his illusions.

There is, moreover, in this transaction a fact of great Economic importance, and to which little attention has been paid.

It is easy to understand that if a manufacturer desires, after ten or fifteen years, to sell his apparatus and materials, even in their new state, he will probably be forced to submit to a loss. The reason is obvious. Ten or fifteen years can scarcely elapse without considerable improvements in machinery taking place. This is the reason why the man who sends to market machinery fifteen years old cannot expect a return exactly equal to the labour he has expended; for with an equal expenditure of labour the purchaser could, owing to the progress subsequently made, procure himself machinery of improved construction—which, we may remark in passing, proves more and more clearly that value is not in proportion to labour, but to services.

Hence we may conclude that machinery and instruments of labour have a tendency to lose part of their value in consequence of the mere lapse of time, without taking into account their deterioration by use—and we may lay down this formula, that “‹one of the effects of progress is to diminish the value of all existing instruments›.” [p265]

It is clear, in fact, that the more rapid that progress is, the greater difficulty will the former instruments have in sustaining the rivalry of new and improved ones.

I shall not stop here to remark the harmony exhibited by the results of this law. What I desire you to observe at present is, that landed property no more escapes from the operation of this law than any other kind of property.

Brother Jonathan experiences this. He holds this language to the purchaser—“What I have expended on this property in permanent improvements represents a thousand days’ labour. I expect that you will, in the first place, reimburse me for these thousand days’ work, and then add something for the value which is inherent in the soil and independent of all human exertion.”

The purchaser replies:

“In the first place, I shall give you nothing for the value inherent in the soil, which is simply utility, which the adjoining property possesses as well as yours. Such native superhuman utility I can obtain gratis, which proves that it possesses no value.

“In the second place, since your books show that you have expended a thousand days’ work in bringing your land to its present state, I shall give you only 800 days’ labour; and my reason for it is, that with 800 days’ labour I can now-a-days accomplish the same improvements on the adjoining land as you have executed with 1000 days’ labour on yours. Pray consider that in the course of fifteen years the art of draining, clearing, building, sinking wells, designing farm-offices, transporting materials, has made great progress. Less labour is now required to effect each given result, and I cannot consent to give you ten for what I can get for eight, more especially as the price of grain has fallen in proportion to this progress, which is a profit neither to you nor to me, but to mankind at large.”

Thus Jonathan was left no alternative but to sell his land at a loss, or to keep it.

Undoubtedly the value of land is not affected by one circumstance exclusively. Other circumstances—such as the construction of a canal, or the erection of a town—may act in an opposite direction, and raise its value, but the improvements of which I have spoken, which are general and inevitable, always necessarily tend to depress it.

The conclusion to be deduced from all I have said is, that as long as there exists in a country abundance of land to be cleared and brought under cultivation, the proprietor, whether he cultivates, or lets, or sells it, enjoys no privilege, no monopoly, no exceptional [p266] advantage,—above all, that he levies no tax upon the gratuitous liberality of nature. How could it be so, if we suppose men to be free? Have not people who are possessed of capital and energy a perfect right to make a choice between agriculture, manufactures, commerce, fisheries, navigation, the arts, or the learned professions? Will not capital and industry always tend to those departments which give extraordinary returns? Will they not desert those which entail loss? Is this inevitable shifting and redistribution of human efforts not sufficient to establish, according to our hypothesis, an equilibrium of profit and remuneration? Do agriculturists in the United States make fortunes more rapidly than merchants, shipowners, bankers, or physicians,—as would necessarily happen if they received the wages of their labour like other people, and the recompense of nature’s work into the bargain?

Would you like to know how a proprietor even in the United States could establish for himself a monopoly? I shall try to explain it.

Suppose Jonathan to assemble all the proprietors of the United States, and hold this language to them:

“I desired to sell my crops, and I found no one who would give me a high enough price for them. I wished then to let my land, and encountered the same difficulty. I resolved to sell it, but still experienced the same disappointment. My exactions have always been met by their telling me, that ‹there is more land in the neighbourhood›; so that, horrible to say, my services are estimated by the community like the services of other people, ‹at what they are worth›, in spite of the flattering promises of theorists. They will give me nothing, absolutely nothing, for those productive and indestructible powers of the soil, for those natural agents, for the solar and lunar rays, for the rain, the wind, the dew, the frost, which I was led to believe were mine, but of which I turn out to be only the nominal proprietor. Is it not an iniquitous thing that I am remunerated only for my services, and at a rate, too, reduced by competition? You are all suffering under the same oppression, you are all alike the victims of anarchical competition. It would be no longer so, you may easily perceive, if we ‹organized› landed property, if we laid our heads together to prevent anyone henceforward from clearing a yard of American soil. In that case, population pressing, by its increase, on a nearly fixed amount of subsistence, we should be able to make our own prices and attain immense wealth, which would be a great boon for all other classes; for being rich, we should provide them with work.”

If, in consequence of this discourse, the combined proprietors [p267] seized the reins of government, and passed an act interdicting all new clearances, the consequence undoubtedly would be a temporary increase of their profits. I say temporary, for the natural laws of society would be wanting in harmony if the punishment of such a crime did not spring naturally from the crime itself. Speaking with scientific exactitude, I should not say that the new law we have supposed would impart value to the powers of the soil, or to natural agents (were this the case, the law would do harm to no one);—but I should say, that the equilibrium of services had been violently upset; that one class robbed all other classes, and that slavery had been introduced into that country.

Take another hypothesis, which indeed represents the actual state of things among the civilized nations of Europe—and suppose all the land to have passed into the domain of private property.

We are to inquire whether in that case the mass of consumers, or the ‹community›, would continue to be the gratuitous usufructuary of the productive powers of the soil, and of natural agents; whether the proprietors of land would be owners of anything else than of its ‹value›, that is to say, of their services fairly estimated according to the laws of competition; and whether, when they are recompensed for those services, they are not forced like everyone else to give the gifts of God into the bargain.

Suppose, then, the entire territory of Arkansas alienated by the government, parcelled into private domains, and subjected to culture. When Jonathan brings his grain or his land to market, can he not now take advantage of the productive power of the soil, and make it an element of value? He could no longer be met, as in the preceding case, with the overwhelming answer. “There is more uncultivated land adjacent to yours.”

This new state of things presupposes an increase of population, which may be divided into two classes: 1st, That which furnishes to the community agricultural services; 2dly, That which furnishes manufacturing, intellectual, or other services.

Now this appears to me quite evident. Labourers (other than owners of land) who wished to procure supplies of grain, being perfectly free to apply either to Jonathan or to his neighbours, or to the proprietors of adjoining states, being in circumstances even to proceed to clear lands beyond the territory of Arkansas, it would be absolutely impossible for Jonathan to impose an unjust law upon them. The very fact that lands which have no value exist elsewhere would oppose to monopoly an invincible obstacle, and we should be landed again in the preceding hypothesis. Agricultural services are subject to the law of Universal Competition, [p268] and it is quite impossible to make them pass for more than they ‹are worth›. I add, that they are worth no more (‹cæteris paribus›) than services of any other description. As the manufacturer, after charging for his time, his anxiety, his trouble, his risk, his advances, his skill (all which things constitute human service, and are represented by value), can demand no recompense for the law of gravitation, the expansibility of steam, the assistance of which he has availed himself of,—so in the same way, Jonathan can include in the value of his grain only the sum total of the personal services, anterior or recent, and not the assistance he has derived from the laws of vegetable physiology. The equilibrium of services is not impaired so long as they are freely exchanged, the one for the other, at an agreed price; and the gifts of God, of which these services are the vehicle, given on both sides into the bargain, remain in the domain of community.

It may be said, no doubt, that in point of fact the value of the soil is constantly increasing; and this is true. In proportion as population becomes more dense and the people more wealthy, and the means of communication more easy, the landed proprietor derives more advantage from his services. Is this law peculiar to him? Does the same thing not hold of all other producers? With equal labour, does not a physician, a lawyer, a singer, a painter, a day labourer, procure a greater amount of enjoyments in the nineteenth than he could in the fourth century? in Paris than in Brittany? in France than in Morocco? But is this increased enjoyment obtained at the expense of any other body? That is the point. For the rest, we shall investigate still farther this law of value (using the word metonymically) of the soil, in a subsequent part of the work, when we come to consider the theory of Ricardo.

At present it is sufficient to show that Jonathan, in the case we have put, can exercise no oppression over the industrial classes, provided the exchange of services is free, and that labour can, without any legal impediment, be distributed, either in Arkansas or elsewhere, among different kinds of production. This liberty renders it impossible for the proprietors to intercept, for their own profit, the gratuitous benefits of nature.

It would no longer be the same thing if Jonathan and his brethren, availing themselves of their legislative powers, were to proscribe or shackle the liberty of trade,—were they to decree, for example, that not a grain of foreign corn should be allowed to enter the territory of Arkansas. In that case the value of services exchanged between proprietors and non-proprietors would no longer be regulated by justice. The one party could no longer control the [p269] pretensions of the other. Such a legislative measure would be as iniquitous as the one to which we have just alluded. The effect would be quite the same as if Jonathan, having carried to market a sack of corn, which in other circumstances would have sold for fifteen francs, should present a pistol at the purchaser’s head, and say, Give me three francs more, or I will blow out your brains.

This (to give the thing its right name) is ‹extortion›. ‹Brutal› or ‹legal›, the character of the transaction is the same. Brutal, as in the case of the pistol, it violates property; legal, as in the case of the prohibition, it still violates property, and repudiates, moreover, the very principle upon which property is founded. The exclusive subject of property, as we have seen, is value, and Value is the appreciation of two services freely and voluntarily exchanged. It is impossible, then, to conceive anything more directly antagonistic to the very principle of property, than that which, in the name of right, destroys the equivalence of services.

It may not be out of place to add, that laws of this description are iniquitous and injurious, whatever may be the opinions entertained by those who impose them, or by those who are oppressed by their operation. In certain countries we find the working-classes standing up for these restrictions, because they enrich the proprietors. They do not perceive that it is at their expense, and I know from experience that it is not always safe to tell them so.

Strange! that people should listen willingly to sectaries who preach Communism, which is slavery; for when a man is no longer master of his own services, he is a slave;—and that they should look askance at those who are always and everywhere the defenders of Liberty, which is the Community of the gifts of God.

We now come to the third hypothesis, which assumes that all the land capable of cultivation throughout the world has passed into the domain of individual appropriation.

We have still to do with two classes—those who possess land—and those who do not. Will the first not oppress the second? and will the latter not be always obliged to give more labour in exchange for the same amount of subsistence?

I notice this objection merely for argument’s sake, for hundreds of years must elapse before this hypothesis can become a reality.

Everything forewarns us, however, that the time must at last come when the exactions of proprietors can no longer be met by the words, There are other lands to clear.

I pray the reader to remark, that this hypothesis implies another—it implies that at the same epoch population will have reached [p270] the extreme limit of the means of subsistence which the earth can afford.

This is a new and important element in the question. It is very much as if one should put the question, What will happen when there is no longer enough of oxygen in the atmosphere to supply the lungs of a redundant population?

Whatever view we take of the principle of population, it is at least certain that population is capable of ‹increase›, nay, that it has a ‹tendency› to increase, since in point of fact it does increase. All the economic arrangements of society appear to have been organized with the previous knowledge of this tendency, and are in perfect harmony with it. The landed proprietor always endeavours to get paid for the natural agents which he has appropriated, but he is as constantly foiled in this foolish and unjust pretension by the abundance of analogous natural agents which have not been appropriated. The liberality of nature, which is comparatively indefinite, constitutes him a simple custodier. But now you drive me into a corner, by supposing a period at which this liberality reaches its limit. Men have then no longer anything to expect from that quarter. The consequence is inevitable, that the tendency of mankind to increase will be paralyzed, that the progress of population will be arrested. No economic régime can obviate this necessity. According to the hypothesis we have laid down, every increase of population would be repressed by mortality. No philanthropy, no optimism, can make us believe that the increase of human beings can continue its progression when the progressive increase of subsistence has conclusively terminated.

Here, then, we have a new order of things and the harmony of the social laws might be called in question, had they not provided for a state of matters the existence of which is possible, although very different from that which now obtains.

The difficulty we have to deal with, then, comes to this: When a ship in mid-ocean cannot reach land in less than a month, and has only a fortnight’s provisions on board, what is to be done? Clearly this, reduce the allowance of each sailor. This is not cruelty—it is prudence and justice.

In the same way, when population shall have reached the extreme limit that all the land in the world can maintain, a law which, by gentle and infallible means prevents the further multiplication of mankind, cannot be considered either harsh or unjust. Now, it is landed property still which affords us solution of the difficulty. The institution of property, by applying the stimulant of self-interest, causes the land to produce the greatest possible [p271] quantity of subsistence, and by the division of inheritances puts each family in a situation to estimate the danger to itself of an imprudent multiplication. It is very clear that any other régime—Communism, for example—would be at once a less effective spur to production, and a less powerful curb to population.

After all, it appears to me that Political Economy has discharged her duty when she has proved that the great and just law of the ‹mutuality of services› operates harmoniously, so long as human progress is not conclusively arrested. Is it not consoling to think that up to that point, and under the empire of freedom, it is not in the power of one class to oppress another? Is economic Science bound to solve this further problem: Given the tendency of mankind to multiply, what will take place when there is no longer room in the world for new inhabitants? Does God hold in reserve for that epoch some creative cataclasm, some marvellous manifestation of His almighty power? Or, as Christians, do we believe in the doctrine of the world’s destruction? These evidently are not economical problems, and there is no science which does not encounter similar difficulties. Natural philosophers know well, that all bodies which move on the surface of the earth have a tendency to descend, not to ascend. After all, a day must come when the mountains shall have filled up the valleys, when the embouchure of our rivers will be on the same level as their source, when the waters can no longer flow, etc., etc. What will happen then? Is Natural Science to cease to observe and to admire the harmony of the actual world because she cannot divine by what other harmony God will provide for a state of things far distant, no doubt, but inevitable? It seems to me that at this point the Economist, like the natural philosopher, should substitute for an exercise of curiosity an exercise of faith. He who has so marvellously arranged the medium in which we now live, knows best how to prepare another medium suitable to other circumstances.

We judge of the productiveness of the soil and of human skill by the facts of which we are witnesses. Is this a rational mode of proceeding? Then, adopting it, we may say, Since it has required six thousand years to bring a tenth part of the earth to the sorry state of cultivation in which we find it, how many hundreds of ages must elapse before its entire surface shall be converted into a garden?

Yet in this appreciation, comforting as it is, we suppose merely the more general diffusion of our present knowledge, or rather our present ignorance, of agriculture. But is this, I repeat, an [p272] admissible rule? Does not analogy tell us that an impenetrable veil conceals from us the power—the indefinite power it may be—of art? The savage who lives by the chase requires a square league of territory. What would be his surprise were he told that the pastoral life enables ten times the number of men to subsist upon the same space? The nomad shepherd would, in like manner, be quite astonished to be told that a system of triennial cultivation [‹la culture triennale›] admits easily of a population ten times greater still. Tell the peasant accustomed to this routine that the same progress will again be the result of alternate culture[60] [‹la culture alterne›], and he will not believe you. Alternate culture is for us the latest improvement—Is it the latest improvement for the human race? Let us comfort ourselves regarding the future destiny of the species—a long tract of ages is before us. At all events, let us not require Political Economy to resolve problems which are not within her domain—and let us with confidence commit the destinies of future races to the keeping of that great and good and wise Being who shall have called them into existence.

* * * * *

Let us recapitulate the ideas contained in this chapter.

These two phenomena, Utility and Value—the co-operation of nature and the co-operation of man, consequently Community and Property—are combined in the work of agriculture, as in every other department of industry.

In the production of corn which appeases our hunger, we remark something analogous to what takes place in the formation of water which quenches our thirst. The ocean, which is the theme of the poet’s inspiration, offers to the Economist also a fine subject of meditation. It is this vast reservoir which gives drink to all human creatures. And yet how can that be, when many of them are situated at a great distance from its shores, and when its water is besides undrinkable? It is here that we have to admire the marvellous industry of nature. We mark how the sun warms the heaving mass, and subjects it to a slow evaporation. The water takes the form of gas, and, disengaged from the salt, which rendered it unfit for use, it rises into the high regions of the atmosphere. Gales of wind, increasing in all directions, drift it towards inhabited continents. There it encounters cold, which condenses it, and attaches it in a solid form to the sides of mountains. By-and-by the gentle heat of spring melts it. Carried along by its weight, [p273] it is filtered and purified through beds of schist and gravel. It ramifies and distributes itself, and supplies and feeds refreshing springs in all parts of the world. Here we have an immense and ingenious industry carried on by nature for the benefit of the human race. Change of form, change of place, utility, nothing is wanting. But where is ‹value›? Value has not yet come into existence; and if what we must call the work of God is to be paid for (it would be paid for if it possessed exchangeable ‹value›)—who could tell the ‹value› of a single drop of this precious liquid?

All men, however, have not a spring of pure water at their door. In order to quench their thirst they must take pains, make efforts, exert foresight and skill. It is this ‹supplementary› human labour which gives rise to arrangements, transactions, ‹estimates›. It is here, then, that we discover the origin and foundation of value.

Man is originally ignorant. Knowledge is acquired. At the beginning, then, he is forced to carry water, to accomplish the supplementary labour which nature has left him to execute with the ‹maximum› of trouble. It is at this stage that water has the greatest ‹value› in exchange. By degrees the water-carrier invents a barrow and wheels, trains horses, constructs pipes, discovers the law of the siphon, etc.; in short, he transfers part of his labour to the gratuitous forces of nature; and, in proportion as he does so, the value of water, but not its utility, is diminished.

There is here, however, a circumstance which it is necessary thoroughly to comprehend, if we would not see discordance where there is in reality only harmony. It is this, that the purchaser of water obtains it on easier terms, that is to say, gives a less amount of labour in exchange for a given quantity of it, each time that a step of progress of this kind is gained, although in such circumstances he has to give a remuneration for the instrument by means of which nature is constrained to act. Formerly he paid for the labour of carrying the water; now he pays not only for that, but for the labour expended in constructing the barrow, the wheel, and the pipe—and yet, ‹everything included›, he pays less; and this shows us how false and futile the reasoning is which would persuade us that that part of the remuneration which is applicable to capital is a burden on the consumer. Will these reasoners never understand that, for each result obtained, capital supersedes more labour than it exacts?

All that I have said is equally applicable to the production of corn. In that case also, anterior to all human labour, there has [p274] been an immense, a measureless, amount of natural industry at work, the secrets of which the most advanced science can yet give no account of. Gases, salts, are diffused through the soil and the atmosphere. Electricity, affinity, the wind, the rain, light, heat, vegetable life, play successively their parts, often unknown to us, in transporting, transforming, uniting, dividing, combining these elements; and this marvellous industry, the activity and utility of which elude our appreciation and even our imagination, has yet no ‹value›. Value makes its appearance at the first intervention of the labour of man, who has, in this, more perhaps than in the other instance we have given, a ‹supplementary› labour to perform, in order to complete what nature has begun.

To direct these natural forces, and remove the obstacles which impede their action, man takes possession of an instrument, which is the soil, and he does so without injury to anyone; for this instrument had previously no value. This is not a matter of argument, but a matter of fact. Show me, in any part of the world you choose, land which has not been subjected directly or indirectly to human action, and I will show you land destitute of value.[61] [p275]

In the meantime, the agriculturist, in order to effect, in conjunction with nature, the production of corn, executes two kinds of labour which are quite distinct. The one kind is applicable directly and immediately to the crop of the year—is applicable only to that, and must be paid for by that—such as sowing, weeding, reaping, etc. The other, as building, clearing, draining, enclosing, is applicable to an indefinite series of crops, and must be charged to and spread over a course of years, and calculated according to the tables of interest and annuities. The crops constitute the remuneration of the agriculturist if he consumes them himself. If he exchanges them, it is for services of another kind, and the appreciation of the services so exchanged constitutes their value.

Now it is easy to see that this class of permanent works executed by the agriculturist upon the land is a ‹value› which has not yet received its entire recompense, but which cannot fail to receive it. It cannot be supposed that he is to throw up his land and allow another to step into his shoes without compensation. The value has been incorporated and mixed up with the soil, and this is the reason why we can with propriety employ a metonymy and say ‹the land has value›. It has value, in fact, because it can be no longer acquired without giving in exchange the equivalent for this labour. But what I contend for is, that this land, on which its natural productive power had not originally conferred any value, [p276] has no value yet in this respect. This natural power, which was gratuitous then, is gratuitous now, and will be always gratuitous. We may say, indeed, that the land has ‹value›, but when we go to the root of the matter we find, that what possesses value is the human labour which has improved the land, and the capital which has been expended on it. Hence it is rigorously exact to say that the proprietor of the land is, after all, the proprietor only of a value which he has created, of services which he has rendered; and what property can be more legitimate? It is property created at no one’s expense, and neither intercepts nor taxes the gifts of God.

Nor is this all. The capital which has been advanced, and the interest of which is spread over the crop of successive years, is so far from increasing the price of the produce, and forming a burden on the consumers, that the latter acquire agricultural products cheaper in proportion as this capital is augmented, that is to say, in proportion as the value of the soil is increased. I have no doubt that this assertion will be thought paradoxical and tainted with exaggerated optimism, so much have people been accustomed to regard the value of land as a calamity, if not a piece of injustice. For my own part, I affirm, that it is not enough to say that the value of the soil has been created at no one’s expense; it is not enough to say that it injures no one; we should rather say that it benefits everybody. It is not only legitimate, but advantageous, even to those who possess no property.

We have here, in fact, the phenomenon of our previous illustration reproduced. We remarked that from the moment the water-carrier invented the barrow and the wheel, the purchaser of the water had to pay for two kinds of labour: 1st, The labour employed in making the barrow and the wheel, or rather the interest of the capital, and an annual contribution to a sinking fund to replace that capital when worn out; 2d, The direct labour which the water-carrier must still perform. But it is equally true that these two kinds of labour united do not equal in amount the labour which had to be undergone before the invention. Why? because a portion of the work has now been handed over to the gratuitous forces of nature. It is, indeed, in consequence of this diminution of human labour that the invention has been called forth and adopted.

All this takes place in exactly the same way in the case of land and the production of corn. As often as an agriculturist expends capital in permanent ameliorations, it is certain that the successive crops are burdened with the interest of that capital. But it is [p277] equally certain that the other species of labour—rude, unskilled, present, direct labour—is rendered unnecessary in a still greater proportion; so that each crop is obtained by the proprietor, and consequently by the consumer, on easier terms, on less onerous conditions—the proper action of capital consisting precisely in substituting natural and gratuitous co-operation for human labour which must be paid for.

Here is an example of it. In order to obtain a good crop, it is necessary that the field should be freed from superfluous moisture. Suppose this species of labour to be still included in the first category. Suppose that the cultivator goes every morning with a jar to carry off the stagnant water where it is productive of injury. It is clear that at the year’s end the land would have acquired no additional ‹value›, but the price of the grain would be enormously enhanced. It would be the same in the case of all those who followed the same process while the art of draining was in this primitive state. If the proprietor were to make a drain, that moment the land would acquire ‹value›, for this labour pertains to the second category—that which is incorporated with the land—and must be reimbursed by the products of consecutive years; and no one could expect to acquire the land without recompensing this work. Is it not true, however, that it would tend to lower the value of the crop? Is it not true that although during the first year it exacted an extraordinary exertion, it saves in the long-run more labour than it has occasioned? Is it not true that the draining thenceforth will be executed by the gratuitous law of hydrostatics more economically than it could be by muscular force? Is it not true that the purchasers of corn will benefit by this operation? Is it not true that they should esteem themselves fortunate in this new value acquired by the soil? And, having reference to more general considerations, is it not true, in fine, that the value of the soil attests a progress realized, not for the advantage of the proprietor only, but for that of society at large? How absurd, then, and suicidal in society to exclaim: The additional price charged for corn, to meet the interest of the capital expended on this drain, and ultimately to replace that capital, or its equivalent, as represented in the value of the land, is a privilege, a monopoly, a theft! At this rate, to cease to be a monopolist and a thief, the proprietor should have only to fill up his drain and betake himself to his jar. Would the man who has no property, and lives by wages, be any gainer by that?

Review all the permanent ameliorations of which the sum total makes up the value of land, and you will find that to each of them [p278] the same remark applies. Having filled up the drain, demolish the fence, and so force the agriculturist to mount guard upon his field; destroy the well, pull down the barn, dig up the road, burn the plough, efface the levelling, remove the artificial mould; replace in the field the loose stones, the weeds, the roots of trees; you will then have realized the Utopia of Equality. The land, and the human race along with it, wall have reverted to the primitive state, and will have no longer any value. The crops will have no longer any connexion with capital. Their price will be freed from that accursed element called interest. Everything, literally everything, will be done by actual labour, visible to the naked eye. Political Economy will be much simplified. Our country will support a man to the square league. The rest of her inhabitants will have died of hunger;—but then it can no longer be said that property is a monopoly, an injustice, and a theft.

Let us not be insensible, then, to those economic harmonies which unfold themselves to our view more and more as we analyze the ideas of exchange, of value, of capital, of interest, of property, of community.—Will it indeed be given me to describe the entire circle, and complete the demonstration?—But we have already, perhaps, advanced sufficiently far to be convinced that the social world, not less than the material world, bears the impress of a Divine hand, from which flows wisdom and goodness, and towards which we should raise our eyes in gratitude and admiration.

I cannot forbear reverting here to the view of this subject taken by M. Considérant.

Setting out with the proposition, that the soil has a proper value, independent of all human labour, that it constitutes ‹primitive and uncreated capital›, he concludes, in perfect consistency with his own views, that ‹appropriation› is ‹usurpation›. This supposed iniquity leads him to indulge in violent tirades against the institutions of modern society. On the other hand, he allows that permanent ameliorations confer an ‹additional value› on this primitive capital, an accessory so mixed up with the principal that we cannot separate them. What are we to do, then? for we have here a total value composed of two elements, of which one, the fruit of labour, is legitimate property; and the other, the gift of God, appropriated by man, is an iniquitous usurpation.

This is no trifling difficulty. M. Considérant resolves it by reference to the Right to Employment [‹Droit au travail›].

“The development of Mankind evidently demands that the Soil shall not be left in its wild and uncultivated state. The destiny of the human race is opposed to property in land retaining ‹its rude and primitive form›.

“In the midst of forests and savannas, the savage enjoys four natural rights, [p279] namely, the rights of Hunting, of Fishing, of Gathering the fruits, of Pasturing. Such is the primitive form of property in land.

“In all civilized societies, the working-classes, the Prolétaires, who inherit nothing and possess nothing, are simply despoiled of these rights. We cannot say that the primitive Right has changed its form, for it no longer exists. The form and the substance have alike disappeared.

“Now in what Form can such Rights be reconciled with the conditions of an industrial Society? The answer is plain:

“In the savage state, in order to avail himself of his Right, man is ‹obliged to act›. The ‹labour› of Fishing, of Hunting, of Gathering, of Pasturing are the conditions of the exercise of his Right. The primitive Right, then, is a Right ‹to engage in these employments›.

“Very well, let an industrial Society, which has appropriated the land, and taken away from man the power of exercising freely and at will his four natural Rights, let this society cede to the individual, in compensation for those Rights, of which it had despoiled him, the ‹Right to Employment›. On this principle, rightly understood and applied, the individual has no longer any reason to complain.

“The condition ‹sine quâ non›, then, of the Legitimacy of Property is, that Society should concede to the Prolétaire—the man who has no property—the ‹Right to Employment›; and, in exchange for a given exertion of activity, ‹assure› him of means of subsistence, at least as adequate as such exercise ‹could› have procured him in the primitive state.”

I cannot, without being guilty of tiresome repetition, discuss this question with M. Considérant in all its bearings. If I demonstrate, that what he terms ‹uncreated capital› is no capital at all; that what he terms the ‹additional value› of the soil, is not an additional value, but the ‹total value›; he must acknowledge that his argument has fallen to pieces, and, with it, all his complaints of the way in which mankind have judged it proper to live since the days of Adam. But this controversy would oblige me to repeat all that I have already said upon the essentially and indelibly gratuitous character of natural agents.

I shall only remark, that if M. Considérant speaks in behalf of the non-proprietary class, he is so very accommodating that they may think themselves betrayed. What! proprietors have usurped the soil, and all the miracles of vegetation which it displays! they have usurped the sun, the rain, the dew, oxygen, hydrogen, and azote, so far at least as these co-operate in the production of agricultural products—and you ask them to assure to the man who has no property, as a compensation, at least as much of the means of subsistence, in exchange for a given exertion of activity, as that exertion could have procured him in the primitive and savage state!

But do you not see that landed property has not waited for your injunctions in order to be a million times more generous? for to what is your demand limited?

In the primitive state, your four rights of fishing, hunting, gathering the fruits, and pasturing, maintain in existence, or rather in a state of vegetation, amid all the horrors of destitution, nearly one man to the square league of territory. The usurpation of the [p280] land will then be legitimate, according to you, when those who have been guilty of that usurpation support one man for every square league, exacting from him at the same time as much activity as is displayed by a Huron or an Iroquois. Pray remark, that France consists of only thirty thousand square leagues; that consequently, if its whole territory supports thirty thousand inhabitants in that condition of existence which the savage state affords, you renounce in behalf of the non-proprietary class all farther demands upon property. Now, there are thirty millions of Frenchmen who have not an inch of land, and among the number we meet with many—the president of the republic, ministers, magistrates, bankers, merchants, notaries, advocates, physicians, brokers, soldiers, sailors, professors, journalists, etc.—who would certainly not be disposed to exchange their condition for that of an Ioway. Landed property, then, must do much more for us than you exact from it. You demand from it the ‹Right to Employment›, up to a certain point—that is to say, until it yields to the masses—and in exchange for a given amount of labour, too—as much subsistence as they could earn in a state of barbarism. Landed property does much more than that—it gives more than the Right to employment—it gives Employment itself, and did it only clear the land-tax, it would do a hundred times more than you ask it to do.

I find to my great regret that I have not yet done with landed property and its value. I have still to state, and to refute, in as few words as possible, an objection which is specious and even formidable.

It is said,

“Your theory is contradicted by facts. Undoubtedly, as long as there is in a country abundance of uncultivated land, the existence of such land will of itself hinder the cultivated land from acquiring an undue value. It is also beyond doubt, that even when all the land has passed into the appropriated domain, if neighbouring nations have extensive tracts ready for the plough, freedom of trade is sufficient to restrain the value of landed property within just limits. In these two cases it would seem that the Price of land can only represent the capital advanced, and the Rent of land the interest of that capital. Whence we must conclude, as you do, that the proper action of the soil and the intervention of natural agents, going for nothing, and not influencing the value of the crops, remain gratuitous, and therefore common. All this is specious. We may have difficulty in discovering the error, and yet this reasoning is erroneous. In order to be convinced of it, it [p281] is sufficient to point to the fact, that there are in France cultivated lands which are worth from 100 francs to 6000 francs the hectare, an enormous difference, which is much easier explained by the difference of fertility than by the difference of the anterior labour applied to these lands. It is vain to deny, then, that fertility has its own value, for not a sale takes place which does not attest it. Every one who purchases a land estate examines its quality, and pays for it accordingly. If, of two properties which lie alongside each other, the one consists of a rich alluvium, and the other of barren sand, the first is surely of more value than the second, although both may have absorbed the same capital, and to say truth, the purchaser gives himself no trouble on that score. His attention is fixed upon the future, and not upon the past. What he looks at is not what the land has cost, but what it will yield, and he knows that its yield will be in proportion to its fertility. Then this fertility has a proper and intrinsic value which is independent of all human labour. To maintain the contrary is to endeavour to base the legitimacy of individual appropriation on a subtilty, or rather on a paradox.”

Let us inquire, then, what is the true foundation of the value of land.

I pray the reader not to forget that this question is of grave importance at the present moment. Hitherto it has been neglected or glossed over by Economists, as a question of mere curiosity. The legitimacy of individual appropriation was not formerly contested, but this is no longer the case. Theories which have obtained but too much success have created doubts in the minds of our best thinkers on the institution of property. And upon what do the authors of these theories found their complaints? Why, exactly upon the assertion contained in the objection which I have just explained—upon the fact, unfortunately admitted by all schools, that the soil, by reason of its fertility, possesses an inherent value communicated to it by nature and not by human means. Now value is not transferred gratuitously. The very word excludes the idea of gratuitousness. We say to the proprietor, then—you demand from me a value which is the fruit of my labour, and you offer me in exchange a value which is not the fruit of your labour, or of any labour, but of the liberality of nature.

Be assured that this would be a fearful complaint were it well founded. It did not originate with Messieurs Considérant and Proudhon. We find it in the works of Smith, of Ricardo, of Senior, of all the Economists without exception, not as a theory [p282] merely, but as a subject of complaint. These authors have not only attributed to the soil an extra-human value, they have boldly deduced the consequence, and branded landed property as a privilege, a monopoly, a usurpation. No doubt, after thus branding it, they have defended it on the plea of ‹necessity›. But what does such a defence amount to, but an error of reasoning which the Communist logicians have lost no time in rectifying?

It is not, then, to indulge an unhappy love for subtilties that I enter on this delicate subject. I should have wished to save both the reader and myself the ennui which even now I feel hovering over the conclusion of this chapter.

The answer to the objection now under consideration is to be found in the theory of Value, explained in the ‹fifth› chapter of this work. I there said that value does not essentially imply labour; still less is it necessarily proportionate to labour. I have shown that the foundation of value is not so much the ‹pains taken› by the person who transfers it as the ‹pains saved› to the person who receives it; and it is for that reason that I have made it to reside in something which embraces these two elements—in ‹service›. I have said that a person may render a great service with very little effort, or that with a great effort one may render a very trifling service. The sole result is, that labour does not obtain necessarily a remuneration which is always in proportion to its intensity, in the case either of man in an isolated condition, or of man in the social state.

Value is determined by a bargain between two contracting parties. In making that bargain, each has his own views. You offer to sell me corn. What matters it to me the time and pains it may have cost you to produce it? What I am concerned about is the time and pains it would have cost me to procure it from another quarter. The knowledge you have of my situation may render you more or less exacting; the knowledge I have of yours may render me more or less anxious to make the purchase. There is no necessary measure, then, of the recompense which you are to derive from your labour. That depends upon the circumstances, and the value which these circumstances confer upon the two services which we are desirous to exchange. By-and-by we shall call attention to an external force called Competition, whose mission is to regulate values, and render them more and more proportional to efforts. Still this proportion is not of the essence of value, seeing that the proportion is established under the pressure of a contingent fact.

Keeping this in view, I maintain that the value of land arises, fluctuates, and is determined, like that of gold, iron, water, the [p283] lawyer’s advice, the physician’s consultation, the singer’s or dancer’s performance, the artist’s picture—in short, like all other values; that it is subject to no exceptional laws; that it constitutes a property the same in origin, the same in nature, and as legitimate, as any other property. But it does not at all follow, as you must now see, that, of two exertions of labour applied to the soil, one should not be much better remunerated than the other.

Let us revert again to that industry, the most simple of all, and the best fitted to show us the delicate point which separates the onerous labour of man from the gratuitous co-operation of nature. I allude to the humble industry of the water-carrier.

A man procures and brings home a barrel of water. Does he become possessed of a value necessarily proportionate to his labour? In that case, the value would be independent of the service the water may render. Nay more, it would be fixed; for the labour, once over, is no longer susceptible of increase or diminution.

Well, the day after he procures and brings home this barrel of water, it may lose its value, if, for example, it has rained during the night. In that case every one is provided—the water can render no service, and is no longer wanted. In economic language, it has ceased to be in demand.

On the other hand, it may acquire considerable value, if extraordinary wants, unforeseen and pressing, come to manifest themselves.

What is the consequence? that man, working for the future, is not exactly aware beforehand what value the future will attach to his labour. Value incorporated in a material object will be higher or lower, according as it renders more or less service, or, to express it more clearly, human labour, which is the source of value, receives according to circumstances a higher or lower remuneration. Such eventualities are an exercise for foresight, and foresight also has a right to remuneration.

But what connexion is there, I would ask, between these fluctuations of value, between these variations in the recompense of labour, and that marvellous natural industry, those admirable physical laws, which without our participation have brought the water of the ocean to the spring? Because the value of this barrel of water varies according to circumstances, are we to conclude that nature charges sometimes more, sometimes less, sometimes nothing at all, for evaporation, for carrying the clouds from the ocean to the mountains, for freezing, melting, and the whole of that admirable industry which supplies the spring? [p284]

It is exactly the same thing in the case of agricultural products.

The value of the soil, or rather of the capital applied to the soil, is made up not of one element but of two. It depends not only on the labour which has been employed, but also on the ability which society possesses to remunerate that labour—on Demand as well as on Supply.

Take the case of a field. Not a year passes, perhaps, in which there is not some labour bestowed upon it, the effects of which are permanent, and of course an increase of value is the result.

Roads of access, besides, are improved and made more direct, the security of person and property becomes more complete, markets are extended, population increases in number and in wealth—different systems of culture are introduced, and a new career is opened to intelligence and skill; the effect of this change of medium, of this general prosperity, being to confer additional value on both the present and the anterior labour, and consequently on the field.

There is here no injustice, no exception in favour of landed property. No species of labour, from that of the banker to that of the day-labourer, fails to exhibit the same phenomenon. No one fails to see his remuneration improved by the improvement of the society in which his work is carried on. This action and reaction of the prosperity of each on the prosperity of all, and ‹vice versa›, is the very law of value. So false is the conclusion which imputes to the soil and its productive powers an imaginary value, that intellectual labour, professions and trades which have no connexion with matter or the co-operation of physical laws, enjoy the same advantage, which in fact is not exceptional but universal. The lawyer, the physician, the professor, the artist, the poet, receive a higher remuneration for an equal amount of labour, in proportion as the town or country to which they belong increases in wealth and prosperity, in proportion as the taste or demand for their services becomes more generally diffused, in proportion as the public is more able and more willing to remunerate them. The acquisition of clients and customers is regulated by this principle. It is still more apparent in the case of the Basque Giant and Tom Thumb, who lived by the simple exhibition of their exceptional stature, and reap a much better harvest, from the curiosity of the numerous and wealthy crowds of our large towns, than from that of a few poor and straggling villagers. In this case, demand not only enhances value, it creates it. Why, then, should we think it exceptional or unjust that demand should also exert an influence on the value of land and of agricultural products? [p285]

Is it alleged that land may thus attain an exaggerated value? They who say so have never reflected on the immense amount of labour which arable land has absorbed. I dare affirm, that there is not a field in this country which ‹is worth› what it has cost, which could be exchanged for as much labour as has been expended in bringing it to its present state of productiveness. If this observation is well founded, it is conclusive. It frees landed property from the slightest taint of injustice. For this reason, I shall return to the subject when I come to examine Ricardo’s theory of Rent, and I shall show that we must apply to agricultural capital the law which I have stated in these terms: In proportion as capital increases, products are divided between capitalists or proprietors and labourers, in such a way that the ‹relative› share of the former goes on continually diminishing, although their ‹absolute› share is increased, whilst the share of the latter is increased both absolutely and relatively.

The illusion which has induced men to believe that the productive powers of the soil have an independent value, because they possess Utility, has led to many errors and catastrophes. It has driven them frequently to the premature establishment of colonies, the history of which is nothing else than a lamentable martyrology. They have reasoned in this way: In our own country we can obtain value only by labour, and when we have done our work, we have obtained a value which is only proportionate to our labour. If we emigrate to Guiana, to the banks of the Mississippi, to Australia, to Africa, we shall obtain possession of vast territories, uncultivated but fertile; and our reward will be, that we shall become possessed not of the value we have created, but also of the inherent and independent value of the land we may reclaim. They set out, and a cruel experience soon confirms the truth of the theory which I am now explaining. They labour, they clear, they exhaust themselves; they are exposed to privations, to sufferings, to diseases; and then if they wish to dispose of the land which they have rendered fit for production, they cannot obtain for it what it has cost them, and they are forced to acknowledge that value is of human creation. I defy you to give me an instance of the establishment of a colony which has not at the beginning been attended with disaster.

“Upwards of a thousand labourers were sent out to the Swan River Colony; but the extreme cheapness of land (eighteenpence, or less than two francs, an acre) and the extravagant rate of wages, afforded them such facilities and inducements to become landowners, that capitalists could no longer get any one to cultivate their lands. A capital of £200,000 (five millions of francs) was lost in consequence, and the colony became a scene of desolation. The labourers having left their employers from the delusive desire to become landowners, agricultural implements were allowed to rust—seeds rotted—and sheep, cattle, and horses perished for want of attention. A frightful famine [p286] cured the labourers of their infatuation, and they returned to ask employment from the capitalists; but it was too late.”—‹Proceedings of the South Australian Association.›

The association, attributing this disaster to the cheapness of land, raised its price to 12s. an acre. But, adds Carey, from whom I borrow this quotation, the real cause was, that the labourers, being persuaded that land possesses an ‹inherent› value, apart from the labour bestowed on it, were anxious to exercise “the power of appropriation,” to which the power to demand Rent is attributed.

What follows supplies us with an argument still more conclusive:

“In 1836, the landed estates in the colony of Swan River were to be purchased from the original settlers at one shilling an acre.”—‹New Monthly Magazine.›

Thus the land which was sold by the company at 12s.—upon which the settlers had bestowed much labour and money—was disposed of by them at one shilling! What then became of the value of ‹the natural and indestructible productive powers of the soil›?[62]

I feel that the vast and important subject of the Value of Land has not been exhausted in this chapter, written by snatches and amid many distractions. I shall return to it hereafter; but in the meantime I cannot resist submitting one observation to my readers, and more especially to Economists.

The illustrious ‹savants› who have done so much to advance the science, whose lives and writings breathe benevolence and philanthropy, and who have disclosed to us, at least in a certain aspect, and within the limits of their researches, the true solution of the social problem—the Quesnays, the Turgots, the Smiths, the Malthuses, the Says—have not however escaped, I do not say from refutation, for that is always legitimate, but from calumny, disparagement, and insult. To attack their writings, and even their motives, has become fashionable. It may be said, perhaps, that in this chapter I am furnishing arms to their detractors, and truly the moment would be ill chosen for me to turn against those whom I candidly acknowledge as my initiators, my masters, and my guides.

But supreme homage is, after all, due to Truth, or what I regard as Truth. No book was ever written without some admixture of error. Now, a single error in Political Economy, if we press it, torture it, deduce from it rigorously its logical consequences, involves all kinds of errors—in fact, lands us in chaos. There never was a book from which we could not extract one proposition, isolated, incomplete, false, including consequently a whole world [p287] of errors and confusion. In my conscience, I believe that the definition which the Economists have given of the word ‹Value› is of this number. We have just seen that this definition has led them to cast a serious doubt on the legitimacy of property in land, and, by consequence, in capital; and they have only been stopped short on this fatal road by an inconsistency. This inconsistency has saved them. They have resumed their march on the road of Truth; and their error, if it be one, is, in their works, an isolated blot. Then the Socialists have come to lay hold of this false definition, not to refute it, but to adopt it, strengthen it, make it the foundation of their propaganda, and deduce from it all its consequences. Hence has arisen in our day an imminent social danger; and it is for that reason that I have thought it my duty to be explicit on this subject, and trace the erroneous theory to its source. If you conclude that I have separated myself from my masters Smith and Say, from my friends Blanqui and Garnier, because, by an oversight in their learned and admirable works, they have made, as I think, an erroneous application of the word ‹value›; if you conclude from this that I have no longer faith in Political Economy and Political Economists, I can only protest, and appeal to the very title of the present volume. [p288]

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

X. COMPETITION

There is not in the whole vocabulary of Political Economy a word which has roused the fury of modern reformers so much as the word ‹Competition›, which, in order to render it the more odious, they never fail to couple with the epithet ‹anarchical›.

What is the meaning of ‹anarchical competition›? I really don’t know. What could we substitute for it? I am equally ignorant.

I hear people, indeed, calling out ‹Organization! Association!› What does that mean? Let us come to an understanding, once for all. I desire to know what sort of authority these writers intend to exercise over me, and all other living men; for I acknowledge only one species of authority, that of reason, if indeed they have it on their side. Is it their wish then to deprive me of the right of exercising my judgment on what concerns my own subsistence? Is their object to take from me the power of comparing the services which I render with those which I receive? Do they mean that I should act under the influence of restraint, exerted over me by them and not by my own intelligence? If they leave me my liberty, Competition remains. If they deprive me of freedom, I am their slave. Association will be ‹free and voluntary›, they say. Be it so. But then each group of associates will, as regards all other groups, be just what individuals now are in relation to each other, and we shall still have ‹Competition›. The association will be ‹integral›. A good joke truly. What! Anarchical Competition is now desolating society, and we must wait for a remedy, until, by dint of your persuasion, all the nations of the earth—Frenchmen, Englishmen, Chinese, Japanese, Caffres, Hottentots, Laplanders, Cossacks, Patagonians—make up their minds to unite in one of the forms of association which you have devised? Why, this is just to avow that competition is indestructible; and will you venture to say that a phenomenon which [p289] is indestructible, and consequently providential, can be mischievous?

After all, what is Competition? Is it a thing which exists and is self-acting like the cholera? No, Competition is only the absence of constraint. In what concerns my own interest, I desire to choose for myself, not that another should choose for me, or in spite of me—that is all. And if any one pretends to substitute his judgment for mine in what concerns me, I should ask to substitute mine for his in what concerns him. What guarantee have we that things would go on better in this way? It is evident that Competition is Liberty. To take away the liberty of acting is to destroy the possibility, and consequently the power, of choosing, of judging, of comparing; it is to annihilate intelligence, to annihilate thought, to annihilate man. From whatever quarter they set out, to this point all modern reformers tend—to ameliorate society they begin by annihilating the individual, under the pretext that all evils come from this source—as if all good did not come from it too.

We have seen that services are exchanged for services. In reality, every man comes into the world charged with the responsibility of providing for his satisfactions by his efforts. When another man saves us an effort, we ought to save him an effort in return. He imparts to us a satisfaction resulting from his effort; we ought to do the same for him.

But who is to make the comparison? for between these efforts, these pains, these services exchanged, there is necessarily a comparison to be made, in order to arrive at equivalence, at justice;—unless indeed injustice, inequality, chance, is to be our rule, which would just be another way of putting human intelligence ‹hors de cause›. We must, then, have a judge; and who is this judge to be? Is it not quite natural that in every case wants should be judged of by those who experience them, satisfactions by those who seek them, efforts by those who exchange them? And is it seriously proposed to substitute for this universal vigilance of the parties interested, a social authority (suppose that of the reformer himself), charged with determining in all parts of the world the delicate conditions of these countless acts of interchange? Do you not see that this would be to set up the most fallible, the most universal, the most arbitrary, the most inquisitorial, the most insupportable—we are fortunately able to add, the most impossible—of all despotisms ever conceived in the brain of pasha or mufti?

It is sufficient to know that Competition is nothing else than [p290] the absence of an arbitrary authority as judge of exchanges, in order to be satisfied that it is indestructible. Illegitimate force may no doubt restrain, counteract, trammel the liberty of exchanging, as it may the liberty of walking; but it can annihilate neither the one nor the other without annihilating man. This being so, it remains for us to inquire whether Competition tends to the happiness or misery of mankind; a question which amounts to this,—Is the human race naturally progressive, or are its tendencies fatally retrograde?

I hesitate not to say that Competition, which, indeed, we might denominate Liberty, despite the repulsion which it excites, despite the declamations to which it has given rise, is a law which is democratical in its essence. Of all the laws to which Providence has confided the progress of human society, it is the most progressive, levelling, and ‹communautaire›. It is this law which brings successively into the ‹common› domain the use and enjoyment of commodities which nature has accorded gratuitously only to certain countries. It is this law, again, which brings into the ‹common› domain all the conquests which the genius of each age bequeaths to succeeding generations, leaving them only supplementary labours to execute, which last they continue to exchange with one another, without succeeding, as they desire, in obtaining a recompense for the co-operation of natural agents; and if these labours, as happens always in the beginning, possess a value which is not proportionate to their intensity, it is still Competition which, by its incessant but unperceived action, restores an equilibrium which is sanctioned by justice, and which is more exact than any that the fallible sagacity of a human magistracy could by possibility establish. Far from Competition leading to inequality, as has been erroneously alleged, we may assert that all ‹factitious› inequality is imputable to its absence; and if the gulf between the Grand Lama and a Paria is more profound than that which separates the President from an artisan of the United States, the reason is this, that Competition (or Liberty), which is curbed and put down in Asia, is not so in America. This is the reason why, whilst the Socialists see in Competition the source of all that is evil, we trace to the attacks which have been made upon it the disturbance of all that is good. Although this great law has been misunderstood by the Socialists and their adepts; although it is frequently harsh in its operation, no law is more fertile in social harmonies, more beneficent in general results; no law attests more brilliantly the measureless superiority of the designs of God over the vain and powerless combinations of men. [p291]

I must here remind the reader of that singular but unquestionable result of the social order to which I have already invited his attention,[63] and which the power of habit hides too frequently from our view. It is this, ‹that the sum total of satisfactions which falls to each member of society is much superior to those which he could procure for himself by his own efforts›. In other words, there is an evident disproportion between our consumption and our labour. This phenomenon, which all of us can easily verify, if we turn our regards upon ourselves, ought, it seems to me, to inspire some gratitude to society, to which we owe it.

We come into this world destitute of everything, tormented with numerous wants, and provided with nothing but faculties to enable us to struggle against them. ‹A priori›, it would seem that all we could expect would be to obtain satisfactions proportionate to our labour. If we obtain more, infinitely more, to what do we owe the excess? Precisely to that natural organization against which we are constantly declaiming, when we are not engaged in seeking to subvert it.

In itself the phenomenon is truly extraordinary. That certain men consume more than they produce is easily explained, if in one way or other they usurp the rights of other people—if they receive services without rendering them. But how can that be true of all men at the same time? How happens it that, after having exchanged their services without constraint, without spoliation, upon a footing of ‹equivalence›, each man can say to himself with truth, I consume in a day more than I could produce in a century?

The reader has seen that the additional element which resolves the problem is the co-operation of natural agents, constantly becoming more and more effective in the work of production; it is gratuitous utility falling continually into the domain of ‹Community›; it is the labour of heat and of cold, of light, of gravitation, of affinity, of elasticity, coming progressively to be added to the labour of man, diminishing the value of services by rendering them more easy.

I must have but feebly explained the theory of ‹value› if the reader imagines that value diminishes immediately and of its own accord, by the simple fact of the co-operation of natural forces, and the relief thereby afforded to human labour. It is not so; for then we might say with the English Economists that value is proportional to labour. The man who is aided by a natural and gratuitous force renders his services more easily; but he does not [p292] on that account renounce voluntarily any portion whatever of his accustomed remuneration. To induce him to do that, external coercion—pressure from without—severe but not unjust pressure—is necessary. It is Competition which exerts this pressure. As long as Competition does not intervene, as long as the man who has availed himself of a natural agent preserves his secret, that natural agent is gratuitous, but it is not yet ‹common›. The victory has been gained, but to the profit only of a single man, or a single class. It is not yet a benefit to mankind at large. No change has yet taken place, except that one description of ‹services›, although partly relieved from the pain of muscular exertion, still exacts all its former remuneration. We have, on the one hand, a man who exacts from all his fellows the same amount of labour as formerly, although he offers them a limited amount of his own labour in return. On the other, we have mankind at large, who are still obliged to make the same sacrifice of time and of labour in order to obtain a product now realized in part by nature.

Were things to remain in this state, a principle of indefinite inequality would be introduced into the world with every new invention. Not only could we not say that value is proportional to labour; we could not even say that value tends to become proportional to labour. All that we have said in the preceding chapters about ‹gratuitous utility› and ‹progressive community› would be chimerical. It would not be true that services are exchanged against services, in such a way that the gifts of God are transferred gratuitously from one man to another, down to the ultimate recipient, who is the consumer. Each would continue to be paid, not only for his labour, but for the natural forces which he had once succeeded in setting to work; in a word, society would be constituted on the principle of universal Monopoly, in place of on the principle of progressive Community.

But it is not so. God, who has bestowed on all His creatures heat, light, gravitation, air, water, the soil, the marvels of vegetable life, electricity, and countless other benefits which it is beyond my power to enumerate,—God, who has placed in the human breast the feeling of ‹personal interest›, which, like a magnet, attracts everything to itself,—God, I say, has placed also in the bosom of society another spring of action, which He has charged with the care of preserving to His benefits their original destination, which was, that they should be gratuitous and common. This spring of action is Competition.

Thus, Personal Interest is that irrepressible force belonging to the individual which urges us on to progress and discovery, which [p293] spurs us on to exertion, but leads also to monopoly. Competition is that force belonging to the species which is not less irrepressible, and which snatches progress, as it is realized, from individual hands, and makes it the common inheritance of the great family of mankind. These two forces, in each of which, considered individually, we might find something to blame, thus constitute social Harmony, by the play of their combinations, when regarded in conjunction.

And we may remark, in passing, that we ought not to be at all surprised that the individual interests of men, considered as producers, should from the beginning have risen up against Competition, should have rebuked it, and sought to destroy it—calling in for this purpose the assistance of force, fraud, privilege, sophistry, monopoly, restriction, legislative protection, etc. The morality of the means shows us clearly enough the morality of the end. But the astonishing and melancholy thing is, that science herself—false science, it is true—propagated with so much zeal by the socialist schools, in the name of philanthropy, equality, and fraternity, should have espoused the cause of Individualism, in its narrowest and most exclusive manifestation, and should have deserted the cause of humanity.

Let us see now how Competition acts:—

Man, under the influence of self-interest, is always, and necessarily, on the outlook for such circumstances as may give the greatest ‹value› to his services. He is not long in discovering that, as regards the gifts of God, he may be favoured in three ways:

1. He may appropriate to his own exclusive use these gifts themselves; or,

2. He may alone know the ‹process› by which they can be made useful; or,

3. He alone may possess the ‹instrument› by means of which their co-operation in the work of production can be secured.

In any of these cases, he gives ‹little› of his own labour in exchange for ‹much› of the labour of other men. His services have a high relative ‹value›, and we are led to believe that this excess of value resides in the natural agent. If it were so, this value would not be subject to fall. Now, what proves that the value is in the service is, that we find Competition diminishing both value and service simultaneously.

1. Natural agents—the gifts of God—are not distributed uniformly over the different countries of the world. What an infinite variety of vegetable productions are spread over the wide range [p294] extending from the region of the pine to the region of the palm tree! Here the soil is more productive, there the heat is more vivifying. In one quarter we meet with stone, in another with lime, in another with iron, copper, or coal. Water-power is not to be found everywhere, nor can we everywhere avail ourselves to an equal extent of the power of the winds. Distance, from the objects we find essential, of itself makes a vast difference in the obstacles which our efforts encounter. Even the human faculties vary in some measure with climate and races.

It is easy to see that, but for the law of Competition, this inequality in the distribution of the gifts of God would lead to a corresponding inequality in the condition of men.

Whoever happened to have within reach a natural advantage would profit by it, but his fellow-men would not. He would not permit other men to participate in it through his instrumentality, without stipulating an excessive remuneration, the amount of which he would have the power of fixing arbitrarily. He could attach to his services any value he pleased. We have seen that the extreme limits between which it must be determined are, the ‹pains taken› by the man who renders the service and the ‹pains saved› to the man who receives it. Competition alone hinders its being always raised to the maximum. The inhabitant of the tropics, for example, would say to the European—“Thanks to the sun’s rays, I can, with labour ‹equal to ten›, procure a given quantity of sugar, coffee, cocoa, or cotton, whilst you, obliged in your cold climate to have recourse to hot-houses, stoves, and shelter, cannot obtain the same quantity but with labour equal ‹to a hundred›. You wish to obtain my coffee, sugar, or cotton, and you would not be sorry were I to take into account in the transaction only the pains which I have taken, the labour I have expended. But what I regard principally is the pains, the labour, I have saved you; for, aware that that is the limit of your resistance, I make it the limit of my exaction. As what I produce with an amount of labour equal to ‹ten›, you could produce only with labour equal to ‹a hundred›, were I to demand in exchange for my sugar a commodity which cost you labour equal to 101, you would certainly refuse; but all that I ask is labour equal to 99. You may higgle and look gruff for a little, but you will come to my terms; for at this rate you have still an advantage by the exchange. You think these terms unfair; but, after all, it is not to you but to me that God has vouchsafed the advantage of a higher temperature. I know that I am in a position to take advantage of this gift of Providence, by depriving you of it unless you pay me a tax, for [p295] I have no competitors. Here, then, are my sugar, my cocoa, my coffee, my cotton—take them on the conditions I impose—or raise them for yourself—or do without them.”

It is true that the European might hold to the inhabitant of the tropics some such language as this: “Turn over your soil, dig pits, search for iron and coal, and felicitate yourself if you find any; for if not, it is my determination to push my exactions to an extreme also. God has vouchsafed to us both precious gifts. We appropriate as much of them as we require, but we will not suffer others to touch them without paying us a tax.”

Even if things took place in this way, scientific exactness would not allow us to attribute to natural agents that Value which resides only in ‹services›. But the error would be harmless, for the result would be absolutely the same. Services would still be exchanged against services, but they would exhibit no tendency to conform to efforts, or labour, as a measure. The gifts of God would be ‹personal› privileges, not ‹common› benefits; and we might perhaps have some reason to complain that the Author of things had treated us in a way so incurably unequal. Should we, then, be brethren? Could we regard ourselves as the children of a common Father? The absence of Competition, that is to say of Liberty, would in the first instance be an insuperable bar to Equality. The absence of Equality would exclude all idea of Fraternity—and nothing of the republican motto[64] would then be left.

But let Competition be introduced, and we shall see it instantly present an insuperable barrier to all such leonine bargains, to all such forestalling of the gifts of God, to all such revolting pretensions in the appreciation of services, to all such inequalities with efforts exchanged.

And let us remark, first of all, that Competition acts forcibly, called forth as it is by these very inequalities. Labour betakes itself instinctively to the quarter where it is best remunerated, and never fails to put an end to this exceptional advantage, so that Inequality is only a spur which urges us on in spite of ourselves towards Equality. It is in truth one of the most beautiful ‹final intentions› observable in the social mechanism. Infinite Goodness, which manifests beneficence everywhere, would seem to have made choice of the avaricious producer in order to effect an equitable distribution among all; and truly it is a marvellous sight this, of self-interest realizing continually what it ever desires to avoid. Man, as a producer, is necessarily, inevitably, attracted by [p296] excessive returns, which he thus reduces to the ordinary rate. He pursues his own interest; and without knowing it, without wishing it, without seeking it, he promotes the general good.

Thus, to recur to our former example, the inhabitant of the tropics, trafficking in the gifts of God, realizes an excessive remuneration, and by that very means brings down upon himself Competition. Human labour exerts itself in proportion to the magnitude of the inequality, if I may use the expression, and never rests until that inequality is effaced. Under the action of Competition, we see the tropical labour, which was ‹equal to ten›, exchanged successively for European labour equal to 80, 50, 40, 20, and finally to 10. Under the empire of the natural laws of society, there is no reason why this should not take place; that is to say, there is no reason why services exchanged should not be measured by the labour performed, the pains taken,—the gifts of God on both sides being gratuitous and into the bargain. We have only to consider, in order to appreciate and bless the revolution which is thus effected. In the first instance, the labour undergone on both sides is equal, and this satisfies the human mind, which always desires justice. Then what has become of the gift of God? Attend to this, reader. No one has been deprived of it. In this respect we have not allowed ourselves to be imposed upon by the clamours of the tropical producer. The Brazilian, in as far as he is himself a consumer of sugar, or cotton, or coffee, never ceases to profit by the sun’s rays—his good fortune does not cease to aid him in the work of production. What he has lost is only the unjust power of levying a tax upon the consumption of the inhabitants of Europe. The beneficence of Providence, because ‹gratuitous›, has become, as it ought to become, ‹common›; for ‹common› and ‹gratuitous› are in reality the same thing.

The gift of God has become common—and the reader will observe that I avail myself here of a special fact to elucidate a phenomenon which is universal—this gift, I say, has become common to all. This is not declamation, but the expression of a truth which is demonstrable. Why has this beautiful phenomenon been misunderstood? Because community is realized under the form of ‹value annihilated›, and the mind with difficulty lays hold of negations. But I ask, Is it not true that when, in order to obtain a certain quantity of sugar, coffee, or cotton, I give only one-tenth of the labour which I should find it necessary to expend in producing the commodity myself, and this because the Brazilian sun performs the other nine-tenths of the work,—Is it not true, I say, that in that case I still exchange labour for labour, and [p297] really and truly obtain, over and above the Brazilian labour, and into the bargain, the co-operation of the climate of the tropics? Can I not affirm with rigorous exactitude that I have become, that all men have become, in the same way as the Indians and Americans, that is to say gratuitously, participators in the liberality of nature, so far as the commodities in question are concerned?

England possesses productive coal mines. That is no doubt a great ‹local› advantage, more especially if we suppose, as I shall do for the sake of argument, that the Continent possesses no coal mines. Apart from the consideration of exchange, the advantage which this gives to the people of England is the possession of fuel in greater abundance than other nations,—fuel obtained with less labour, and at less expense of useful time. As soon as exchange comes into operation—keeping out of view Competition—the exclusive possession of these mines enables the people of England to demand a considerable remuneration, and to set a high price upon their labour. Not being in a situation to perform this labour ourselves, or procure what we want from another quarter, we have no alternative but to submit. English labour devoted to this description of work will be well remunerated; in other words, coal will be dear, and the bounty of nature may be considered as conferred on the people of one nation, and not on mankind at large.

But this state of things cannot last; for a great natural and social law is opposed to it—Competition. For the very reason that this species of labour is largely remunerated in England, it will be in great demand there, for men are always in quest of high remuneration. The number of miners will increase, both in consequence of the sons of miners devoting themselves to their fathers’ trade, and in consequence of men transferring their industry to mining from other departments. They will offer to work for a smaller recompense, and their remuneration will go on diminishing until it reach the ‹normal rate›, or the rate generally given in the country for analogous work. This means that the price of English coal will fall in France; that a given amount of French labour will procure a greater and greater quantity of English coal, or rather of English labour incorporated and worked up in coal; and, finally (and this is what I pray you to remark), that the gift which nature would appear to have bestowed upon England has in reality been conferred on the whole human race. The coal of Newcastle is brought within the reach of all men ‹gratuitously›, as far as the mere material is concerned. This is neither a paradox nor an exaggeration,—it is brought within their reach like the [p298] water of the brook, on the single condition of going to fetch it, or remunerating those who undertake that labour for us. When we purchase coal, it is not the coal that we pay for, but the labour necessary to extract it and transport it. All that we do is to give a corresponding amount of labour which we have worked up or incorporated in wine or in silk. So true is it that the liberality of nature has been extended to France, that the labour which we refund is not greater than that which it would have been necessary to undergo had the deposit of coal been in France. Competition has established equality between the two nations as far as coal is concerned, except as regards the inevitable and inconsiderable difference resulting from distance and carriage.

I have given two examples, and, to render the phenomenon more striking, I have selected international transactions, which are effected on a great scale. I fear I may thus have diverted the reader’s attention from the same phenomena acting incessantly around us in our every-day transactions. Let him take in his hand the most familiar objects, a glass, a nail, a loaf, a piece of cloth, a book. Let him meditate on such ordinary products, and reflect how great an amount of gratuitous utility would never but for Competition have become ‹common› for humanity at large, although remaining gratuitous for the producer. He will find that, thanks to Competition, in purchasing his loaf he pays nothing for the action of the sun, nothing for the rain, nothing for the frost, nothing for the laws of vegetable physiology, nothing even for the powers of the soil, despite all that has been said on that subject; nothing for the law of gravitation set to work by the miller; nothing for the law of combustion set to work by the baker; nothing for the horse-power set to work by the carrier; that he pays only for the services rendered, the pains taken, by human agents; and let him reflect that, but for Competition, he must have paid, over and above, a tax for the intervention of all these natural agents; that that tax would have had no other limit than the difficulty which he might himself have experienced in procuring the loaf by his own efforts, and that consequently a whole life would not have been sufficient to supply the remuneration which would have been demanded of him. Let him think farther, that he does not make use of a single commodity which might not give rise to the same reflections, and that these reflections apply not to him only, but to all mankind, and he will then comprehend the radical error of those socialist theories which, looking only at the surface of things, the epidermis of society, have been set up with so much levity against Competition, in other words, against human Liberty. He will then regard [p299] Competition, which preserves to the gifts of nature, unequally distributed, their common and gratuitous character, as the principle of a just and natural equalization; he will admire it as the force which holds in check the egotism of individual interest, with which at the same time it is so artistically combined as to serve both as a curb to avarice and a spur to exertion; and he will bless it as a most striking manifestation of God’s impartial solicitude for the good of all His creatures.

From what has been said, we may deduce the solution of one of the problems which have been most keenly controverted, namely, that of free trade as between nation and nation. If it be true, as seems to me incontestable, that Competition leads the various countries of the globe to exchange with one another nothing else than labour, exertion more and more equalized, and to transfer at the same time reciprocally, and ‹into the bargain›, the natural advantages that each possesses; how blind and absurd must those men be who exclude foreign products by legislative measures, under the pretext that they are cheap, and have little value in proportion to their aggregate utility; that is to say, precisely because they include a large proportion of gratuitous utility!

I have said, and I repeat it, that I have confidence in a theory when I find it in accordance with universal practice. Now, it is certain that countries would effect many exchanges with each other were they not interdicted ‹by force›. It requires the bayonet to prevent them; and for that reason it is wrong to prevent them.

2. Another circumstance places certain men in a favourable and exceptional situation as regards remuneration—I mean the personal and exclusive knowledge of the ‹processes› by means of which ‹natural agents› can alone be appropriated. What we term invention is a conquest by human genius; and these beautiful and pacific conquests, which are, in the first instance, a source of wealth for those who achieve them, become by-and-by, under the action of Competition, the ‹common and gratuitous› patrimony of all.

The forces of nature belong indeed to all. Gravitation, for instance, is common property; it surrounds us, pervades us, commands us. And yet were there but one mode of making gravitation co-operate towards a useful and determinate result, and but one man acquainted with that mode, this man might set a high price upon his work, or refuse to work except in exchange for a very high remuneration. His demands would have no limit [p300] until they reached the point at which the consumers must make greater sacrifices than the old processes entailed upon them. He may have contrived, for example, to annihilate nine-tenths of the labour necessary to produce a certain commodity, ‹x›. But ‹x› has at present a current market-price determined by the labour which its production by the ordinary methods exacts. The inventor sells ‹x› at the market-price; in other words, his labour receives a recompense ten times higher than that of his rivals. This is the first phase of the invention.

So far we discover nothing unjust or unfair. It is just and equitable that the man who makes the world acquainted with a useful process should be rewarded for it;—‹A chacun selon sa capacité›.

Observe, too, that as yet mankind, with the exception of the inventor, have gained nothing unless virtually, and in perspective, so to speak, since in order to procure the commodity ‹x›, each acquirer must make a sacrifice equal to the former cost.

Now, however, the invention enters its second phase—that of ‹imitation›. Excessive remuneration awakens covetousness. The new process is more generally adopted; the price of the commodity ‹x› continues to fall, and the remuneration goes on diminishing in proportion as the imitation becomes more distant in date from the original invention, that is to say, in proportion as it becomes more easy, and for that reason less meritorious. Surely there is nothing in all this that cannot be avowed by a legislation the most advanced and the most impartial.

At length the invention reaches its third phase, its final stage, that of universal ‹diffusion›, when it becomes ‹common› and ‹gratuitous›. The cycle has been completed when Competition has brought back the remuneration of the producers of ‹x› to the general and normal rate yielded by all analogous work. Then the nine-tenths of the labour, which by the hypothesis we supposed to be saved by the invention, become an acquisition to mankind at large. The utility of the commodity ‹x› remains the same; but nine-tenths of that commodity are now the product of gravitation, a force which was formerly common to all in principle, but has now become common to all in this special application. So true is this, that all the consumers of that commodity throughout the world may now acquire it with one-tenth of the labour which it formerly cost. The surplus labour has been entirely annihilated by the new process.

If we consider that there is no human invention which has not described this circle, that ‹x› is here an algebraical sign which represents corn, clothing, books, ships,—in the production of which an [p301] incalculable amount of Labour or Value has been annihilated, by the plough, the spinning-jenny, the printing-press, and the sail; that this observation is applicable to the humblest of tools as well as to the most complicated mechanism, to the nail, the wedge, the lever, as well as to the steam-engine and the electric telegraph, we shall come, I trust, to understand the solution of this grand problem of human society, ‹that an amount of utility and enjoyment, always greater, and more and more equally distributed, comes to remunerate each determinate quantity of human labour›.

3. I have shown how Competition brings into the domain of the ‹common and gratuitous› both ‹natural agents› and the ‹processes› by which they are made operative. It remains to show that Competition executes the same function with reference to the instruments by means of which we set these agents to work. It is not enough that there should exist in nature a force, such as heat, light, gravitation, electricity; it is not enough that intelligence conceives the means of making that force available;—there must be ‹instruments› to realize this conception of the mind, and ‹provisions› to maintain those who devote themselves to it during the operation.

As regards remuneration, there is a third circumstance which favours a man, or a class of men, namely, the possession of ‹Capital›. The man who has in his hands the tools necessary for labour, the materials to work upon, and the provisions for his subsistence during the operation, is in a situation to determine his own remuneration. The principle of this is equitable, for capital is only anterior labour which has not yet been remunerated. The capitalist is in a good position to impose terms; but observe that, even when free from Competition, there is a limit which his demands never can exceed—this limit is the point at which his remuneration would absorb all the advantages of the service which he renders. In these circumstances, it is unreasonable to talk, as is so often done, of the ‹tyranny of capital›, seeing that even in the most extreme cases neither its presence nor its absence can injure the condition of the labourer. Like the inhabitant of the tropics, who has an intensity of heat at his disposal which nature has denied to colder regions—or like the inventor, who possesses the secret of a process unknown to other men—all that the capitalist can say is: “Would you profit by my labour—I set such a price upon it; if you find it too high, do as you have done hitherto—do without it.”

But Competition takes place among capitalists. Tools, materials, and provisions, contribute to the creation of utilities only [p302] when employed. There is an emulation, then, among capitalists to find employment for their capital. All that this emulation forces them to abate from the extreme demand, of which I have just assigned the limits, resolving itself into a reduction of the price of the commodity, is so much clear profit, so much ‹gratuitous› gain, for the consumer, that is to say, for mankind.

This gain, however, can clearly never be ‹absolutely gratuitous›; for, since capital represents labour, that capital must always possess in itself the principle of remuneration.

Transactions relative to Capital are subject to the universal law of exchanges; and exchanges take place only because there is an advantage for the two contracting parties in effecting them,—an advantage which has no doubt a tendency to be equalized, but which accidentally may be greater for the one than for the other. There is a limit to the remuneration of capital, beyond which limit no one will consent to borrow it. This limit is the minimum of service for the borrower. In the same way, there is a limit beyond which no one will consent to lend, and this limit is the minimum of remuneration for the lender. This is self-evident. If the requirements of one of the contracting parties are pushed so far as to reduce to zero the benefit to be derived by the other from the transaction, the loan becomes impossible. The remuneration of capital oscillates between these two extreme terms, pressed towards the maximum by the Competition of borrowers, brought back towards the minimum by the Competition of lenders; so that, by a necessity which is in harmony with justice, it rises when capital is scarce, and falls when it is abundant.

Many Economists imagine that the number of borrowers increases more rapidly than it is possible to create capital to lend to them, whence it would follow that the natural tendency of interest is to rise. The ‹fact› is decidedly the other way, and on all sides accordingly we perceive civilisation lowering the return for capital. This return, it is said, is 30 or 40 per cent. at Rome, 20 per cent. in Brazil, 10 per cent. in Algeria, 8 per cent. in Spain, 6 per cent. in Italy, 5 per cent. in Germany, 4 per cent. in France, 3 per cent. in England, and still less in Holland. Now all that part of the return for capital which is annihilated by progress, although lost to the capitalist, is not lost to mankind. If interest, originally at 40 per cent., is reduced to 2 per cent., all commodities will be freed from 38 parts in 40 of this element of cost. They will reach the consumer freed from this charge to the extent of nineteen-twentieths. This is a force which, like ‹natural agents›, like expeditive ‹processes›, resolves itself into ‹abundance›, ‹equalization›, [p303] and, finally, into an elevation of the general level of the human race.

* * * * *

I have still to say a few words on the Competition of labourer with labourer,—a subject which in these days has given rise to so much sentimental declamation. But have we not already exhausted this subject? I have shown that, owing to the action of Competition, men cannot long receive an exceptional remuneration for the co-operation of ‹natural forces›, for their acquaintance with new ‹processes›, or for the possession of ‹instruments› by means of which they avail themselves of these forces. This proves that efforts have a tendency to be exchanged on a footing of equality, or, in other words, that value tends to become proportionate to labour. Then I do not see what can justly be termed the Competition of labourers; still less do I see how it can injure their condition, since in this point of view workmen are themselves the consumers. The working class means everybody, and it is precisely this vast community which reaps ultimately the benefits of Competition, and all the advantage of values successively annihilated by progress.

The evolution is this: Services are exchanged against services, values against values. When a man (or a class) appropriates a natural agent or a new process, his demands are regulated, not by the labour which he undergoes, but by the labour which he saves to others. He presses his exactions to the extreme limit, without ever being able to injure the condition of others. He sets the greatest possible value on his services. But gradually, by the operation of Competition, this value tends to become proportioned to the labour performed; so that the evolution is brought to a conclusion when equal labour is exchanged for equal labour, both serving as the vehicle of an ever-increasing amount of gratuitous utility, to the benefit of the community at large. In such circumstances, to assert that Competition can be injurious to the labourer, would be to fall into a palpable contradiction.

And yet this is constantly asserted, and constantly believed; and why? Because by the word labourer is understood not the great labouring community, but a particular class. You divide the community into two classes. On one side you place all those who are possessed of capital, who live wholly or partly on anterior labour, or by intellectual labour, or the proceeds of taxation; on the other, you place those who have nothing but their hands, who live by wages, or—to use the consecrated expression—the ‹prolétaires›. You look to the relative position of these two classes, [p304] and you ask if, in that relative position, the Competition which takes place among those who live by wages is not fatal to them?

The situation of men of this last class, it is said, is essentially precarious. As they receive their wages from day to day, they live from hand to mouth. In the discussion which, under a free régime, precedes every bargain, they cannot wait; they must find work for to-morrow on any terms, under pain of death. If this be not strictly true of them all, it is at least true of many of them, and that is enough to depress the entire class; for those who are the most pressed and the poorest capitulate first, and establish the general rate of wages. The result is, that wages tend to fall to the lowest rate which is compatible with bare subsistence—and in this state of things, the occurrence of the least excess of Competition among the labourers is a veritable calamity, for, as regards them, the question is not one of diminished prosperity, but of simple existence.

Undoubtedly there is much that is true, much that is too true, ‹in fact›, in this description. To deny the sufferings and wretchedness of that class of men who bear so material a part in the business of production, would be to shut our eyes to the light of day. It is, in fact, this deplorable condition of a great number of our brethren which forms the subject of what has been justly called the ‹social problem›; for although other classes of society are visited also with disquietudes, sufferings, sudden changes of fortune, commercial crises, and economic convulsions, it may nevertheless be said with truth that ‹liberty› would be accepted as a solution of the problem, did mere liberty not appear powerless to cure that rankling sore which we denominate Pauperism.

And although it is here, pre-eminently, that the social problem lies, the reader will not expect that I should enter upon it in this place. Its solution, please God, may be the result of the entire work, but it clearly cannot be the result of a single chapter.

I am at present engaged in the exposition of general laws, which I believe to be harmonious; and I trust the reader will now begin to be convinced that these laws exist, and that their action tends towards community, and consequently towards equality. But I have not denied that the action of these laws is profoundly troubled by disturbing causes. If, then, we now encounter inequality as a stubborn ‹fact›, how can we be in circumstances to form a judgment regarding it until we have first of all investigated the regular laws of the social order, and the causes which disturb the action of these laws? [p305]

On the other hand, I have ignored neither the existence of evil nor its mission. I have ventured to assert, that ‹free-will› having been vouchsafed to man, it is not necessary to confine the term ‹harmony› to an aggregate from which evil should be excluded; for free-will implies error, at least possible error, and error is evil. Social harmony, like everything which concerns man, is relative. Evil is a necessary part of the machinery destined to overcome error, ignorance, injustice, by bringing into play two great laws of our nature—responsibility and solidarity.

Now, taking pauperism as an existing fact, are we to impute it to the natural laws which govern the social order,—or to human institutions which act in a sense contrary to these laws,—or, finally, to the people themselves, who are the victims, and who, by their errors and their faults, have brought down this severe chastisement on their own heads?

In other words, does pauperism exist by providential destination,—or, on the contrary, by what remains of the artificial in our political organization,—or as a personal retribution? Fatality, Injustice, Responsibility—to which of these three causes must we attribute this frightful sore?

I hesitate not to assert that it cannot be the result of the natural laws which have hitherto been the subject of our investigations, seeing that these laws all tend to equalization by amelioration; that is to say, to bring all men to one and the same level, which level is continually rising. This, then, is not the place to seek a solution of the problem of pauperism.

At present, if we would consider specially that class of labourers who execute the most material portion of the work of production, and who, in general, having no interest in the profits, live upon a fixed remuneration called ‹wages›, the question we have to investigate is this: Apart from the consideration of good or bad economic institutions—apart from the consideration of the evils which the men who live by wages [the ‹prolétaires›] bring upon themselves by their faults—what is, as regards them, the proper effect of Competition?

For this class, as for all, the operation of Competition is twofold. They feel it both as buyers and as sellers of services. The error of those who write upon these subjects is never to look but at one side of the question, like natural philosophers, who, if they took into account only centrifugal force, would never cease to believe and to prophesy that all was over with us. Grant their false datum, and you will see with what irrefragable logic they conduct you to this sinister conclusion. The same may be said of the [p306] lamentations which the Socialists found upon the exclusive consideration of centrifugal Competition, if I may be allowed the expression. They forget to take into account centripetal Competition; and that is sufficient to reduce their doctrines to puerile declamation. They forget that the workman, when he presents himself in the market with the wages he has earned, becomes a centre towards which innumerable branches of industry tend, and that he profits then by that universal Competition of which all trades complain in their turn.

It is true that the labourer, when he regards himself as a producer, as the person who supplies labour or services, complains also of Competition. Grant, then, that Competition benefits him on one side, while it pinches him on the other, the question comes to be, Is the balance favourable or unfavourable—or is there compensation?

I must have explained myself very obscurely if the reader does not see that in the play of this marvellous mechanism, the action of Competition, apparently antagonistic, tends to the singular and consoling result, that there is a balance which is favourable to all at the same time; caused by gratuitous Utility continually enlarging the circle of production, and falling continually into the domain of Community. Now, that which becomes common is profitable to all without hurting any one; we may even say—for this is mathematically certain—is profitable to each in proportion to his previous poverty. It is this portion of ‹gratuitous› utility, forced by Competition to become ‹common›, which causes the tendency of value to become proportioned to labour, to the evident benefit of the labourer. This, too, renders evident the social solution which I have pressed so much on the attention of the reader, and which is only concealed by the illusions of habit,—for a determinate amount of labour each receives an amount of satisfactions which tends to be increased and equalized.

Moreover, the condition of the labourer does not depend upon one economic law, but upon all. To become acquainted with that condition, to discover the prospects and the future of the labourer, this is Political Economy; for what other object could that science have in view? . . . But I am wrong—we have still spoliators. What causes the equivalence of services? Liberty. What impairs that equivalence? Oppression. Such is the circle we have still to traverse.

As regards the condition of that class of labourers who execute the more immediate work of production, it cannot be appreciated until we are in a situation to discover in what manner the law of [p307] Competition is combined with that of Wages and Population, and also with the disturbing effects of unequal taxes and monopolies.

I shall add but a few words on the subject of Competition. It is very clear that it has no natural tendency to diminish the amount of the enjoyments which are distributed over society. Does Competition tend to make this distribution unequal? If there be anything evident in the world, it is that after having, if I may so express myself, attached to each service, to each value, a larger proportion of utility, Competition labours incessantly to level the services themselves, to render them proportional to efforts. Is Competition not the spur which urges men into profitable branches of industry, and urges them out of those which are unprofitable? Its proper action, then, is to realize equality more and more, by elevating the social level.

Let us not misunderstand each other, however, on this word equality. It does not imply that all men are to have the same remuneration, but that they are to have a remuneration proportioned to the quantity, and even to the quality of their efforts.

A multitude of circumstances contribute to render the remuneration of labour unequal (I speak here only of free labour, subject to Competition); but if we look at it more narrowly, we shall find that this fancied inequality, almost always just and necessary, is in reality nothing else than substantial equality.

‹Cæteris paribus›, there are larger profits in those trades which are attended with danger than in those which are not so; in those which require a lengthened apprenticeship, and expensive training long unremunerated—which imply the patient exercise of certain domestic virtues—than in those where mere muscular exertion is sufficient; in professions which demand a cultivated mind and refined taste, than in trades which require mere brute force. Is not all this just? Now, ‹Competition› establishes necessarily these distinctions—and society has no need of the assistance of Fourier or Louis Blanc in the matter.

Of all these circumstances, that which operates in the greatest number of cases is the inequality of instruction. Now here, as everywhere else, we find Competition exerting its twofold action, levelling classes, and elevating society.

If we suppose society to be composed of two layers or strata, placed one above another, in one of which the intelligent principle prevails, and in the other the principle of brute force; and if we study the natural relations of these two layers, we shall easily discover a force of attraction in the one, and a force of aspiration in the other, which co-operate towards their fusion. The very inequality [p308] of profits breathes into the inferior ranks an inextinguishable ardour to mount to the region of ease and leisure; and this ardour is seconded by the superior knowledge which distinguishes the higher classes. The methods of teaching are improved; books fall in price; instruction is acquired in less time, and at a smaller cost; science, formerly monopolized by a class or a caste, and veiled in a dead language, or sealed up in hieroglyphics, is written and printed in the vulgar tongue; it pervades the atmosphere, if I may use the expression, and is breathed as freely as the air of heaven.

Nor is this all. At the same time that an education more universal and more equal brings the two classes of society into closer approximation, some very important economic phenomena, which are connected with the great law of Competition, come to aid and accelerate their fusion. The progress of the mechanical arts diminishes continually the proportion of manual labour. The division of labour, by simplifying and separating each of the operations which concur in a productive result, brings within the reach of all, branches of industry which could formerly be engaged in only by a few. Moreover, a great many employments which required at the outset much knowledge and varied acquirements, fall, by the mere lapse of time, into ‹routine›, and come within the sphere of action of classes generally the least instructed, as has happened in the case of agriculture. Agricultural processes, which in ancient times procured to their discoverers the honours of an apotheosis, are now inherited and almost monopolized by the rudest of men; and to such a degree, that this important branch of human industry is, so to speak, entirely withdrawn from the ‹well-educated› classes.

From the preceding observations it is possible that a false conclusion may be drawn. It may be said—“We perceive, indeed, that Competition lowers remuneration in all countries, in all departments of industry, in all ranks, and levels, ‹by reducing›, it; but in that case the wages of unskilled labour, of physical exertion, must become the type, the standard, of all remuneration.”

I must have been misunderstood, if you have not perceived that ‹Competition›, which labours to bring down all excessive remuneration towards an average more and more uniform, raises ‹necessarily› this average. I grant that it pinches men in their capacity of producers, but in so doing it ameliorates the condition of the human race in the only way in which it can reasonably be elevated, namely, by an increase of material prosperity, ease, leisure, moral and intellectual improvement, in a word, by enlarging ‹consumption›. [p309]

Will it be said that, in point of fact, mankind have not made the progress that this theory seems to imply?

I answer, in the first place, that in modern society Competition is far from occupying the sphere of its natural action. Our laws run counter to it, at least in as great a degree as they favour its action; and when it is asked whether the inequality of conditions is owing to its presence or its absence, it is sufficient to look at the men who make the greatest figure among us, and dazzle us by the display of their scandalous wealth, in order to assure ourselves that inequality, so far as it is artificial and unjust, has for foundation conquests, monopolies, restrictions, privileged offices, functions, and places, ministerial trafficking, public borrowing,—all things with which Competition has nothing to do.

Moreover, I believe we have overlooked the real progress which mankind have made since the very recent epoch to which we must assign the partial enfranchisement of labour. It has been justly said that much philosophy is needed in order to discern facts which are continually passing before us. We are not astonished at what an honest and laborious family of the working class daily consumes, because habit has made us familiar with this strange phenomenon. If, however, we compare the comfortable circumstances in which such a family finds itself, with the condition in which it would be placed under a social order which excluded Competition—if statisticians, armed with an instrument of sufficient precision, could measure, as with a dynamometer, the relation of a working man’s labour to his enjoyments at two different periods, we should acknowledge that liberty, restrained as it still is, has accomplished in his favour a prodigy which its very permanency hinders us from remarking. The contingent of human efforts which, in relation to a given result, has been annihilated, is truly incalculable. Time was when the artisan’s day’s labour would not have sufficed to procure him the most trumpery almanac. At the present day, for a halfpenny, or the fiftieth part of his day’s wages, he can obtain a gazette containing the matter of a volume. The same might be said of clothing, locomotion, carriage, lighting, and a multitude of other satisfactions. To what is this result owing? To this, that an enormous proportion of human labour, which had formerly to be paid for, has been handed over to be performed by the gratuitous forces of nature. It is a value annihilated, and to be no longer recompensed. Under the action of Competition, it has been replaced by common and gratuitous utility. And it is worthy of remark, that when, in consequence of progress, the price of any commodity comes to fall, [p310] the labour ‹saved› to the poor purchaser in obtaining it is always ‹proportionally› greater than the labour saved to the rich purchaser. That is demonstrable.

In fine, this constantly increasing current of utilities which labour pours into all the veins of the body politic, and which Competition distributes, is not all summed up in an accession of wealth. It is absorbed, in great part, by the stream of advancing numbers. It resolves itself into an increase of population, according to laws which have an intimate affinity with the subject which now engages us, and which will be explained in another chapter.

Let us now stop for a moment and take a rapid glance at the ground over which we have just travelled.

Man has wants which are unlimited—desires which are insatiable. In order to provide for them he has materials and agents which are furnished to him by nature—faculties, instruments, all things which ‹labour› sets in motion. Labour is the resource which has been most equally distributed to all. Each man seeks instinctively, and of necessity, to avail himself to the utmost of the co-operation of natural forces, of talents natural and acquired, and of capital, in order that the result of this co-operation may be a greater amount of utilities produced, or, what comes to the same thing, a greater amount of satisfactions acquired. Thus, the more active co-operation of natural agents, the indefinite development of intelligence, the progressive increase of capital, give rise to this phenomenon (which at first sight seems strange)—that a given quantity of labour furnishes an always increasing amount of utilities, and that each man can, without despoiling anyone, obtain a mass of consumable commodities out of all proportion to what his own efforts could have realized.

But this phenomenon, which is the result of the divine harmony which Providence has established in the mechanism of society, would have been detrimental to society, by introducing the germ of indefinite inequality, had there not been combined with it a harmony no less admirable, namely, Competition, which is one of the branches of the great law of human ‹solidarity›.

In fact, were it possible for an individual, a family, a class, a nation, possessed of certain natural advantages, of an important discovery in manufactures, or of the instruments of production in the shape of accumulated capital, to be set permanently free from the law of Competition, it is evident that this individual, this family, this nation, would have for ever the monopoly of an exceptionally high remuneration, at the expense of mankind at large. In what situation should we be if the inhabitants of the tropical [p311] regions, set free from all rivalry with each other, could exact from us, in exchange for their sugar, their coffee, their cotton, their spices, not the equivalent of labour equal to their own, but an amount of labour equal to what we must ourselves undergo in order to produce these commodities under our inclement skies? What an incalculable distance would separate the various conditions of men, if the race of Cadmus alone could read, if the direct descendants of Triptolemus alone could handle the plough, if printing were confined to the family of Gutenberg, cotton-spinning to the children of Arkwright, and if the posterity of Watt could alone work the steam engine! Providence has not ordered things thus, but, on the contrary, has placed in the social machine a spring whose power is only less surprising than its simplicity—a spring by the operation of which all productive power, all superiority in manufacturing processes, in a word, all exclusive advantages, slip from the hands of the producer, having remained there, in the shape of exceptional remuneration, only long enough to excite his zeal, and come at length to enlarge the common and gratuitous patrimony of mankind, and resolve themselves into individual enjoyments always progressive, and more and more equally distributed—this spring is ‹Competition›. We have already seen its economical effects—and it now remains for us to take a rapid survey of its moral and political consequences. I shall confine myself to the more important of these.

Superficial thinkers have accused Competition of introducing ‹antagonism› among men. This is true and inevitable, if we consider men only in the capacity of producers, but, regarded from another point of view, as consumers, the matter appears in a very different light. You then see this very Competition binding together individuals, families, classes, nations, and races, in the bonds of universal fraternity.

Seeing that the advantages which appear at first to be the property of certain individuals become, by an admirable law of Divine beneficence, the common patrimony of all; seeing that the ‹natural advantages› of situation, of fertility, of temperature, of mineral riches, and even of manufacturing aptitude, slip in a short time from the hands of producers, by reason of their competition with each other, and turn exclusively to the profit of consumers, it follows that there is no country which is not interested in the advancement and prosperity of all other countries. Every step of progress made in the East is wealth in perspective for the West. Fuel discovered in the South warms the men of the North. Great Britain makes progress in her spinning mills; [p312] but her capitalists do not alone reap the profit, for the interest of money does not rise; nor do her operatives, for the wages of labour remain the same. In the long-run, it is the Russian, the Frenchman, the Spaniard; in a word, it is the human race, who obtain equal satisfactions at a less expense of labour, or, what comes to the same thing, superior satisfactions with equal labour.

I have spoken only of the advantages—I might say as much of the disadvantages—which affect certain nations and certain regions. The peculiar action of Competition is to render general what was before exclusive. It acts exactly on the principle of ‹Insurance›. A scourge visits the fields of the agriculturist, and the consumers of the bread are the sufferers. An unjust tax is laid upon the vines of France, and this means dear ‹wine› for all wine-drinkers. Thus, advantages and disadvantages, which have any permanence, only glance upon individuals, classes, or nations. Their providential destination in the long-run is to affect humanity at large, and elevate or lower the condition of mankind. Hence to envy a certain people the fertility of their soil, or the beauty of their harbours and rivers, or the warmth of their sun, is to overlook the advantages in which we are called to participate. It is to contemn the abundance which is offered to us. It is to regret the labour which is saved to us. Hence national jealousies are not only perverse feelings;—they are absurd. To hurt others is to injure ourselves. To place obstacles in the way of others—tariffs, wars, or workmen’s strikes—is to obstruct our own progress. Hence bad passions have their chastisement, just as generous sentiments have their reward. The inevitable sanction of an exact distributive justice addresses itself to men’s interests, enlightens opinion, proclaims and establishes among men these maxims of eternal truth: that the useful is one of the aspects of the just; that Liberty is the fairest of social Harmonies; and that Honesty is the best Policy.

Christianity has introduced into the world the grand principle of human fraternity. It addresses itself to our hearts, our feelings, our noble instincts. Political Economy recommends the same principle to our cool judgment; and, exhibiting the connexion of effects with their causes, reconciles in consoling harmony the vigilant calculations of interest with the inspirations of the sublimest morality.

A second consequence which flows from this doctrine is, that society is truly a ‹Community›. Messieurs Owen and Cabet may save themselves the trouble of seeking the solution of the great [p313] ‹Communist› problem—it is found already—it results not from their arbitrary combinations, but from the organization given by God to man, and to society. Natural forces, expeditive processes, instruments of production, everything is ‹common› among men, or has a tendency to become so, everything ‹except pains›, labour, individual effort. There is, and there can be, but one ‹inequality›—an inequality which Communists the most absolute must admit,—that which results from the inequality of efforts. These efforts are what are exchanged for one another at a price bargained for. All the utility which nature, and the genius of ages, and human foresight, have implanted in the commodities exchanged, we obtain ‹into the bargain›. Reciprocal remunerations have reference only to reciprocal efforts, whether actual under the name of Labour, or preparatory under the name of Capital. Here then is Community in the strictest sense of the word, unless we are to pretend that the personal share of enjoyment should be equal, although the quota of labour furnished is not so, which indeed would be the most iniquitous, the most monstrous, of inequalities,—I will add, the most fatal; for it would not destroy Competition—it would only give it a retrograde action. We should still compete, but the Competition would be a rivalry of idleness, stupidity, and improvidence.

In fine, the doctrine—so simple, and, as we think, so true—which we have just developed, takes the great principle of human ‹perfectibility› out of the domain of declamation, and transfers it to that of rigorous demonstration. This internal motive, which is never at rest in the bosom of the individual, but stirs him up to improve his condition, gives rise to the progress of art, which is nothing else than the progressive co-operation of forces, which from their nature call for no remuneration. To Competition is owing the concession to the community of advantages at first individually obtained. The intensity of the labour required for the production of each given result goes on continually diminishing, to the advantage of the human race, which thus sees the circle of its enjoyments and its leisure enlarging from one generation to another, whilst the level of its physical, intellectual, and moral improvement is raised; and by this arrangement, so worthy of our study and of our profound admiration, we behold mankind recovering the position they had lost.

Let me not be misunderstood, however. I do not say that all fraternity, all community, all perfectibility, are comprised and included in Competition. I say only that Competition is allied and combined with these three great social dogmas—that it forms part [p314] of them, that it exhibits them, that it is one of the most powerful agents of their realization.

I have endeavoured to describe the general effects of Competition, and consequently its benefits, for it would be impious to suppose that any great law of nature should be at once hurtful and permanent; but I am far from denying that the action of Competition is accompanied with many hardships and sufferings. It appears to me that the theory which has just been developed explains at once those sufferings, and the inevitable complaints to which they give rise. Since the work of Competition consists in ‹levelling›, it must necessarily run counter to all who proudly attempt to rise above the general level. Each producer, in order to obtain the highest price for his labour, endeavours, as we have seen, to retain as long as possible the exclusive use of an ‹agent›, a ‹process›, or an ‹instrument›, of production. Now the proper mission and result of Competition being to withdraw this exclusive use from the individual, in order to make it ‹common› property, it is natural that all men, in their capacity of producers, should unite in a concert of maledictions against ‹Competition›. They cannot reconcile themselves to Competition otherwise than by taking into account their interests as consumers, and regarding themselves, not as members of a coterie or a corporation, but as men.

Political Economy, we must say, has not yet exerted herself sufficiently to dissipate this fatal illusion, which has been the source of so much heartburning, calamity, and irritation, and of so many wars. This science, from a preference not very philosophical, has exhausted her efforts in analyzing the phenomena of production. The very nomenclature of the science, in fact, convenient as it is, is not in harmony with its object. Agriculture, manufactures, commerce, may be an excellent classification, when the object is to describe the ‹processes› of art; but that description, however essential in technology, has little connexion with social economy;—I should even say that it is positively dangerous. When we have classed men as agriculturists, manufacturers, and merchants, of what can we speak but of their class interests, of those special interests to which Competition is antagonistic, and which are placed in opposition to the general good? It is not for the sake of agriculturists that agriculture exists, of manufacturers that we have manufactures, or of merchants that we have exchanges, but in order that men should have at their disposal the greatest amount of commodities of every kind. ‹Consumption›, its laws, what favours it, and renders it equitable and moral—that is the interest which is truly social, and which truly affects the human [p315] race. It is the interest of the consumer which constitutes the real object of Political Economy, and upon which the science should concentrate its clearest lights. This, in truth, forms the bond which unites classes, nations, races—it is the principle and explanation of human fraternity. It is with regret, then, that we see Economists expending their talents and sagacity on the anatomy of production, and throwing into the fag-end of their books, or into supplementary chapters, a few common-places on the phenomena of consumption. Have we not even seen a justly celebrated professor suppressing entirely that branch of the science, confining himself to the ‹means›, without ever speaking of the ‹result›, and banishing from his course everything in connexion with the ‹consumption of wealth›, as pertaining, in his opinion, to morals rather than to Political Economy? Can we be surprised that men are more struck with the inconveniences of Competition than with its advantages, since the former affect them specially as producers,—in which character they are constantly considered and talked of; while the latter affect them only in their capacity of consumers,—a capacity which is altogether disregarded and overlooked?

I repeat that I do not deny or ignore, on the contrary I deplore as much as any one can, the sufferings attendant on Competition; but is this any reason for shutting our eyes to its advantages? And it is all the more consoling to observe these advantages, inasmuch as I believe Competition, like all the great laws of nature, to be indestructible. Had it been otherwise, it would assuredly have succumbed to the universal resistance which all the men who have ever co-operated in the production of commodities since the beginning of the world have offered to it, and more especially it would have perished under the ‹levée en masse› of our modern reformers. But if they have been foolish enough to attempt its destruction, they have not been strong enough to effect it.

And what progressive principle, I would ask, is to be found in the world, the beneficent action of which is not mingled, especially in the beginning, with suffering and misery? The massing together of human beings in vast agglomerations is favourable to boldness and independence of thought, but it frequently sets private life free from the wholesome restraint of public opinion, and gives shelter to debauchery and crime. Wealth and leisure united give birth to mental cultivation, but they also give birth to pride and luxury among the rich, and to irritation and covetousness among the poor. The art of printing brings home knowledge and truth to all ranks of society, but it has brought also afflicting doubt and subversive error. Political liberty has unchained [p316] tempests and revolutions, and has modified the simple manners of primitive nations, to such a decree as to induce thinking men to ask themselves whether they would not have preferred tranquillity under the cold shade of despotism. Christianity herself has cast the noble seed of love and charity into a soil saturated with the blood of martyrs.

Why has it entered into the designs of Infinite Goodness and Justice that the happiness of one region or of one era should be purchased at the expense of the sufferings of another region or of another era? What is the Divine purpose which is concealed under this great law of ‹solidarity›, of which Competition is only one of the mysterious aspects? Human science cannot answer. What we do know is this, that good always goes on increasing, and that evil goes on diminishing. From the beginning of the social state, such as conquest had made it, when there existed only masters and slaves, and the inequality of conditions was extreme, the work of Competition in approximating ranks, fortunes, intelligences, could not be accomplished without inflicting individual hardships, the intensity of which, however, as the work proceeded, has gone on diminishing, like the vibrations of sound and the oscillations of the pendulum. To the sufferings yet in reserve for them, men learn every day to oppose two powerful remedies—namely, ‹foresight›, which is the fruit of knowledge and experience; and ‹association›, which is organized foresight.

* * * * *

In the first part of this work—alas! too hastily written—I have endeavoured to keep the reader’s attention fixed upon the line of demarcation, always flexible, but always marked, which separates the two regions of the economic world—natural co-operation, and human labour—the bounty of God, and the work of man—the gratuitous, and the onerous—that which in exchange is remunerated, and that which is transferred without remuneration—aggregate utility, and the fractional and supplementary utility which constitutes value—absolute wealth, and relative wealth—the co-operation of chemical or mechanical forces, constrained to aid production by the instruments which render them available, and the just recompense of the labour which has created these instruments themselves—Community and Property.

It is not enough to mark these two orders of phenomena which are so essentially different, it is necessary also to describe their relations, and, if I may so express myself, their harmonious evolutions. I have essayed to explain how the business of Property consists in conquering utility for the human race, and, casting it [p317] into the domain of Community, to move on to new conquests—so that each given effort, and consequently the aggregate of efforts, should continually be delivering over to mankind satisfactions which are always increasing. Human services exchanged, while preserving their relative value, become the vehicle of an always increasing proportion of utility which is gratuitous, and, therefore, common; and in this consists progress. The possessors of value, then, whatever form it assumes, far from usurping and monopolizing the gifts of God, multiply these gifts, without causing them to lose the character which Providence has affixed to them, of being—Gratuitous.

In proportion as the satisfactions which are handed over by progress to the charge of nature fall by that very fact into the domain of Community, they become ‹equal›—it being impossible for us even to conceive inequality except in the domain of human services, which are compared, appreciated, and ‹estimated› with a view to an exchange; whence it follows that Equality among men is necessarily progressive. It is so, likewise, in another respect, the action of Competition having for its inevitable result to level and equalize the services themselves, and to bring their recompense more and more into proportion with their merit.

Let us now throw a glance back on the ground over which we have passed.

By the light of the theory, the foundation of which has been laid in the present volume, we shall have to investigate:

The relations of man with the Economic phenomena, in his capacity of producer, and in his character of consumer;

The law of Rent;

That of Wages;

That of Credit;

That of Taxation, which, introducing us into the domain of Politics, properly so called, will lead us to compare those services which are private and voluntary with those which are public and compulsory;

The law of Population.

We shall then be in a situation to solve some practical problems which are still disputed—Free-trade, Machinery, Luxury, Leisure, Association, Organization of Labour, etc.

I hesitate not to say, that the result of this exposition may be expressed beforehand in these terms: ‹The constant approximation of all men towards a level which is always rising›—in other terms: ‹Improvement and Equalization›; in a single word, «Harmony».

Such is the definitive result of the arrangements of Providence—of [p318] the great laws of nature—when they act without impediment, when we regard them as they are in themselves, and apart from any disturbance of their action by error and violence. On beholding this Harmony, the Economist may well exclaim, like the astronomer who regards the planetary movements, or the physiologist who contemplates the structure and arrangement of the human organs—‹Digitus Dei est hic!›

But man is a free agent, and consequently fallible. He is subject to ignorance and to passion. His will, which is liable to err, enters as an element into the play of the economic laws. He may misunderstand them, forget them, divert them from their purpose. As the physiologist, after admiring the infinite wisdom displayed in the structure and relations of our organs and viscera, studies these organs likewise in their abnormal state when sickly and diseased, we shall have to penetrate into a new world—the world of social Disturbances.

We shall pave the way for this new study by some considerations on man himself. It would be impossible for us to give an account of ‹social evil›, of its origin, its effects, its design—of the limits, always more and more contracted, within which it is shut up by its own action (which constitutes what I might almost venture to call a harmonic dissonance), did we not extend our investigation to the necessary consequences of Free-Will, to the errors of Self-Interest, which are constantly corrected, and to the great laws of human Responsibility and Solidarity.

We have seen the germ of all the ‹social Harmonies› included in these two principles—«Property», «Liberty». We shall see that all ‹social Dissonances› are only the development of these two antagonistic principles—«Spoliation», «Oppression».

The words Property and Liberty, in fact, express only two aspects of the same idea. In an economical point of view, Liberty is allied to the act of production—Property to the things produced. And since Value has its foundation in the human act, we may conclude that Liberty implies and includes Property. The same relation exists between Oppression and Spoliation.

Liberty! here at length we have the principle of harmony. Oppression! here we have the principle of dissonance. The struggle of these two powers fills the annals of the human race.

And as the design of Oppression is to effect an unjust appropriation, as it resolves itself into and is summed up in spoliation, it is Spoliation that must form the subject of our inquiry.

Man comes into this world bound to the yoke of Want, which is pain. [p319]

He cannot escape from it but by subjecting himself to the yoke of Labour, which is pain also.

He has, then, only a choice of pains, and he detests pain.

This is the reason why he looks around him, and if he sees that his fellow-man has accumulated wealth, he conceives the thought of appropriating it. Hence comes false property, or Spoliation.

Spoliation! here we have a new element in the economy of society.

From the day when it first made its appearance in the world down to the day when it shall have completely disappeared, if that day ever come, this element has affected and will affect profoundly the whole social mechanism; it will disturb, and to the extent of rendering them no longer recognisable, those laws of social harmony which we have endeavoured to discover and describe.

Our duty, then, will not have been accomplished until we have completed the monography of Spoliation.

It may be imagined that we have here to do with an accidental and exceptional fact, a transient derangement unworthy of the investigations of science.

But in truth it is not so. On the contrary, Spoliation, in the traditions of families, in the history of nations, in the occupations of individuals, in the physical and intellectual energies of classes, in the schemes and designs of governments, occupies nearly as prominent a place as Property itself.

No; Spoliation is not an ephemeral scourge, affecting accidentally the social mechanism, and which economical science may disregard as exceptional.

The sentence pronounced upon man in the beginning was, ‹In the sweat of thy brow shalt thou eat bread›. Whence it appears that effort and satisfaction are indissolubly united, and that the one must be always the recompense of the other. But on all sides we find man revolting against this law, and saying to his brother, Thine be the labour, and mine the fruit of that labour.

Repair to the hut of the savage hunter, or to the tent of the nomad shepherd, and what spectacle meets your eyes? The wife, lank, pale, disfigured, affrighted, prematurely old, bears the whole burden of the household cares, while the man lounges in idleness. What idea can we form of family Harmonies? The idea has disappeared, for Strength here throws upon Feebleness the weight of labour. And how many ages of civilizing effort will be needed to raise the wife from this state of frightful degradation?

Spoliation, in its most brutal form, armed with torch and sword, [p320] fills the annals of the world. Of what names is history made up? Cyrus, Sesostris, Alexander, Scipio, Cæsar, Attila, Tamerlane, Mahomet, Pizarro, William the Conqueror—pure Spoliation from beginning to end in the shape of Conquest. Hers are the laurels, the monuments, the statues, the triumphal arches, the song of the poet, the intoxicating enthusiasm of the fair!

The Conqueror soon finds that he can turn his victories to more profitable account than by putting to death the vanquished; and Slavery covers the earth. Down to our own times, all over the world this has been the form in which societies have existed, bringing with it hates, resistance, internal struggles, and revolutions. And what is Slavery but organized oppression—organized for the purpose of Spoliation?

But Spoliation not only arms Force against Feebleness—she turns Intelligence against Credulity. What hard-working people in the world has escaped being sweated by sacerdotal theocracies, Egyptian priests, Greek oracles, Roman auguries, Gallic druids, Indian brahmins, muftis, ulemas, bonzes, monks, ministers, mountebanks, sorcerers, soothsayers,—spoliators of all garbs and of all denominations. Assuming this guise, Spoliation places the fulcrum of her lever in heaven, and sacrilegiously prides herself on the complicity of the gods! She enslaves not men’s limbs only, but their souls. She knows how to impress the iron of slavery as well upon the conscience of Séide[65] as upon the forehead of Spartacus—realizing what would seem impossible—Mental Slavery.

Mental Slavery! what a frightful association of words! O Liberty! we have seen thee hunted from country to country, crushed by conquest, groaning under slavery, insulted in courts, banished from the schools, laughed at in saloons, misunderstood in workshops, denounced in churches. It seems thou shouldst find in thought an inviolable refuge. But if thou art to surrender in this thy last asylum, what becomes of the hopes of ages, and of what value is human existence?

At length, however, the progressive nature of man causes Spoliation to develop in the society in which it exists, resistance which paralyzes its force, and knowledge which unveils its impostures. But Spoliation does not confess herself conquered for all that; she only becomes more crafty, and, enveloping herself in the forms of government and in a system of checks and counterpoises, she gives birth to Politics, long a prolific resource. We then see her usurping the liberty of citizens, the better to get hold of their wealth, [p321] and draining away their wealth to possess herself more surely of their liberty. Private activity passes into the domain of public activity. Everything is transacted through functionaries, and an unintelligent and meddling bureaucracy overspreads the land. The public treasury becomes a vast reservoir into which labourers pour their savings, to be immediately distributed among placemen. Transactions are no longer regulated by free bargaining and discussion, and the ‹mutuality of services› disappears.

In this state of things the true notion of Property is extinguished, and every one appeals to the Law to give his services a factitious value.

We enter then upon the era of privileges. Spoliation, ever improving in subtilty, fortifies herself in Monopoly, and takes refuge behind Restrictions. She displaces the natural current of exchanges, and sends capital into artificial channels, and with capital, labour—and with labour, population. She gets painfully produced in the North what is produced with facility in the South; creates precarious classes and branches of industry; substitutes for the gratuitous forces of nature the onerous fatigues of labour; cherishes establishments which can sustain no rivalry, and invokes against competitors the employment of force; provokes international jealousies; flatters patriotic arrogance; and invents ingenious theories, which make auxiliaries of her own dupes. She constantly renders imminent industrial crises and bankruptcies, shakes to its foundation all confidence in the future, all faith in liberty, all consciousness of what is just. At length, when science exposes her misdeeds, she stirs up against science her own victims, by proclaiming a Utopia! and ignores not only the science which places obstacles in her path, but the very idea of any possible science, by this crowning sentence of scepticism—There are no principles!

Under the pressure of suffering, at length the masses rise, and overturn everything which is above them. Government, taxes, legislation, everything is at their mercy, and you imagine perhaps that there is now an end to the reign of Spoliation;—that the mutuality of services is about to be established on the only possible or even imaginable basis—Liberty. Undeceive yourself. The fatal idea, alas! has permeated the masses, that Property has no other origin, no other sanction, no other legitimacy, no other foundation, than Law; and then the masses set to work legislatively to rob one another. Suffering from the wounds which have been inflicted upon them, they undertake to cure each of their members by conceding to him the right to oppress his neighbour, and call [p322] this Solidarity and Fraternity. “You have produced—I have not produced—we are ‹solidaires›—let us divide.” “You have something—I have nothing—we are brethren—let us share.” It will be our duty then to examine the improper use which has been made in these latter days of the terms association, organization, labour, ‹gratuité du crédit›, etc. We shall have to subject them to this test—Do they imply Liberty or Oppression? In other words, are they in unison with the great Economical laws, or are they disturbances of those laws?

Spoliation is a phenomenon too universal, too persistent, to permit us to attribute to it a character purely accidental. In this, as in many other matters, we cannot separate the study of natural laws from the study of their Perturbations.

But, it may be said, if spoliation enters necessarily into the play of the social mechanism as a ‹dissonance›, how can you venture to assert the Harmony of the Economic laws?

I must repeat here what I have said in another place, namely, that in all which concerns man, a being who is only ‹perfectible› because he is ‹imperfect›, Harmony consists, not in the absolute absence of ‹evil›, but in its gradual diminution. The social body, like the human body, is provided with a curative force, a ‹vis medicatrix›, the laws and infallible power of which it is impossible to study without again exclaiming, ‹Digitus Dei est hic›. [p323]

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

XI. PRODUCER—CONSUMER

If the level of the human race is not continually rising, man is not a perfectible being.

If the social tendency is not a constant approximation of all men towards this progressive elevation, the economic laws are not harmonious.

Now, how can the level of humanity be rising, if each given quantity of labour does not yield a constantly increasing amount of enjoyments, a phenomenon which can be explained only by the transformation of onerous into gratuitous utility.

And, on the other hand, how can this utility, having become gratuitous, bring men nearer and nearer to a common level, if the utility has not at the same time itself become common?

Here, then, we discover the essential law of social harmony.

I should have been pleased had the language of Political Economy furnished me with two words other than the terms ‹production› and ‹consumption›, to designate services which are rendered and received. These terms savour too much of materiality. There are evidently services, like those of the clergyman, the professor, the soldier, the artist, which tend to the furtherance of morality, education, security, taste, which have nothing in common with mechanical or manufacturing industry, except this, that the end to be attained is ‹satisfaction› or enjoyment.

The terms I have referred to are those generally employed, and I have no wish to become a neologist. But let it be understood that by ‹production› I mean what confers utility, and by ‹consumption› the enjoyment to which that utility gives rise.

Let the protectionist school—which is in reality a phase of Communism—believe that in employing the terms ‹producer› and ‹consumer› we are not absurd enough to wish to represent the human race as divided into two distinct classes, the one engaged [p324] exclusively in the work of producing, the other exclusively in that of consuming. The naturalist divides the human race into whites and blacks, or into men and women, and the economist, forsooth, is not to classify them as producers and consumers, because, as the protectionist gentlemen sagely remark, ‹producer and consumer make but one person›!

Why, it is for the very reason that they do make but one that each individual comes to be considered by the science of Political Economy in this double capacity. Our business is not to divide the human race into two classes, but to study man under two very different aspects. If the protectionists were to forbid grammarians to employ the pronouns ‹I› and ‹thou›, on the pretext that every man is in turn ‹the person speaking› and ‹the person spoken to›, it would be a sufficient answer to say, that although it be perfectly true that we cannot place all the tongues on one side, and all the ears on the other, since every man has both ears and a tongue, it by no means follows that, with reference to each proposition enunciated, the tongue does not pertain to one man and the ear to another. In the same way, ‹with reference to every service›, the man who renders it is quite distinct from the man who receives it. The producer and consumer are always set opposite each other, so much so that they have always a controversy.

The very people who object to our studying mankind under the double aspect of producers and consumers have no difficulty in making this distinction when they address themselves to legislative assemblies. We then find them demanding monopoly or freedom of trade, according as the matter in dispute refers to a commodity which they sell, or a commodity which they purchase.

Without dwelling longer, then, on this preliminary exception taken by the protectionists, let us acknowledge that in the social order the separation of employments causes each man to occupy two situations, sufficiently distinct to render their action and relations worthy of our study.

In general, we devote ourselves to some special trade, profession, or career, and it is not from that particular source that we expect to derive our satisfactions. We render and receive services; we supply and demand values; we make purchases and sales; we work for others, and others work for us; in short, we are ‹producers and consumers›.

According as we present ourselves in the market in one or other of these capacities, we carry thither a spirit which is very different, or rather, I should say, very opposite. Suppose, for example, that corn is the subject of the transaction. The same man has very [p325] different views when he goes to market as a purchaser, from what he has when he goes there as a seller. As a purchaser, he desires abundance; as a seller, scarcity. In either case, these desires may be traced to the same source—personal interest; but as to sell or buy, to give or to receive, to supply or to demand, are acts as opposite as possible, they cannot but give rise, and from the same motive, to opposite desires.

Antagonistic desires cannot at one and the same time coincide with the general good.

In another work,[66] I have endeavoured to show that the wishes or desires of men in their capacity of consumers are those which are in harmony with the public interest; and it cannot be otherwise. For seeing that enjoyment is the end and design of labour, and that the labour is determined only by the obstacle to be overcome, it is evident that labour is in this sense an ‹evil›, and that everything should tend to diminish it; that enjoyment is a ‹good›, and that everything should tend to increase it.

And here presents itself the great, the perpetual, the deplorable illusion which springs from the erroneous definition of ‹value›, and from confounding value with ‹utility›.

Value being simply a relation, is of as much greater importance to each individual as it is of less importance to society at large.

What renders service to the masses is utility alone; and value is not at all the measure of it.

What renders service to the individual is still only utility. But value is the measure of it; for, with each determinate value, he obtains from society the utility of his choice, in the proportion of that value.

If we regard man as an isolated being, it is as clear as day that consumption, and not production, is the essential thing; for consumption to a certain extent implies labour, but labour does not imply consumption.

The separation of employments has led certain economists to measure the general prosperity, not by consumption, but by labour. And by following these economists we have come to this strange subversion of principle, to favour labour at the expense of its results.

The reasoning has been this: The more difficulties are overcome the better. Then augment the difficulties to be conquered.

The error of this reasoning is manifest.

No doubt, a certain amount of difficulties being given, it is fortunate that a certain quantity of labour also given should [p326] surmount as many of these difficulties as possible. But to diminish the power of the labourer or augment that of the difficulties, in order to increase value, is positively monstrous.

An individual member of society is interested in this, that his services, while preserving even the same degree of utility, should increase in value. Suppose his desires in this respect to be realized, it is easy to perceive what will happen. He is better off, but his brethren are worse off, seeing that the total amount of utility has not been increased.

We cannot then reason from particulars to generals, and say: Pursue such measures as in their result will satisfy the desire which all individuals entertain to see the value of their services augmented.

Value being a relation, we should have accomplished nothing if the increase in all departments were proportionate to the anterior value; if it were arbitrary and unequal for different services, we should have done nothing but introduce injustice into the distribution of utilities.

It is of the nature of every bargain or mercantile transaction to give rise to a ‹debate›. But by using this word debate, shall I not bring down upon myself all the sentimental schools which are nowadays so numerous? ‹Debate› implies ‹antagonism›, it will be said. You admit, then, that antagonism is the natural state of society. Here again I have to break another lance; for in this country economic science is so little understood, that one cannot make use of a word without raising up an opponent.

I have been justly reproached for using the phrase that “Between the seller and buyer there exists a radical antagonism.” The word ‹antagonism›, when strengthened by the word ‹radical›, implies much more than I meant to express. It would seem to imply a permanent opposition of interests, consequently an indestructible social dissonance; while what I wished to indicate was merely that transient debate or discussion which precedes every commercial transaction, and which is inherent in the very idea of a bargain.

As long as, to the regret of the sentimental utopiast, there shall remain a vestige of liberty in the world, buyers and sellers will discuss their interests, and higgle about prices; nor will the social laws cease to be harmonious on that account. Is it possible to conceive that the man who ‹offers› and the man who ‹demands› a service should meet each other in the market without having for the moment a different idea of its ‹value›? Is that to set the world on fire? Must all commercial transactions, all exchanges, all barter, all liberty, be banished from this earth, or are we to allow each of [p327] the contracting parties to defend his position, and urge and put forward his motives? It is this very free debate or discussion which gives rise to the equivalence of services and the equity of transactions. By what other means can our system-makers ensure this equity which is so desirable? Would they by legislation trammel the liberty of one of the parties only? Then the one must be in the power of the other. Would they take away from both the liberty of managing their own affairs, under the pretext that they ought henceforth to buy and sell on the principle of fraternity? Let me tell the Socialists that it is here their absurdity becomes apparent, for, in the long-run, these interests must be regulated and adjusted. Is the discussion to be inverted, the purchaser taking the part of the seller and ‹vice versa›? Such transactions would be very diverting, we must allow. “Please, sir, give me only 10 francs for this cloth.” “What say you? I will give you 20 for it.” “But, my good sir, it is worth nothing—it is out of fashion—it will be worn out in a fortnight,” says the merchant. “It is of the best quality, and will last two winters,” replies the customer. “Very well, sir, to please you, I will add 5 francs—this is all the length that fraternity will allow me to go.” “It is against my Socialist principles to pay less than 20 francs, but we must learn to make sacrifices, and I agree.” Thus this whimsical transaction will just arrive at the ordinary result, and our system-makers will regret to see accursed liberty still surviving, although turned upside down and engendering a new antagonism.

That is not what we want, say the ‹organisateurs›; what we desire is liberty. Then, what would you be at? for services must still be exchanged, and conditions adjusted. We expect that the care of adjusting them should be left to us. I suspected as much. . . . . .

Fraternity! bond of brotherhood, sacred flame kindled by heaven in man’s soul, how has thy name been abused! In thy name all freedom has been stifled. In thy name a new despotism, such as the world had never before seen, has been erected; and we are at length driven to fear that the very name of fraternity, after being thus sullied, and having served as the rallying cry of so many incapables, the mask of so much ambition, and proud contempt of human dignity, should end by losing altogether its grand and noble significance.

Let us no longer, then, aim at overturning everything, domineering over everything and everybody, and withdrawing all—men and things—from the operation of natural laws. Let us leave the world as God has made it. Let us, poor scribblers, not imagine [p328] ourselves anything else than observers, more or less exact, of what is passing around us. Let us no longer render ourselves ridiculous by pretending to change human nature, as if we were ourselves beyond humanity and its errors and weaknesses. Let us leave producers and consumers to take care of their own interests, and to arrange and adjust these interests by honest and peaceful conventions. Let us confine ourselves to the observation of relations, and the effects to which they give rise. This is precisely what I am about to do, keeping always in view this general law, which I apprehend to be the law of human society, namely, the gradual equalization of individuals and of classes, combined with general progress.

A line no more resembles a force or a velocity, than it does a value or a utility. Mathematicians, nevertheless, make use of diagrams; and why should not the economist do the same?

We have values which are equal, values the mutual relations of which are known as the half, the quarter, double, triple, etc. There is nothing to prevent our representing these differences by lines of various lengths.

But the same thing does not hold with reference to ‹utility›. General utility, as we have seen, may be resolved into gratuitous utility and onerous utility, the former due to the action of nature, the latter the result of human labour. This last being capable of being estimated and measured, may be represented by a line of determinate length; but the other is not susceptible of estimation or of measurement. No doubt in the production of a measure of wheat, of a cask of wine, of an ox, of a stone of wool, a ton of coals, a bundle of faggots, nature does much. But we have no means of measuring this natural co-operation of forces, most of which are unknown to us, and which have been in operation since the beginning of time. Nor have we any interest in doing so. We may represent gratuitous utility, then, by an indefinite line.

Now, let there be two products, the ‹value› of the one being double that of the other, they may be represented by these lines:—

I A B ................————————————————————

I C D ................——————————

IB, ID, represent the total product, general utility, what satisfies man’s wants, absolute wealth. [p329]

IA, IC, the co-operation of nature, gratuitous utility, the part which belongs to the domain of community.

AB, CD, human service, onerous utility, ‹value›, relative wealth, the part which belongs to the domain of property.

I need not say that AB, which you may suppose, if you will, to represent a house, a piece of furniture, a book, a song sung by Jenny Lind, a horse, a bale of cloth, a consultation of physicians, etc., will exchange for twice CD, and that the two men who effect the exchange will give into the bargain, and without even being aware of it, the one, once IA, the other twice IC.

Man is so constituted that his constant endeavour is to diminish the proportion of effort to result, to substitute the action of nature for his own action; in a word, to accomplish more with less. This is the constant aim of his skill, his intelligence, and his energy.

Let us suppose then that John, the producer of IB, discovers a process by means of which he accomplishes his work with one-half the labour which it formerly cost him, taking everything into account, even the construction of the instrument by means of which he avails himself of the co-operation of nature.

As long as he preserves his secret, we shall have no change in the figures we have given above; AB and CD will represent the same values, the same relations; for John alone of all the world being acquainted with the improved process, he will turn it exclusively to his own profit and advantage. He will take his ease for half the day, or else he will make, each day, twice the quantity of IB, and his labour will be better remunerated. The discovery he has made is for the good of mankind, but mankind in this case is represented by one man.

And here let us remark, in passing, how fallacious is the axiom of the English Economists that ‹value comes from labour›, if thereby it is intended to represent ‹value› and ‹labour› as proportionate. Here we have the labour diminished by one-half, and yet no change in the value. This is what constantly happens, and why? Because the service is the same. Before as after the discovery, as long as it is a secret, he who gives or transfers IB renders the same service. But things will no longer be in the same position when Peter, the producer of ID, is enabled to say, “You ask me for two hours of my labour in exchange for one hour of yours; but I have found out your process, and if you set so high a price on your service, I shall serve myself.”

Now this day must necessarily come. A process once realized [p330] is not long a mystery. Then the value of the product IB will fall by one-half, and we shall have these two figures.

I A A´ B .................................————————————

I C D .................................————————————

AA´ represent value annihilated, relative wealth which has disappeared, property become common, utility formerly onerous, now gratuitous.

For, as regards John, who here represents the producer, he is reinstated in his former condition. With the same effort which it cost him formerly to produce IB, he can now produce twice as much. In order to obtain twice ID, we see him constrained to give twice IB, or what IB represents, be it furniture, books, houses, or what it may.

Who profits by all this? Clearly Peter, the producer of ID, who here represents consumers in general, including John himself. If, in fact, John desires to consume his own product, he profits by the saving of time represented by the suppression of AA´. As regards Peter, that is to say as regards consumers in general, they can now purchase IB with half the expenditure of time, effort, labour, value, compared with what it would have cost them before the intervention of natural forces. These forces, then, are gratuitous, and, moreover, common.

Since I have ventured to illustrate my argument by geometrical figures, perhaps I may be permitted to give another example, and I shall be happy if by this method—somewhat whimsical, I allow, as applied to Political Economy—I can render more intelligible to the reader the phenomena which I wish to describe.

As a producer, or as a consumer, every man may be considered as a centre from whence radiate the services which he renders, and to which tend the services which he receives in exchange.

Suppose then that there is placed at A (Fig. 1) a producer, a copyist, for example, or transcriber of manuscripts, who here represents all producers, or production in general. He furnishes to society four manuscripts. If at the present moment the ‹value› of each of these manuscripts is equal to 15, he renders services equal to 60, and receives an equal value, variously spread over a multitude of services. To simplify the demonstration, I suppose only [p331] four of them, proceeding from four points of the circumference BCDE.

This man, we now suppose, discovers the art of printing. He can thenceforth produce in 40 hours what formerly would have cost him 60. Admit that competition forces him to reduce proportionally the price of his books, and that in place of being worth 15, they are now worth only 10. But then in place of four our workman can now produce six books. On the other hand, the fund of remuneration proceeding from the circumference, amounting to 60, has not changed. There is remuneration for six books, worth 10 each, just as there was formerly remuneration for four manuscripts, each worth 15.

This, let me remark briefly, is what is always lost sight of in discussing the question of machinery, of free-trade, and of progress in general. Men see the labour set free and rendered disposable by the expeditive process, and they become alarmed. They do not see that a corresponding proportion of remuneration is rendered disposable also by the same circumstance.

The new transactions we have supposed are represented by Fig. 2, where we see radiate from the centre A, a total value of 60, spread over six books, in place of four manuscripts. From the circumference still proceeds a value, equal to 60, necessary now as formerly, to make up the balance.

Who then has gained by the change? As regards ‹value›, no one. As regards real wealth, positive satisfactions, the countless body of consumers ranged round the circumference. Each of them can now purchase a book with an amount of labour reduced by one-third. But the consumers are the human race. For observe that [p332] A himself, if he gains nothing in his capacity of producer,—if he is obliged, as formerly, to perform 60 hours’ labour in order to obtain the old remuneration,—nevertheless, in as far as he is a consumer of books, gains exactly as others do. Like them, if he desires to read, he can procure this enjoyment with an economy of labour equal to one-third.

But if, in his character of producer, he finds himself at length deprived of the profit of his own inventions, by competition, where in that case is his compensation?

His compensation consists, ‹1st›, in this, that as long as he was able to preserve his secret, he continued to sell 15 of what he produced at the cost of 10; ‹2dly›, In this, that he obtains books for his own use at a smaller cost, and thus participates in the advantages he has procured for society. But, ‹3dly›, His compensation consists above all in this, that just in the same way as he has been forced to impart to his fellow-men the benefit of his own progress, he benefits by the progress of his fellow-men.

Just as the progress accomplished by A has profited B, C, D, E, the progress realized by B, C, D, E has profited A. By turns A finds himself at the centre and at the circumference of universal industry, for he is by turns producer and consumer. If B, for example, is a cotton-spinner who has introduced improved machinery, the profit will redound to A as well as to C, D. If C is a mariner who has replaced the oar by the sail, the economy of labour will profit B, A, E.

In short, the whole mechanism reposes on this law:—

Progress benefits the producer, as such, only during the time necessary to recompense his skill. It soon produces a fall of value, and leaves to the first imitators a fair, but small, recompense. At length value becomes proportioned to the diminished labour, and the whole saving accrues to society at large.

Thus all profit by the progress of each, and each profits by the progress of all. The principle, ‹each for all, all for each›, put forward by the Socialists, and which they would have us receive as a novelty, the germ of which is to be discovered in their organizations founded on oppression and constraint, God himself has given us; and He has educed it from liberty. [p333]

God, I say, has given us this principle, and He has not established it in a model community, presided over by M. Considérant, or in a ‹Phalanstère› of six hundred ‹harmoniens›, or in a tentative ‹Icarie›,[67] on condition that a few fanatics should submit themselves to the arbitrary power of a monomaniac, and that the faithless should pay for the true believers. No, God has established the principle ‹each for all and all for each› generally, universally, by a marvellous mechanism, in which justice, liberty, utility, and sociability are mingled and reconciled in such a degree as ought to discourage these manufacturers of social organizations.

Observe that this great law of ‹each for all and all for each› is much more universal than my demonstration supposes it. Words are dull and heavy, and the pen still more so. The writer is obliged to exhibit successively, and one after the other, with despairing slowness, phenomena which recommend themselves to our admiration only in the aggregate.

Thus, I have just spoken of ‹inventions›. You might conclude that this was the only case in which progress, once attained, escapes from the producer, and goes to enlarge the common fund of mankind. It is not so. It is a general law that every advantage of whatever kind, proceeding from local situation, climate, or any other liberality of nature, slips rapidly from the hands of the person who first discovered and appropriated it—not on that account to be lost, but to go to feed the vast reservoir from which the enjoyments of mankind are derived. One condition alone is attached, which is, that labour and transactions should be free. To run counter to liberty is to run counter to the designs of Providence; it is to suspend the operation of God’s law, and limit progress in a double sense.

What I have just said with reference to the transfer of advantages holds equally true of evils and disadvantages. Nothing remains permanently with the producer—neither advantages nor inconveniences. Both tend to disseminate themselves through society at large.

We have just seen with what avidity the producer seeks to avail himself of whatever may facilitate his work; and we have seen, too, in how short a time the profit arising from inventions and discoveries slips from the inventor’s hands. It seems as if that profit were not in the hands of a superior intelligence, but of a blind and obedient instrument of general progress.

With the same ardour he shuns all that can shackle his action; and this is a happy thing for the human race, for it is to mankind [p334] at large that in the long-run obstacles are prejudicial. Suppose, for example, that A, the producer of books, is subjected to a heavy tax. He must add the amount of that tax to the price of his books. It will enter into the value of the books as a constituent part, the effect of which will be that B, C, D, E must give more labour in exchange for the same satisfaction. Their compensation will consist in the purpose to which Government applies the tax. If the use to which it is applied is beneficial, they may gain instead of losing by the arrangement. If it is employed to oppress them, they will suffer in a double sense. But as far as A is concerned, he is relieved of the tax, although he pays it in the first instance.

I do not mean to say that the producer does not frequently suffer from obstacles of various kinds, and from taxes among others. Sometimes he suffers most seriously from the operation of taxes, and it is precisely on that account that taxes tend to shift their incidence, and to fall ultimately on the masses.

Thus, in France, wine has been subjected to a multitude of exactions. And then a system has been introduced which restricts its sale abroad.

It is curious to observe what skips and bounds such burdens make in passing from the producer to the consumer. No sooner has the tax or restriction begun to operate than the producer endeavours to indemnify himself. But the ‹demand› of the consumers, as well as the supply of wine, remaining the same, the price cannot rise. The producer gets no more for his wine after, than he did before, the imposition of the tax. And as before the tax he received no more than an ordinary and adequate price, determined by services freely exchanged, he finds himself a loser by the whole amount of the tax. To cause the price to rise, he is obliged to diminish the quantity of wine produced.[68] . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The consumer, then,—the public,—is relatively to the loss or profit which affects in the first instance certain classes of producers what the earth is to electricity—the great common reservoir. All proceeds from it, and after some detours, longer or shorter as the case may be, and after having given rise to certain phenomena more or less varied, all returns to it again.

* * * * *

We have just shown that the economic effects only glance upon the producer, so to speak, on their way to the consumer, and that consequently all great and important questions of this kind must [p335] be regarded from the consumer’s point of view if we wish to make ourselves masters of their general and permanent consequences.

This subordination of the interests of the producer to that of the consumer, which we have deduced from the consideration of ‹utility›, is fully confirmed when we advert to the consideration of ‹morality›.

Responsibility, in fact, always rests with the initiative. Now where is the initiative? In ‹demand›.

‹Demand› (which implies the means of remuneration) determines all—the direction of capital and of labour, the distribution of population, the morality of professions, etc. ‹Demand› answers to Desire, while ‹Supply› answers to Effort. Desire is reasonable or unreasonable, moral or immoral. Effort, which is only an effect, is morally neuter, or has only a reflected morality.

Demand or Consumption says to the producer, “Make that for me.” The producer obeys. And this would be evident in every case if the producer always and everywhere waited for the demand.

But in practice this is not the case.

Is it exchange which has led to the division of labour, or the division of labour which has given rise to exchange? This is a subtle and thorny question. Let us say that man makes exchanges, because, being intelligent and sociable, he comprehends that this is one means of increasing the proportion of result to effort. That which results exclusively from the division of labour and from foresight, is that a man does not wait for a specific request to work for another. Experience teaches him tacitly that demand exists.

He makes the effort beforehand which is to satisfy the demand, and this gives rise to trades and professions. Beforehand he makes shoes, hats, etc., or prepares himself to sing, to teach, to plead, to fight, etc. But is it really the supply which precedes the demand, and determines it?

No. It is because there is a sufficient certainty that these different services will be demanded that men prepare to render them, although they do not always know precisely from what quarter the demand may come. And the proof of it is, that the relation between these different services is sufficiently well known, that their value has been so widely tested that one may devote himself with some security to a particular manufacture, or embrace a particular career.

The impulse of demand is then pre-existent, seeing that one may calculate the intensity of it with so much precision. [p336]

Moreover, when a man betakes himself to a particular trade or profession, and sets himself to produce commodities, about what is he solicitous? Is it about the utility of the article which he manufactures, or its results, good or bad, moral or immoral? Not at all; he thinks only of its ‹value›. It is the demander who looks to the ‹utility›. Utility answers to his want, his desire, his caprice. Value, on the contrary, has relation only to the effort made, to the service transferred. It is only when, by means of exchange, the producer in his turn becomes the demander that utility is looked to. When I resolve to manufacture hats rather than shoes, I do not ask myself the question, whether men have a greater interest in protecting their heads or their heels. No, that concerns the demander, and determines the demand. The demand in its turn determines the value, or the degree of esteem in which the public holds the service. Value, in short, determines the effort or the supply.

Hence result some very remarkable consequences in a moral point of view. Two nations may be equally furnished with values, that is to say, with relative wealth (see chap. vi), and very unequally provided with real utilities, or absolute wealth; and this happens when one of them forms desires which are more unreasonable than those of the other—when the one considers its real wants, and the other creates for itself wants which are factitious or immoral.

* * * * *

Among one people a taste for education may predominate; among another a taste for good living. In such circumstances we render a service to the first when we have something to teach them; to the other, when we please their palate.

Now, services are remunerated according to the degree of importance we attach to them. If we do not exchange, if we render these services to ourselves, what should determine us if not the nature and intensity of our desires?

In one of the countries we have supposed, professors and teachers will abound; in the other, cooks.

In both, the services exchanged may be equal in the aggregate, and may consequently represent equal values, or equal relative wealth, but not the same absolute wealth. In other words, the one employs its labour well, and the other employs it ill.

And as regards satisfactions the result will be this, that the one people will have much instruction, and the other good dinners. The ultimate consequences of this diversity of tastes will have considerable influence not only upon real, but upon relative wealth; [p337] for education may develop new means of rendering services, which good dinners never can.

We remark among nations a prodigious diversity of tastes, arising from their antecedents, their character, their opinions, their vanity, etc.

No doubt there are some wants so imperious (hunger and thirst, for example) that we regard them as determinate quantities. And yet it is not uncommon to see a man scrimp himself of food in order to have good clothes, while another never thinks of his dress until his appetite is satisfied. The same thing holds of nations.

But these imperious wants once satisfied, everything else depends greatly on the will. It becomes an affair of taste, and in that region morality and good sense have much influence.

The intensity of the various national desires determines always the quantity of labour which each people subtracts from the aggregate of its efforts in order to satisfy each of its desires. An Englishman must, above all things, be well fed. For this reason he devotes an enormous amount of his labour to the production of food, and if he produces any other commodities, it is with the intention of exchanging them abroad for alimentary substances. The quantity of corn, meat, butter, milk, sugar, etc., consumed in England is frightful. A Frenchman desires to be amused. He delights in what pleases his eye, and in frequent changes. His labours are in accordance with his tastes. Hence we have in France multitudes of singers, mountebanks, milliners, elegant shops, coffee-rooms, etc. In China, the natives dream away life agreeably under the influence of opium, and this is the reason why so great an amount of their national labour is devoted to procuring this precious narcotic, either by direct production, or indirectly by means of exchange. In Spain, where the pomp of religious worship is carried to so great a height, the exertions of the people are bestowed on the decoration of churches, etc.

I shall not go the length of asserting that there is no immorality in services which pander to immoral and depraved desires. But the immoral principle is obviously in the desire itself.

That would be beyond doubt were man living in a state of isolation; and it is equally true as regards man in society, for society is only individuality enlarged.

Who then would think of blaming our labourers in the south of France for producing brandy? They satisfy a ‹demand›. They dig their vineyards, dress their vines, gather and distil the grapes, without concerning themselves about the use which will be made of the product. It is for the man who seeks the enjoyment to [p338] consider whether it is proper, moral, rational, or productive of good. The responsibility rests with him. The business of the world could be conducted on no other footing. Is the tailor to tell his customer that he cannot make him a coat of the fashion he wants because it is extravagant, or because it prevents his breathing freely, etc., etc.

Then what concern is it of our poor vine-dressers if rich diners-out in London indulge too freely in claret? Or can we seriously accuse the English of raising opium in India with the deliberate intention of poisoning the Chinese?

A frivolous people requires frivolous manufactures, just as a serious people requires industry of a more serious kind. If the human race is to be improved, it must be by the improved morality of the consumer, not of the producer.

This is the design of religion in addressing the rich—the great ‹consumers›—so seriously on their immense responsibility. From another point of view, and employing a different language, Political Economy arrives at the same conclusion, when she affirms that we cannot check the ‹supply› of any commodity which is in ‹demand›; that as regards the producer, the commodity is simply a ‹value›, a sort of current coin which represents nothing either good or evil, whilst it is in the intention of the consumer that ‹utility›, or moral or immoral enjoyment, is to be discovered; consequently, that it is incumbent on the man who manifests the desire or makes the demand for the commodity to weigh the consequences, whether useful or hurtful, and to answer before God and man for the good or bad direction which he impresses upon industry.

Thus from whatever point of view we regard the subject, we see clearly that consumption is the great end of Political Economy; and that good and evil, morality and immorality, harmonies and dissonances, all come to centre in the consumer, for he represents mankind at large. [p339]

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