Зображення сторінки
PDF
ePub

which, great as it is already, is without doubt destined to become indefinitely greater. He exerts this power either by availing himself of natural forces in existence, or by arranging objects in those mixtures and combinations by which natural forces are generated; as when by putting a lighted match to fuel, and water into a boiler over it, he generates the expansive force of steam, a power which has been made so largely available for the attainment of human purposes.

Labor, then, in the physical world, is always and solely employed in putting objects in motion; the properties of matter, the laws of nature, do the rest. The skill and ingenuity of human beings is chiefly exercised in discovering movements, practicable by their powers, and capable of bringing about the effects which they desire. But, while movement is the only effect which man can immediately and directly produce by his muscles, it is not necessary that he should produce directly by them all the movements which he requires. The first and most obvious substitute is the muscular action of cattle; by degrees he makes the powers of inanimate nature aid him in this too, as by making the wind or water, things already in motion, communicate a part of their motion to the wheels, which before that invention he made revolve by muscular force. He extorts this service from the powers of wind and water by a set of actions, consisting like the former in moving certain objects into certain positions in which they constitute what is termed a machine; but the muscular action necessary for this is not constantly renewed, but performed once for all, and there is on the whole a great economy of labor.

3. Some writers have raised the question, whether nature gives more assistance to labor in one kind of industry or in another; and have said that in some occupations labor does most, in others nature most. In this, however,

there seems much confusion of ideas. The part which nature has in any work of man, is indefinite and incommensurable. It is impossible to decide that in any one thing nature does more than in any other. One cannot even say that labor does less. One may say, that less labor is required; but if that which is required, is absolutely indispensable, the result is just as much the product of labor, as of nature. When two conditions are equally necessary for producing the effect at all, it is useless to say that so much of it is produced by one, and so much by the other; it is like attempting to decide which half of a pair of scissors has most to do in the act of cutting; or which of the factors, five and six, contributes most to the production of thirty. The form which this conceit usually assumes, is that of supposing, that nature lends more assistance to human endeavors in agriculture, than in manufactures. This notion, held by the French Economistes, and from which Adam Smith was not free, arose from a misconception of the nature of rent. The rent of land being a price paid for a natural agency, and no such price being paid in manufactures, these writers imagined that since a price was paid, it was because there was a greater amount of service to be paid for; whereas a better consideration of the subject would have shown that the reason why the use of land bears a price is simply the limitation of its quantity, and that if air, heat, electricity, chemical agencies, and the other powers of nature employed by manufacturers were sparingly supplied, and could, like land, be engrossed and appropriated, a rent could be exacted for them also.

§ 4. This leads to a distinction which we shall find to be of primary importance. Of natural powers, some are unlimited, others limited in quantity. By an unlimited quantity is of course not meant literally, but practically unlimited; a quantity beyond the use which can in any, or at

least in present circumstances, be made of it. Land is, in some newly settled countries, practically unlimited in quantity; there is more than can be used by the existing population of the country, or by any accession likely to be made to it for generations to come. But even there, land favorably situated with regard to markets or means of carriage, is generally limited in quantity; there is not so much of it as persons would gladly occupy and cultivate, or otherwise turn to use. In all old countries, land capable of cultivation, land at least of any tolerable fertility, must be ranked among agents limited in quantity. Water, for ordinary purposes, on the banks of rivers or lakes, may be regarded as of unlimited abundance; but if required for irrigation, it may even there be insufficient to supply all wants, while in places which depend for their consumption on cisterns or tanks, or on wells which are not copious, or are liable to fail, water takes its place among things the quantity of which is most strictly limited. Where water itself is plentiful, yet water-power, i. e., a fall of water applicable by its mechanical force to the service of industry, may be exceedingly limited, compared with the use which would be made of it, if it were more abundant. Coal, metallic ores, and other useful substances found in the earth, are still more limited than land. They are not only strictly local, but exhaustible; though, at a given place and time, they may exist in much greater abundance than would be applied to present use even if they could be obtained gratis. Fisheries, in the sea, are in most cases a gift of nature practically unlimited in amount; but the Arctic whale fisheries have long been insufficient for the demand which exists even at the very considerable price necessary to defray the cost of appropriation; and the immense extension which the Southern fisheries have in consequence assumed, is tending to exhaust them likewise. River fisheries are a natural resource of a very limited character, and would be rapidly

exhausted if allowed to be used by every one without restraint. Air, even that state of it which we term wind, may, in most situations, be obtained in a quantity sufficient for every possible use; and so likewise, on the sea coast or on large rivers, may water carriage; though the wharfage or harbor-room applicable to the service of that mode of transport is in many situations far short of what would be used if easily attainable.

It will be seen hereafter how much of the economy of society depends on the limited quantity in which some of the most important natural agents exist, and more particularly land. For the present, I shall only remark that so long as the quantity of a natural agent is practically unlimited, it cannot, unless susceptible of artificial monopoly, bear any value in the market, since no one will give anything for what can be obtained gratis. But as soon as a limitation becomes practically operative, as soon as there is not so much of the thing to be had, as would be appropriated and used if it could be obtained for asking, the ownership or use of the natural agent acquires an exchangeable value. When more water-power is wanted in a particular district, than there are falls of water to supply it, persons will give an equivalent for the use of a fall of waWhen there is more land wanted for cultivation than a place possesses, or than it possesses of a certain quality and certain advantages of situation, land of that quality and situation may be sold for a price, or let for an annual rent. This subject will hereafter be discussed at length; but it is often useful to anticipate, by a brief suggestion, principles and deductions which we have not yet reached the place for exhibiting and illustrating fully.

ter.

37

CHAPTER II.

OF LABOR AS AN AGENT OF PRODUCTION.

1. THE labor which terminates in the production of an article fitted for some human use, is either employed directly about the thing, or in previous operations destined to facilitate, perhaps essential to the possibility of, the subsequent ones. In making bread, for example, the labor employed about the thing itself is that of the baker; but the labor of the miller, though employed directly in the production not of bread but of flour, is equally part of the aggregate sum of labor by which the bread is produced; as is also the labor of the sower, and of the reaper. Some may think that all these persons ought to be considered as employing their labor directly about the thing; the corn, the flour, and the bread being one substance in three different states. Without disputing about this question of mere language, there is still the ploughman, who prepared the ground for the seed, and whose labor never came in contact with the substance in any of its states; and the ploughmaker, whose share in the result was still more remote. All these persons ultimately derive the remuneration of their labor from the bread, or its price, the plough-maker as much as the rest; for since ploughs are of no use except for tilling the soil, no one would make or use ploughs for any other reason than because the increased returns thereby obtained from the ground afforded a source from which an adequate equivalent could be assigned for the labor of the ploughmaker. If the produce is to be used or consumed in the form of bread, it is from the bread that this equivalent must The bread must suffice to remunerate all these laborers, and several others; such as the carpenters and brick

come.

[blocks in formation]
« НазадПродовжити »