steel, and the application of them to a vast number of new purposes; in the transportation of men and goods, and the transmission of intelligence; in the use of new materials, such as caoutchouc, gutta-percha, gas, and petroleum; in the work of a great printingoffice, like that of The Times newspaper; and even in the implements and processes of agriculture now in use, so much has been accomplished, that we may safely say the amount of possible enjoyment has been quadrupled, and one man now often does what would have been the work of a thousand only fifty years ago.

Often the immediate consequence of introducing an improved process, or a new machine, is so to economize human labor that many workmen are thrown out of employment, and wages are, for a while, considerably depressed. In most cases, however, the ultimate result is, through cheapening the price, so far to increase the demand for the products, that more persons than ever are employed in their formation, and wages rise again. Railroads have, in a great degree, created the travel and the traffic which they so much facilitate and cheapen, and thus give employment to laborers greatly exceeding in number the stage-drivers and wagoners whose occupations were superseded by them. The invention of printing deprived many copyists of work and wages, but has so multiplied books and newspapers, that there are now probably more persons employed in making books, than there were, in the fifteenth century, in reading them. Generally speaking, the progress of invention has enlarged, rather than contracted, the field for the employment of industry.

But I doubt whether it has been so in every instance. The demand for an article is sometimes limited by natural causes, irrespective of its dearness or cheapness; and in such case, any improvement which will diminish the labor required for its production must permanently deprive some laborers of employment. Thus, the demand for bread must be limited by the size of the population, that is, by the number of months to be fed: cheapen its production ever so much, and very little more will be called for. Hence, it may be feared, the use of the steam-engine in many kinds of farm-work, and the recent invention of so many sowing, reaping, mowing, and threshing machines, have permanently diminished the number of agricultural laborers, and thereby lowered the rates of wages everywhere, even in manufactures.

This is one of the causes others will be pointed out hereafter - why the number of persons engaged in agriculture in Great Britain is constantly becoming less, so that a process of depopulating the rural districts seems to be going on, at the same time that pauperism is increasing, and the multitudes who take refuge in the cities and manufacturing towns find little employment there and scant wages. Through the extended use of such machinery, indeed, a great farm comes to resemble a huge manufactory, in which steam furnishes the whole motive power, and the number of human beings employed is small out of all proportion to the quantity of work done. This result is a triumph of inventive skill and money-making ingenuity; but it is a matter of evil omen for the classes who are entirely dependent upon the wages of labor. The recent invention of the sewing-machine has taken away work and wages from many seamstresses, journeymen tailors, and shoemakers; and I doubt whether it has increased, in anything like the same degree, the demand for clothes, boots and shoes, and other sewed fabrics; since this demand must be regulated by the number of people who need to be clothed and shod. The construction of machinery, of railroads and canals, and of great works of irrigation, as in India, not only lessens the demand for manual labor, but takes away from the power of paying wages for it, through converting large amounts of Circulating Capital into Fixed Capital.

CHAPTER IV.

THE NATURE OF CAPITAL, AND THE MEANS OF ITS INCREASE: CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH FAVOR THE GROWTH OF CAPITAL: THE SECURITY OF PROPERTY.

ANOTHER circumstance on which the efficiency of labor largely depends is the co-operation of capital, or stock. All capital is wealth, but all wealth is not capital. The furniture of a rich man's house, for instance, his carpets, his plate, his paintings, and much even of the food which is daily placed upon his table, forms a portion of his wealth, but not of his capital. All these articles contribute to his enjoyment; perhaps some of them are

necessary for his sustenance; but they do not directly aid him in the creation of other values. As they are consumed, or slowly worn out, they create nothing to replace them, and leave behind them nothing but the remembrance of the gratification which they have afforded. They are the fruit of previous industry indeed, having been created, as all other values are, by labor; but with the exception of the little food which is necessary to support life, they do not sustain present labor, do not aid in the production of fresh values. Capital is that portion of wealth which is consumed, not for purposes of mere enjoyment, not for immediate gratification, but to aid in the production of more wealth. It is still consumed, with greater or less rapidity; but its value disappears in one shape only to reappear in another.

The necessity for the employment of capital arises from the fact that man cannot labor to any good purpose with his hands alone. He must have tools, implements, machinery, raw material; if the article on which he is engaged requires time for its manufacture, he must be fed, clothed, and lodged while he is occupied in manufacturing it. The aggregate of wealth existing in these various forms, designed either to aid the laborer in his work, or to support him while working, is capital. It is consumed, but its value appears again in the larger amount of wealth which industry produces when thus assisted. The tools and machinery wear out; but the products which they have aided in creating enable the capitalist to replace them with a profit. Raw cotton is consumed in large quantities, and reappears as cloth; the seed-corn is buried in the earth, but in a few months the harvest yields twenty or thirty fold.

Labor is limited by capital, because labor cannot be prosecuted to any advantage without capital. Yet this fact does not contradict our general proposition, that wealth is created by labor alone; for capital itself is created by labor, and might be called consolidated or invested labor. But although labor is thus limited, it is by no means proportioned to the amount of capital employed. A master-shoemaker, with a capital of not more than $5,000, may keep twenty journeymen and apprentices in constant employment; while a manufacturer of gold and silver plate, or a wholesale merchant, with a capital of half a million of dollars, may not pay wages to more than thirty or forty persons. McCulloch observes, that "a manufacturer's power to employ labor is not measured by the

total amount of his capital, but by the amount of that portion only which is circulating capital. A capitalist possessed of a hundred steam-engines, and of £50,000 of circulating capital, has no greater demand for labor, and does not, in fact, employ a single workman more, than the capitalist who has no machinery, and only £50,000, devoted exclusively to the payment of wages." Boots and shoes, for instance, were formerly manufactured without machinery, and with the aid only of a few cheap tools. With a lapstone, a hammer, a knife, and an awl, the journeyman can begin work; and even the raw material which he needs is so frequently "turned over," as the phrase goes, or so quickly converted from leather into merchantable boots and shoes, that, if the articles can be sold as soon as they are manufactured, a few dollars will keep him constantly supplied with sufficient stock. On the other hand, an immense capital must be vested in machinery before the business of weaving cotton or woollen cloth on a great scale can begin.

Even in the rudest states of society, among savage nations, capital exists, though in small quantities, and performs its appropriate functions. "The wretched native of New Holland," says Colonel Torrens, "has his spear, his fishing-implements, and his canoe, for the purpose of abridging his labor, of performing operations of which he would otherwise be incapable, and appropriating productions of nature which, but for the aid of these rude instruments, would forever have remained beyond his reach." Before he labors directly to capture the wild tenants of the forests and the rivers, he labors to prepare himself for the task by manufacturing the necessary implements; consequently, the exchangeable value of the articles which he finally obtains is measured by the quantity of labor, both direct and indirect, which was devoted to their production. No one will give labor of either sort for nothing. That which was bestowed on the manufacture of bows and arrows must be compensated just as much, and in the same ratio, as that which was given to the pursuit and killing of wild animals; otherwise, no one will make bows and arrows. The law of distribution, therefore, that the value of the completed product will be divided among its producers in exact proportion to the labor bestowed by each, is not altered by the co-operation of capital with labor. The profits of capital are the reward of labor, just as much as the wages directly paid to the laborer.

Capital exists, as I have said, among savages; and it accumulates very rapidly with the progress of civilization. So rapid, indeed, is its increase, and so vast becomes its aggregation, that it constitutes the chief difference in point of efficiency between the labor of the savage and that of civilized man. The Australian or the Indian may be as muscular as the European; he often works as hard, and is even more capable of enduring hardship and privation. He also practises the division of labor to some extent, as a whole tribe often unite in the chase or in war, and make larger captures by acting in concert and parcelling out the work among each other. But their labor on the whole is miserably inefficient and unproductive, because it is aided only by a trifling amount of capital.

The savage does not amass capital, because he is incapable of foresight and self-denial. What he obtains is devoted to the gratification of the present moment, or is wasted. This, in truth, is the chief reason why he does not till the ground; he often has knowledge enough for this end, his powers of observation being largely developed. He notices slight peculiarities of vegetation, which escape the eye of the white man, and by this means is often enabled to find his way through the trackless forests. He knows that edible fruits and grains are produced from seed. But he is not economical and prudent enough to reserve seed-corn for agriculture, or to lay in a store of food which will enable him to expend labor on the ground, to dig and plant, with the expectation of reaping the fruits of his labor only after an interval of some months. He is obliged to give all his toil to the necessities of the present hour, because he is not prudent enough to save, and not industrious enough to work when there is no immediate necessity for working.

Though the common opinion runs the other way, I believe that man has no natural instinct for saving, no original propensity for labor, none, at least, that is not constantly overridden by other and stronger propensities. The hardest lesson for children and savages to learn is that of economy, the necessity of bridling the inclination or appetite of the moment, with a view to some prospective benefit. Long and hard experience has taught this lesson to the full-grown and reflecting man, and taught it so effectually that, as is often the case, the acquired inclination