Principles of Social Science

1. By means of his bow, Crusoe reduced to his service the force of elasticity a great power always existing in nature, and waiting appropriation at the hands of man. His canoe enabled him to command another important force, the supporting power of water; to which, when he had made a sail, he added a third, the propelling power of wind each addition to his power increasing his supplies of food, while diminishing his labor. At a later period, we see him using his stick to make holes in the ground, with a view to obtain the aid of certain properties of the earth and atmosphere; and now it is that the earth gives him back five, ten, or even twenty grains in return for the single one he had given to her.

As thus yielded, however, they do not constitute the thing he seeks not being as yet food for man. That they may so become, it is necessary that they be first converted into meal, for the accomplishment of which object he calls to his service another natural force that of gravitation. Still, however, there has been no production of the thing he is seeking to obtain -food. The meal is scarcely more fitted to answer his purposes than the wheat had been; and therefore is it that he seeks the assistance of a further force—that of friction. Rubbing together a couple of pieces of wood, he obtains heat, and ultimately fire; and now it is that he produces bread, the commodity he needs. What, however, was the ultimate object of all these labors? Why did he give so much time and mind to the construction of the bow and the canoe, to the making of holes in the earth, to VOL. III.-2

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the taking of fish, the pounding of grain, and the conversion of both into the forms in which they could be regarded in the light of food? That object was the attainment of muscular power in himself for doing which it was required that he should subject to decomposition the matter that nature had before composed. This he does by passing it through his stomach, where it is subjected to the action of other natural forces-being there prepared again to enter into the composition of fish or birds, wheat or rye, apples or potatoes. We have here a never-ending round; but, among all these operations, to which of them may we apply the term production? Where does production end, and where are we to find the beginning of consumption?

The canoe is consumed in producing fish, the bow in producing birds, the air and earth in producing wheat, the wheat in producing flour, the flour in producing bread, and the bread in producing man. He, in turn, being consumed in producing all these things, passes finally into soil, ready to take his part in furnishing anew the materials of which birds, beasts, fishes, wheat, rye, and potatoes are composed. One man, however, as we are told, is a producer of cotton, while another produces cotton cloth, which passes to a third, who produces calicoes; yet all these men are engaged in different portions of the same work-that of reducing to the service of man the forces of nature, by enabling those existing in the earth and atmosphere to take that form in which they will best afford the protection required against the winter's cold.

Again: a man is called a producer of coal; whereas, he has simply changed its place- bringing to the head of the shaft what before was at its foot. In doing this, however, he has taken but a single step towards the end for whose attainment coal is sought. Man needs power, and to have power there must be motion, which requires heat. To have heat he must consume the coal-the act of consumption becoming thus an act of production. Having obtained heat, he has now to consume it in the act of consuming water and producing steam. That done, he consumes the steam in producing water; and thus on and on, in an endless round, in which production and consumption are so entirely part and parcel of each other, that distinction between the two has ceased to exist.

Further one man produces coal, and another iron ore, both

of which must be consumed before either can command those services of nature which are obtained from the use of a bar of iron. They are consumed, but, in place of a malleable bar, we find a brittle lump of metal of slight utility. That, in its turn, being consumed, it is now that we obtain a bar. That, again, consumed, we next obtain strips of iron fitted for yielding knives. Before, however, the knife can be obtained, we are required to consume other iron in producing steel; and it is when both the iron and the steel have been consumed, that we find in their place a parcel of knives and forks. All the acts of consumption here described, are part and parcel of one great act of production. Having made holes in the earth with his stick, Crusoe obtained corn. Having consumed the corn, he obtained muscular force, by means of which he obtained a spade. That, in its turn, being consumed in making deeper holes, he thus enabled the earth to consume more of the elements with which the atmosphere was charged-giving him, in return, more corn, by help of which he has greater force. The more corn he consumed, the more of its elements he could return to the land, and the greater was the power of the soil to increase its consumption of other elements, by means of which to produce more food. These are all, therefore, but acts of motion, each of which is required for the production of the other. Man, however, can cause no motion to exist. All he can do is, so to engineer the forces of nature as to make them serve his purposes. Serve him they will, if he will put himself in the way of being served. The waters of Niagara, and the great coal-beds of the West, are ready to grant their aid to him, if he can but be induced to qualify himself for subjecting them to his power, and thus adding to his wealth.

§ 2. That man may qualify himself for obtaining command of the forces of nature, it is required that his own latent powers be stimulated into action-a result to be obtained only by means of association and combination with his fellow-men. The solitary Crusoe could make a bow; but when he attempted to fell a tree, out of which to make a canoe, he failed. His strength was insufficient for building a dam, in default of which the water passing from the hill remained as useless as it had been before his appearance on the island. Deficient in the power required for convert

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Principles of Social Science, Том 3