Chapter CLIII: Section VI: Paper Money—A Curse Or A Blessing? (4)

_ 298 Hermann_, St. Untersuchungen, 289 ff.; _List_, System der
politischen Œkonomie, I, 325 ff. Thus, for instance, capitalization
among a race of hunters may be continued longest by the creation of
herds; that of a race of shepherds by the building of houses, and by
land-improvements; that of an agricultural people by the
establishment of trades, artificial roads, etc. As to how, in
general the accumulation of goods to any great extent, supposes
exchange, and as to how, first of all, with exchange through the
existence of a superabundance wealth may originate, see _Hermann_,
loc. cit., II, Aufl., 25 ff.

299 The annual increase of the capital of France during the later years
of Louis Philippe’s reign, was estimated at from 200 to 300 million
of francs; during the best years of Napoleon III’s reign, at 600
million. Journal des Econ., Nov., 1861, 170. The capital of the
British empire, judging from the statistics of the income tax,
increased from 1843 to 1853, in Great Britain alone, at least
£42,000,000 yearly; from 1854 to 1860, in the whole empire, at least
£114,000,000; and in 1863 alone by £130,000,000. London Statis.
Journal, 1864, 118 ff. A war carried on on English soil would
doubtless be more destructive of capital than one waged in Russia;
but Russia would recover from one like that of 1854-55 with much
greater difficulty because of the small tendency of its people to
amass capital. In countries in which the middle classes
preponderate, the influence of the amassing of capital on foreign
politics is one that favors peace. In despotic or democratic
countries, it may as readily favor war.

300 The “absolute formation” of capital above described is, of course,
the only one in the general economy of mankind. In the economy of
individuals, we frequently meet with another which is only
“relative,” as when the increase of one’s resources is attended by
as great or even greater decrease of another’s. This is the case,
for instance, where privileges or monopolies are granted. The same
phenomenon is found also in the intercourse of economies of
different nations. _Supra_, § 64.

301 Thus _Cicero_, De Off., II, 3, 4. Nature may indeed produce mere
value in use without the coöperation of labor, in the narrow sense
of the word; as, for instance, a forest which protects a district
from avalanches etc. But “everything which has been transformed into
goods tends constantly to return to its natural state, and to
withdraw itself from the life of goods.” _Stein_, Lehrbuch.

302 Compare _List_, System der Polit. Œkon. But see also the very fine
discussion of _J. S. Mill_, Principles, IV, ch. VI, 2, on the
dreariness of nature, when taken exclusive possession of by man;
“with every rood of land brought into cultivation which is capable
of growing food for human beings; every flowery waste or natural
pasture plowed up; all quadrupeds or birds which are not
domesticated for man’s use, exterminated as his rivals for food;
every hedgerow or superfluous tree rooted out, and scarcely a place
left where a wild shrub or flower could grow, without being
eradicated as a weed, in the name of improved agriculture.”

303 In Paris, in 1820, the necessary tools of a rag-gatherer cost 6-¼
francs. _Garnier_, Elements d’Econ.-polit., 43.

304 It is not to be overlooked that all labor expended for a distant end
also falls under the head of capital. See _Droz_, Economie
politique, 1829, I, 6.

305 For a good exposition as to how England has need of more
agricultural products, the East Indies of more capital, and the West
Indies of more labor, see _Fawcett_, Manual of P. E., 110.

306 It is a very significant fact, that, at present, in certain European
countries, in Germany for instance, the laborer is called a _taker_,
and the capitalist a _giver_ of work. The expressions employed by
_Canard_, _Say_ and _Hermann_, teach a similar lesson.

_ 307 Schäffle_, Kapitalismus und Socialismus, 124 seq.

308 It is evident, that, absolutely considered, the predominating factor
of an earlier period may continue to increase during the following:
and, as a rule, it does continue to increase.

309 I need cite only the instance of the slaves, who called out the
hours, thus performing the functions of a clock: _Martial_, VIII.
67; _Juvenal_, X. 216; _Petron._ 26; of the turning of water wheels,
in Egypt and Babylon, by human hands. _Strabo_, XVI. 738, XVII.,
807. Among the ancients, it required one shepherd, and shepherd boys
besides, to take care of twenty sheep. (_Geopon._ XVIII, 1.) In
highly cultivated regions, the number ran up to fifty. (_Demosth._,
adv. Euerg. et Mnes., 1155.) It seldom passed eighty (_Varro_, De re
rust., II. 10, 10. 2, 20), or one hundred (_Cato_, R.R. c. 10);
while, recently, five men are sufficient to take care of eighteen
hundred sheep. See _Roscher’s_ discourse on the relation of
Political Economy to classical antiquity, in the reports of the
Royal Saxon Science Association, May, 1849. Also _D. Hume_,
Discourses, No. 10.

310 The productive power of each of the factors of production has been
over-estimated by some schools. After _Gratian_ (c. i, C. XIII. qu.
i), had clearly recognized the necessary coöperation of the three
elements, there was in the one-sidedness with which the Reformers
emphasized God’s blessing as the only source of wealth, a great
over-estimation of the factor nature. The Mercantile System
over-estimated the factor capital, in one of its most obvious
component parts, money. In later times again: “_La terre est la
source ou la matière d’où l’on tire la ichesse; le travail de
l’homme est la forme qui la produit. Tous les hommes d’un état
subsistent et s’enrichissent aux dépens des propriétaires des
terres._” (_Cantillon_, Sur la Nature du Commerce, 1755, I. 33, 55.)
_La terre est l’unique source des richesses._ (_Quesnay_, Maximes
générales de Gouvernement, 1758, ch. 3.) In another place, indeed,
the same writer says: _les revenus sont le produit des terres et des
hommes (Grains_, p. 276, Daire), and _Mirabeau_ frequently laid
stress on the necessary coöperation of labor and capital.
(Landwirthschaftsphilosophie, translation by _Wichmann,_ I, 5.)
_Turgot_, Sur la Formation et Distribution des Richesses, § 7. For
an excellent refutation of this “Physiocratic” one-sidedness, which,
if all men are endowed by nature with equal rights, leads to
socialism, see _Canard_, Principes, 6. According to _Gioja_, N.
Prospetto, I. 35, the part played by labor, in the production of
_Parmesan_ cheese, is a thousand times as great as that played by
the soil; and in the production of a Dutch tulip, a hundred thousand
times as great. The English are wont, similarly, to over-estimate
the relative power of labor. (_Ponocratie_, after _Ancillon_, Essais
philosophiques, 1817, II. 327.) “Commerce and trade first spring
from the labour of men.” (_North_, Discourses upon Trade, 112.)
Thus, _Locke_ (1690), Of Civil Government, II, 5, 40 ff., is of
opinion, that, at least 9/10 of the value of the products of the
soil, useful to man, are to be ascribed to labor, and, in the case
of most, even 99/100. And so, _Berkeley_ (1735), Querist, No. 38
seq. This view is advocated in its boldest form,—a thing unusual in
the case of the independent disciples of a great master—by
_McCulloch_, Principles, II, ch. i, that it is to labor, and to
labor alone, that man owes everything that possesses any value in
exchange. Similarly, _J. Mill_, Elements (1824), III, 2. The
consequences which socialism might draw from these premises are
self-evident. _Karl Marx’s_ whole system, for instance, rests,
without any attempt at demonstration, on the assumption that the
Ricardo school is right. Much more moderate views are met with
earlier. Thus, _Hobbes_, De Cive, XIII, 14, and _Leviath_., 24 (1642
and 1651), calls _labor et parsimonia_ necessary sources of wealth;
_proventus terræ et aquæ_ useful ones; and _Petty_, On Taxes (1679),
47, says: “Labour is the father and active principle of wealth, as
lands are the mother. Land and labour together are the sources of
all wealth; without a competency of lands there would be no
subsistence, and but a very poor one without labour.” _Harris_, Upon
Money and Coins, 1757, P.I. _Adam Smith_, also, in spite of the well
known passage at the beginning of his work, very frequently lays
stress on “the annual produce of land and labour.” (See the passages
collected in _Leser_, Begriff des Reichthums bei A.S., 97.)
According to _Leibniz, regionis potentia consistit in terra, rebus,
hominibus_. (ed. Dutens, IV. 2, 531.) _Ricardo’s_ school is wont to
bring capital under the head of labor, as saved-up labor. This is
about as correct as to say, that all that a grown man does, his
parents had done. (_Umpfenbach_, Nat. Œk., 64.) There is only one
way in which labor, and even then the expression is not exactly
correct, can be looked upon as the only factor in production; and
that is to presuppose the forces of nature as matters of course
(_als sich von selbst verstehend_), and to call the aggregate use
made of them by the human mind, labor. Or we might say with old
_Epicharmos_, that the gods sell all goods for labor. (_Xenoph_.,
Memor. II. 1.) Moreover, even in purely intellectual productions, in
poetical productions for instance, nature, labor and experience, the
culture inherited from former ages (a kind of intellectual capital)
uniformly coöperate. But how almost completely valueless in
literature are all entirely pure (empty!) productions of the fancy!

311 Before the predominance of the Mercantile System, _Montchrétien_
very cleverly called all trades: _parcelles et fragments de cette
sagesse divine que Dieu nous communique par le moyen de la raisen_.
By means of the three estates; _labourers, artisans, merchands, tout
état est nourri; par eux tout profit se fait. L’utilité règle les
rangs des arts_. (Traité, 12, 45, 66.) The teaching of _P. Gregorius
Tolosanos_ (ob. 1597) on the different classes of society and the
different callings of men, is still more in keeping with the present
doctrine of production; only, in the moralizing tone of the time, he
speaks rather of their dignity than of their influence in creating
wealth: De Rep. I, 195. See, also, the earlier views of _Franc.
Patricius_ (ob. 1494), De Rep. I, 4, 7, 8.

312 Compare _A. Serra_, Breve Trattato delle Cause che possono far
abbondare i Regni d’Oro d’Argento, 1613. _Th. Mun_, England’s
Treasure by foreign Trade, 1664. _Ch. King_, British Merchant or
Commerce Preserved, 1721. But, particularly, _A.C. Leib_, Von
Verbesserung Land und Leuten etc. (1708), who, from the point of
view of the Mercantile System, draws a very clear distinction
between the productive and unproductive classes. See, also, _infra_,
§ 116. First thoroughly refuted by _W. Petty_, Political Anatomy of
Ireland, 67, 82. Quantulumcunque concerning Money (1682). _D.
North_, Discourses upon trade (1691). See _Roscher’s_ Geschichte der
englischen Volkswirthschaftslehre, 77, 88, 138. And later,
especially, _Ad. Smith_, W. of N. IV., ch. 1 ff. _Adam Smith’s_
doctrine of productive and unproductive labor is to be found
already, in this period, in _Petty_, Several Essays, 127 ff.
Political Anatomy, 185 ff; also, in the anonymous work, A Discourse
of Trade, Coyn and Paper Credit, London (1697), 44, 159.

_ 313 Quesnay_, Dialogue sur les Travaux des Artisans, 210 ff.; 289 éd.
Daire; _Turgot_, Sur la Formation etc., § 8; _Dupont_,
Correspondence avec J.B. Say, 400, éd. Daire. _B. Franklin_, Letter
to Dr. Evans (1768), and Positions Concerning National Wealth
(1769), Works ed. Sparks, VII and II. Similarly even _Aristotle_,
Oec., I, 2, says, that commerce, wage-labor and war win from men,
with or without their will; but that only agriculture obtains booty
from nature. And so _Cicero_ says of merchants: _nihil proficiunt,
nisi admodum mentiantur_. De Off., I, 42. The same view seems to
have prevailed during the middle ages. See _Thom. Aquin._, De Rebus
publicis, II, 3, 5 seq. _Luther_ entertained a like notion (Vom
Kaufhandel und Wucher, 1524). He prefers agriculture to the trades.
See the Irmischer edition of his works, XXII, 284; XXXVI, 172; LXI,
352. _Calvin_ considered commerce both useful and honorable; so that
_ex ipsius mercatoris diligentia atque industria_, its profit may be
greater than that of agriculture. (Opp. ed. Amstelod, 1664, IX,
223.) _Asgill_, Several Assertions proved in order to create another
Species of Money than Gold (1691): “what we call commodities is
nothing but land severed from the soil; man deals in nothing but
earth.” Concerning _Cantillon_, compare § 47, note 4. How violent an
innovation the Physiocratic theory was in its time may be inferred
from what _Zincke_ writes in the Leipzig Sammlungen, X, 551 ff.
(1753), p. 20, XIII, 861.

_ 314 Quesnay_, l. c., 189, does not ignore that many workmen earn more
than the cost of their necessary subsistence; but he claimed that
this was a result of a natural or legal monopoly of the same. The
dearer labor was, the more productive it seemed. Per contra, see
_Dohm_ on the Physiocratic system, in the Deutsch. Museum, 1778, II,
313 ff.

_ 315 Gournay_ (compare _Turgot_, Eloge de G., in Guillaumin’s edition,
I, 266, 271 ff.), as well as _Raynal_, Histoire des Indes, vol. X,
Livre 19, spite of the similarity of their and Quesnay’s views,
acknowledged on this account, the productiveness of industry. For
some remarkable examples illustrative of how it may increase the
value in exchange of raw material, see the anonymous work, Paying
Old Debts without New Taxes, London, 1723. See also _Algarotti_ (ob.
1794), 318, in _Custodi_, Economisti classici italiani, Parte
moderna, I. Thus a cwt. of coarse cast iron is converted, in a
Berlin manufactory, into 88,440 shirt buttons worth 6-⅔ silver
groschens each. Hence the value is raised from 1-2 thalers to 19,653
thalers. The increase of the value in use by industrial labor is
self-evident.

_ 316 Quesnay_, Dialogue sur le Commerce.

317 Recognized very early by _Ad. Contzen_, Politicorum, Lib. VIII, C.
10 (1629).

318 This did not escape the notice of Frederick II. _Von Raumer_,
Hohenstaufen, III, 535.

_ 319 Condillac_ acknowledges the productive power both of industry and
of commerce; and that the service rendered by the state is at least
economically indispensable. (Le Commerce et le Gouvernment, 1776, I,
6, 7, 10.) _Beccaria_, Economia pubblica (1769 ff.), IV, 4, 24.
_Boisguillebert_ (ob. 1714), Sur la Nature des Richesses,
illustrated the utility of commerce by the picture of a number of
men bound to pillars, one hundred steps apart, one with a
superabundance of food but naked, a second with a superabundance of
fuel, a third with a superabundance of clothing etc.; all of whom
perish, because unable to exchange their respective surpluses with
one another. According to _Lotz_, Revision, I, 217, “buying dear,”
apart from real fraud, means only a decrease of possible gain.

_ 320 Verri_, Meditazioni, XXIV, instead of calling the merchant
productive, calls him a mediator between producers and consumers. It
would be just as reasonable to call the shoemaker a mediator between
the production and consumption of leather; or the cloth merchant,
who cuts the material from the piece, an assistant preparatory to
the tailor. The labor of commerce is especially like that of the
fisherman or the turf digger, because they produce only in so far as
they transfer goods from inaccessible to accessible places. See,
however, _Rau_, Lehrbuch, I, § 103. See the demonstration of the
productive power of commerce in general, as well as of what is, by
way of preference, called industry, in _Ad. Smith_, W. of N., IV,
ch. 9. A much more fundamental refutation of the Physiocratic
Principle is to be found in _Jacob_, N. Œk., 204 ff.

321 In 1843, about 55,000 tons of ice were shipped from Boston. Less
than 25 cents per ton was paid for the ice in the first instance.
When packed on board ship, it was worth $2.55 per ton. The ultimate
sale brought $3,575,000. Ausland, 1844, No. 278. The ancients were
acquainted with a similar production of ice, the value in exchange
of which might be almost entirely reduced to the labor of commerce.
See _Xenoph._, Memor., II, I, 30; Athen. III 97: Proverbs of
Solomon, 25, 13.

322 W. of N., ch. 3. See, however, _Garnier’s_ French translation of Ad.
Smith, Préf. p. IX and V, note 20. Similarly, _Malthus_, Principles,
ch. 1, Lect. 21. Definitions, ch. 7, 10.

_ 323 Bacon_ had already said of the nobility, clergy and literateurs:
_sorti reipublicæ nihil addunt_ (Serm., 15, 29); in opposition to
which, _Hobbes_ justly remarks, that even human labor may, like
other things, be exchanged against goods of all sorts. (Leviathan,
24.) In the work, Discourse of Trade, Coyn and Credit, p. 44 ff.,
and p. 156, the absolute necessity of “head-work” as well as bodily
labor, is conceded; but it is insisted that physicians, clergymen
and jurists can never enrich a country, and that a relatively large
number of them would even conduce to national poverty. (See
_Roscher_, Geschichte der englischen Volkswirthschaftslehre, 138.)
_David Hume_ considers merchants as productive, but says that a
doctor or lawyer can grow rich only at the expense of some one else.
(Discourses, No. 4, On Interest.) _Ferguson_ very cleverly compares
such a valuation of national wealth to that of a miser. Hist. of
Civil Society, VI, I.

324 Similarly _Lauderdale_, Inquiry, 355; _Lotz_, Handbuch der
Staätswirthschaft, I, § 39, and _Rau_, Lehrbuch I, § 195, concede
only indirect productiveness to commerce. It may be shown, in a
great many instances, that such productiveness exists side by side
with direct productiveness, on account of the thousand ways in which
all economic threads are interwoven with one another. Thus _Paley_
remarks in his work on the Principles of Morals and Politics, that a
tobacco manufacturer even may contribute indirectly to the
cultivation of grain; an actor, to industry etc.

325 Thus _Sismondi_, Nouveaux Principes, II, ch. 1, and, earlier,
_Mengotti_ Colbertismo, 317. (Cust.) See, on the other hand,
_Hermann_, Staatsw. Untersuchungen, 34 ff. Even _J.B. Say_ does no
manner of justice, in this respect, to personal services. He speaks
_of produits qui ne s’attachent à rien qui s’évanouissent à mésure
qu’ils naissent, qu’il est impossible d’accumuler, qui n’ajoutent
rein à la richesse nationale_. Compare Catéchisme (3d ed.) 52 ff.,
174 ff. On the other hand _Dunoyer_, Libertê du Travail, L.V.,
remarks that here labor and its result are made to change places;
the former like all labor is very perishable, the latter as lasting
as in the case of other kinds of labor. In the one case the utility
is fixed in things, in the other in persons. _Ad. Müller_, Elemente
der Staatskunst passim, calls special attention to how the kinds of
labor, called unproductive by _Adam Smith_, preserve the state, and
in that way, all individual exchangeable goods. Similarly, _Storch_,
Handbuch, I, 347; _Steinlein_, Handbuch, I, 460. _Lauderdale_ (443),
however, is correct when he says, that the continued duration of the
product of labor depends, usually, more on the caprice of consumers
than on the nature of the labor.

_ 326 Garnier_ calls attention to the fact, that there is a great
quantity of material products, such as laces, perfumes etc., that
can scarcely be ever used in further production, and, generally
speaking, one’s resources for the most part are not kept in lasting
goods, but are preserved by the change of technic forms in
production. _Hermann_, I, Aufl., 115.

327 When _Schön_, Nat. Œkonomie, 33, ridicules the idea of the
productiveness of personal services, by citing the instance of
prostitution carried on as a trade, he forgets that many material
goods also may conduce to the moral damage of the purchaser of them.
It is said that there are in France 3,500 retailers and colporteurs
of immoral writings and pictures, who sell yearly nine million
numbers or pieces, at a cost of six million francs! (Moniteur, 9
Avril, 1853.)

328 Compare _Schäffle_, Theorie der ausschliessenden Absatzverhältnise,
1867, 135. seq.

329 Many of the socialists take a retrograde step in this respect, in as
much as they consider only manual labor productive. _Fourier’s_
school particularly, declaim passionately against the
unproductiveness of commerce and of most personal services. Compare
_V. Considérant_, Destinée sociale, 1851, I, 44.

330 Besides the above, see _Gioja_, N. Prospetto, I, 246 ff.;
_Scialoja_, 42; _J. B. Say_, Traité, I, ch. 2; _Hufeland_, N.
Grundlegung, I, 42, 54; _Gr. Soden_, Nat. Œkonomie, I, 142 ff.
_Hermann_, St. Untersuchungen, 20 ff., distinguishes three
politico-economical points of view; that of the producer, that of
the consumer, and that of the whole nation’s economy. The producer
calls his labor productive, in case he receives back his outlay of
capital with the rate of profit usual in the trade of the country.
To this point of view, therefore, every service which is paid for,
according to wish, seems productive. On the other hand, the consumer
ascribes productiveness to all those kinds of labor the achievements
of which he may use, and which he can obtain at a convenient price.
Whenever, therefore, he pays for a service voluntarily, he
acknowledges its productiveness. Lastly, from a national-economical
point of view, all labor is considered productive which increases
the quantity of goods exposed for sale in the market; and this,
personal services do. The technic productiveness, which depends on
the execution of the technic ideas floating before the mind of the
workman, must be distinguished from this economic productiveness. It
is possible that, technically labor may be very productive, and yet
cause economic loss; for instance, the fine arts and the so-called
master pieces of the trades! See _Seneca_, De Benef., II, 33. _H._
(33) furnishes a very good refutation of the doctrine that a great
deal depends on whether the labor has been paid from capital or from
income. _Eiselen_, Volkswirthschaft (1843), 27 ff., remarks, that
the laborer, for instance, who grows corn, must besides look after
his health and the preservation of his house; this is a part of his
necessary aggregate labor. Why, then, should it be called
unproductive when such secondary labor is performed by particular
persons? Otherwise the farmer would have no time whatever for his
principal business! Edinburgh Review, 1804, IV, 343 ff.;
_Wakefield_, An Essay upon Political Economy, 1804, who is concerned
mainly with the theory of the productiveness of labor. _L.
Lauderdale_ says, that when the nation’s wealth is estimated
according to its value in use, all useful labor is productive; and
that when estimated according to its value in exchange, all labor
that is paid is productive. (Inquiry, ch. 3.) _Stein_ (Lehrbuch, 68;
Tüb. Zeitschr., 1868, 230) conditions the notion of productiveness
by the presence of a superfluity of values. But, it may be asked,
does a family, which does no more than support itself, labor
unproductively? (Compare, however, § 30.) _J. S. Mill_ took a
surprisingly retrograde step in the doctrine on this point, in his
Principles, I, ch. 3. Compare his Essays on some unsettled Questions
of Political Economy, No. 3. A still more surprising exaggeration in
_de Augustinis_ Instituzzioni di Economia sociale (Napoli 1837), who
goes so far as to call a person guilty of arson a productive person
because he has produced for himself “the pleasure of destruction”!
More recently, _von Mangoldt_ distinguishes between economic labor
and the labor of culture: the latter is incorporated into the man
himself, the former one employed on the external world, in order to
transform it in a way corresponding to human wants. Viewed from the
stand-point of Political Economy, the latter only is productive.
(Volkswirthschaftslehre, 1865, 26 ff.)

331 We might, indeed, compare original production, that which preceded
all other, to eating; the trades, to digestion; commerce, to the
movements of the several members of the body; personal services to
inspiration, and yet all are equally necessary to the life of the
body! Thus, _Gamilh_ compares agriculture to the root of a tree of
which the service rendered by the state is the top. The growth of
the latter contributes, as well as that of the former, to the
nutrition of the whole, and is far removed from exhausting the tree.
Théorie de l’ E.P., II, 46 ff. “Natural production” would, indeed,
accomplish very little without the legal protection guaranteed by
the state, or without the tools furnished by industry etc. But it
is, besides, in most instances, a distortion of the truth to speak
of productive and unproductive men or classes of men. These
expressions are proper only when applied to individual kinds of
labor. See _Murhard_, Ideen über Nat. Œk., 88 ff. Persons seriously
ill are temporarily unproductive, and children who die early, are
unproductive for their whole life.

332 Not, however, in the case in which the loser estimates the pleasure
of the play higher than the loss.

_ 333 J. B. Say_, Traité, I. ch. 1.

_ 334 v. Cancrin_, Œkonomie der menschlichen Gesellschaften, 1845, 10,
speaks, in this case, of privative production. Among the Socialists,
_Bazard’s_ expression _l’exploitation de l’homme par l’homme_, has
found loud echo; instead of which only _l’exploitation du globe par
l’homme_ should be allowed to obtain. (Exposition de la Doctrine de
St. Simon, 24.) But _von Schröder_ had already warned the world of
“imagined food” which led only to idleness. (F. Schatz- und
Rentkammer, 191, 363.)

335 Therefore, there should not be too many nor too highly salaried
offices. See _Storch_, Nationaleinkommen, 33 ff.

336 See _v. Mangoldt_, Volkswirthschaftslehre, 29 ff.

_ 337 Remained_, and not _become_, poor, as is generally supposed; for
the enormous wealth of Spain, under Ferdinand and Isabella, as well
as during the early period of Charles V. is only a _fable convenue_.
Charles V. said: France has a superabundance of everything, and
Spain is in want of everything. See also the embassy report of
_Navagero_ (1526), Viaggio fatto in Spagna e in Francia (Venet.,
1563), and _Ranke_, Fürsten und Volker, I, 393 ff.

338 The prize was won by _Arreta de Monteseguro_. The author of the
history of Portuguese Asia, translated by _Stevens_, is of opinion
(III, ch. 6), that commerce is not a proper subject for serious
history to treat.

339 There is a very fine description of this spirit in _Clenard_, Epist.
I. ad Latomum (1535 ff.) Compare _Juvellanos_, in _Laborde_,
Itinéraire déscriptif, IV, 176. _Townsend_, Journey through Spain,
II, 207, 117. _Buckle_, History of Civilization, II, ch. I. The
census of 1788 gave the number of priests and monks, soldiers,
mariners, nobles, lawyers, tax-gatherers, authors, students and
domestics, at 1,221,000, in a total of 3,800,000 men; from which
number there was a multitude of beggars, vagrants etc. to be
deducted. _Laborde_, Itinéraire, II, 32 ff. The seventeen
universities and the numberless small Latin schools, with their
gratuitous instruction, and their many scholarships, misled a
disproportionately large number to engage in study. At the beginning
of this century, there were at least 200,000 priests, nuns
(_Geistliche_), etc., in a population of from three to three and a
half millions only. (_Ebeling_, Erdbeschreibung von Portugal, 66.)
_Senior_ shows that the poverty of the Osman is caused by too many
state employees, tax-farmers and retail merchants. (Journal kept in
Turkey and Greece, 1857-58.) Thus, also, _J. Tucker_, Four Tracts,
1774, 18, contrasts men engaged in industry with rich idlers, whose
increase, possibly by immigration, would make the people a nation of
“gentlemen and ladies, footmen, grooms, laundresses etc.”
_Schmitthener_, N. Œk., 656, calls a condition such as that of
Spain, “national-economical phthisis.”

_ 340 Tucker_, Progress of the U.S., 137. The following data also will
serve for a comparison: In Belgium, in 1856, it was estimated that,
leaving persons _sans profession_ out of consideration, 45.6 per
cent. were agriculturists, 37.2 industrials, 6.7 in commerce, 2.8 in
the liberal professions, 1.5 _force publique_, 2.1 _propriétaires,
rentiers, pensionnés_, 3.7 _domesticité_. In Prussia, in 1871, of
the entire male population, 28.6 per cent. were engaged in
agriculture, forest-culture, hunting and fishing: 32.3 per cent. in
mining, industry, building, and in founderies: 8.56 in trade and
commerce; 20.3 in personal services and handiwork not belonging to
any of the groups above mentioned; 2.3 in the army and navy; 3.7 in
other callings; 2.7 were renters, pensioners, and persons who lived
by selling or renting houses, reserving lodgings for themselves
therein, and persons who gave no account of their calling. (Preuss.
statisc. Zeitschr., 1875, 32. ff.) It is, however, surprising that
_Engel’s_ Amtl. Jahrbuch, III, 1867, gives only 48 per cent. as
belonging to the first category, and 25 to the second. In the
kingdom of Saxony in 1861, 25.1 per cent. of the population were
agriculturists and foresters; 56.1 were engaged in industry; 7.7 in
trade and commerce; 6.8 in art, science, the service of the state
and of private persons; while 4.1 per cent were without any
particular calling, or returned none. Bavaria, in 1852, had 67.9 per
cent. of its population engaged in agriculture; 22.7 in the trades
and in manufactures; 5.5 per cent., persons living on the interest
of their money, and by performing the higher class of personal
services; 1.9 in the army; and 2 per cent. of listed poor. In
_Hermann_, Beiträge zur Statistik des Königreichs Bayern. In France,
according to the official reports, there were:

_Agriculteurs_ 61.46 per cent. in 1851, 51.49 per cent. in 1866;
_Industriels et commerçants_ 25.95 per cent. in 1851, 32.78 per
cent. in 1866;
_Professions libérales_ 9.73 per cent. in 1851, 9.48 per cent. in
1866.

To which it must be added, that, in 1851, there were 2.86 _sans
profession ou dont les professions n’ont pu être constatées_; and
that, in 1866, on the other hand, there were 2.87 per cent. in
_professions se rattachant à l’agriculture, industrie et commerce.
(Legoyt.)_ In England and Wales, leaving the domestic class out of
consideration (women without an independent means of employment,
school children, servant girls etc.), and also the “indefinite
class,” there were, in 1861, 25.3 per cent. of the population
engaged in agricultural pursuits; 60.7 in industrial; 7.8 in
commercial; and 6.06 in professional pursuits. In Italy, omitting
housewives, children and infirm persons, there were, in 1862, 57.4
per cent. of the population engaged in agriculture; 22.9 in
industrial pursuits; 4 in commerce; and 3.9 per cent. in the army
and in the liberal professions. (Annali univ. di Statistica, Febbr.,
1866.) On Holland, in the middle of the 17th century, see _J. de
Wit_, Mémoires, 34 seq.

_ 341 Csaplovics_, Gemälde von Ungarn II, 1. _Torrens_, The Budget: On
commercial and colonial Policy, 106 ff.

342 Precisely as there are more people ruined by spirituous liquors than
by bread. Time thieving is also more frequent among servants. There
is scarcely anything in agriculture analogous to the lazzaroni who
wait all day to help a gondola to land, to unload a coach, etc.
There is more in the chase, in the fisheries, or in the cattle
raising.

343 Compare _Bastiat_, Harmonies économiques, ch. 17. Hence _Sismondi_
accounts it one of the chief merits of the constitutional state,
that in it, the _population gardienne_ does not regulate its own
remuneration. (N.P., I, 144.) _Saint Simon_, indeed, says that the
French members of the _Chambre_, in his time, drew a revenue from
the state, three times as large as from their own resources, and
were, therefore, deeply interested in increasing the budget. (Vues
sur la Propriété et la Législation, 1818.) I would call attention
also to the national over-estimation and over-crowding of learned
callings from which Germany suffered, even as far back as the time
of Louis XIV. (_v. Schröder_, Fürstl. Schatz-und Rentkammer, 302
ff.); to the disproportionate number of keepers of public houses,
which is related to the system of popular assemblies, and is a
regular attendant upon Democracy (_Bronner_, Der C. Aargau, I, 451.)
Taxation-legislation may here become a good means of popular
education.

344 This was recognized very early by _Gregor. Tolsan_, l.c. _Ad.
Müller_, Elemente, II, 255. _Storch_, Handbuch, II, 229 ff.
(_Schleiermacher_, Christ. Sitte, 668.) _A. Smith,_ W. of N., II,
ch. 5, ascribed greater productiveness to agricultural than to
industrial labor; in the former case, not only human labor was put
in operation, but the forces of nature were compelled to coöperate
with them. Similarly, _Malthus_, Additions (1817) to the Essay on
the Principle of Population, B. III, ch. 8-12. Principles of P. E.,
217 ff. Both thus explain the rent of land, and so far as products,
which have only value in exchange are concerned, they are right.
Hence it is all the more surprising that _Carey_, the zealous
advocate of a protective tariff and opponent of rent, comes back in
this to Adam Smith. Principles of Social Science, 1858, II, 35, and
passim. Compare also _J. B. Say_, Traité, II, ch. 8; _Sismondi_, N.
P., II, ch. 5. For the best refutation of this view, see _Ricardo_,
Principles, ch. 2, 3. Does not all labor put the force of nature in
operation? _Ad opera nihil aliud potest homo, quam ut corpora
naturalia admoveat, reliqua natura intus transigit._ (_Bacon._)
Similarly, _Verri_, Meditazioni, III, 1. An expression escapes even
_Ricardo_ himself (ch. 7), to the effect, that capitalists are the
producing class.

345 Relying on very superficial statistics of England and France,
_Ganilh_ advocates a theory of the productive forces of the several
branches of economy the very reverse of _Adam Smith’s_. He places
foreign trade first; then follow wholesale trade, industry and
agriculture. (Théorie, I, 240 seq.)

346 Ausland, 1846, No. 54. Expressions still used in Europe, such as
_Spindelmagen_ (spindle-relation), _Kunkellehen_ (apron-string-hold)
etc., for instance, suggest this most ancient and purely family
division of labor. The lower classes of the population, even in the
most civilized countries, are wont to preserve some of the peculiar
customs of very primitive times. Hence it is that among
proletarians, the division of labor between males and females is
still very small. The employments usual at different stages of life
among men, and the costumes worn by them are much more uniform than
among the higher classes. See _Riehl_, Die Familie, 1855, passim.

347 As _Dankwardt_ shows, the _jus civile_ of the earliest Roman time is
based on the condition of isolated labor, the later _jus gentium_,
on the division of labor. N. Œk. und Jurisprudenz, 1857, Heft. I.

_ 348 Saxo Gramm._, Hist. Dan. V, 101. _Turner_, Hist. of the A. Saxons
B. VII, ch. 11. Nibel., 351 ff. There is a French proverb: _du temps
que la reine Berthe filait_. Queen Bertha was a mythic daughter of
Charlemagne. It may be that the character meant is the old German
spinning goddess Berchta. Concerning the daughter of Otto the Great,
see _Dithmar_, Merseb. II. _Homer_, Od. V, 31 ff.; X, 106; XXIII,
189 ff. _Herodot._, VIII, 137. _Livy_, I. 57.

_ 349 Eden_, State of the Poor I, 558 ff. In the interior of Peru, the
priest is also usually a shop-keeper (_Pöppig_, Reise, II, 365); in
Canada, as in many of the villages of the Alps which are not often
visited, a hotel keeper. In countries with an unadvanced
civilization, the little division of labor that exists is also very
awkwardly regulated. Thus in Russia, weak children are very
frequently put to work on farms, while powerful men are found in the
city offering all kinds of eatables and the pictures of saints for
sale. (_Storch_, Gemälde des russischen Reichs II, 364. _v.
Haxthausen_, Studien I, 335.)

_ 350 Babbage_, Economy of Machinery, 1833, 201. _L. Faucher_, Angleterre
II, Ch. “_la Ville des Serruriers_.” The industrial statistics of
Paris, furnished by _H. Say_ in 1847 and 1848, show that in that
city alone there are 325 different branches of industry, 17 of which
are concerned with the production of food; 21 with building; 32 with
the manufacture of furniture; 21 with that of clothing; 36 with that
of thread and tissues; 7 with skins and leathers; 14 with vehicles,
saddlery, and military equipment; 33 with chemicals and pottery; 33
with working in metal, glass etc.; 35 in that of the precious metals
and jewels; 27 with printing, engraving and paper; 15 with that of
wooden-ware and wicker-ware; 34 with _articles de Paris_. Journal
des Economistes, Janv., 1853, 107. According to the industrial
almanac of Birmingham, there are in that city manufacturers of
buttons in gold, silver, metal, mother-of-pearl etc.; manufacturers
of hammers, ink-stands, coffin-nails, dog-collars, tooth-picks,
stirrups, fish-hooks, spurs, pack-needles etc.

351 And so with the subdivisions. Flannel is manufactured almost
exclusively in Halifax, woolen blankets between Leeds and
Huddersfield etc.

352 The same division of labor was developed among the Dutch in the 17th
century, and excited then the wonder of the English. See _Sir W.
Temple,_ Observations upon the U. Provinces, 1672, ch. 3. Works, I,
128, 143. In 1615, _Montchrêtien_ held up the Flemish as a model to
the French, in this respect.

353 On the bees, see _Virgil, Georg._ IV, 158.

354 The principle of the division of labor was known to the ancients:
_Xenophon_, Cyri Discipl., VIII, 2, 5. _Plato_, de Rep., II, 369,
III, 394, IV, 443; _Isocrat_., Busir., 8. _Aristot_., Polit., II, 8,
8. Among the more modern writers, compare _Thomas Aquin_., De Reg.
pr., I, 1, II, 3. _Luther_ (Works by Walch, I, 388), in his
Commentary on Genesis, 3, 19. _Petty_, Several Essays, 1682, p. 113.
Considerations upon the East India Trade, London, 1701. _Roscher_,
Geschichte der englischen Volkswirthschaftslehre, 118. _Mandeville_,
The Fable of the Bees, enlarged edition of 1723, p. 411. _Berkeley_,
Querist, 1735, No. 415, 430, 520 ff., 586: “What is everybody’s
business is nobody’s.” _Harris_, on Money and Coins (1757), I, 16.
_J. J. Rousseau_, Emile (1762), L. III. _Turgot_, Sur la Formation
et la Distribution des Richesses, § 3, p. 50, 62, 66. _Diderot_,
Encyclopédie de l’Art, s. v. Art. _J. Tucker_, Four Tracts (1774),
p. 25 ff. _Boccaria_, Economia pubblica, I, 1, 9. But the author to
whom we owe most on this score is undoubtedly _Adam Smith_. To him
we are indebted almost entirely for our knowledge of the natural
laws developed in § 59 seq.

355 According to _Adam Smith_, a nailer can make 2,300 nails (_Rau_ says
3,000 shoemaker’s tacks in the Odenwalde) per day; a smith who is
only occasionally employed in the manufacture, from 800 to 1,000;
and smiths who never made nails before, from 200 to 300. A clever
filer makes 200 strokes in a minute; a skilled comb-maker can make
in a day from 60 to 70 combs of such fineness that there are from 40
to 48 teeth to the inch in them; eight Liege brick-makers, working
together, produce 4,800 bricks per day; children employed in a
needle manufactory, in making the eyes of needles, grow so skillful
at it that they can make a small hole in the finest hair and draw
another hair through it. _Rau_, Lehrbuch I, § 115. The old proverb,
“practice makes perfect,” is followed even by thieves in their great
division of labor. See _Thiele_, Die jüdischen Gauner I, 87.
_Fregier_, Des Classes Dangéreuses.

356 Children, with their thinner fingers, can point twice as many
needles in the same time as a grown person.

357 The manufacture of English needles demands, on the part of workmen,
degrees of skill so different that their pay varies from 6 pence to
20 shillings per day. If the most skillful workman were to
manufacture whole needles alone, he would partly be obliged to be
satisfied with one-fortieth of what he might otherwise receive.
_Babbage_, loc. cit.

358 In the case of machines and in the chemical branches of industry,
the labor increases in a much smaller ratio than the material used
in production.

359 In opposition to monopolies, and to practical constraint which has
its source in ignorance etc.

360 Hence _Torrens_ calls foreign trade the “territorial division of
labour.” (Essay on the Production of Wealth (1821), 155 ff.)

361 See _Bastiat_, Harmonies, ch. 1, for a very beautiful exposition of
the doctrine that each man receives much more from society than he
accomplishes on his part, for it.

362 The working together of a great number of persons is often carried
on to the detriment of agriculture, for each then waits for all the
others to work, throws all the blame on them etc. (_Columella_, I,
9.) As many a housekeeper must have observed, two seamstresses or
ironers accomplish, in a day, less than one, in two days. Of course,
this rule does not apply in the case of work which cannot be
performed by one man, under any circumstances, or the magnitude of
which would easily discourage him, and in which mutual aid is easily
obtained; as in the raising of heavy loads, the construction of
roads, dikes etc.

_ 363 Ad. Smith_, B., II, Introd. _Hufeland_, Neue Grundlegung, I, 215.
In many instances, a division of labor, of course, favors the saving
of capital. If every workman needed all the tools necessary to the
work in which he participates, three-fourths of them would have to
lie idle at present. _J. Rae_, New Principles on the Subject of
Political Economy, 164.

364 This necessity is observable, although in a peculiar form, even
where what has been called the “despotic organization of labor”
prevails, instead of freedom.

365 In the highlands of Scotland, in Adam Smith’s time, there were no
smiths who manufactured nails only; for the reason that no smith had
a market for more than 1,000 nails a year, that is not for so many
as might be manufactured in a single day.

366 It is of course very different when there is question of a foreign
market, even if it be only indirectly. Thus, for instance, there are
in the Hartz mountains, persons who are simply post-makers,
trough-makers, chess-wood-makers, block-hewers, shingle-makers etc.

367 Too much should not be inferred from the existence among the
Egyptians of physicians, specialists for the several members of the
body. _Herodot._, II, 84. Something analogous is to be found even
among barbarous nations; but it is accounted for entirely by the
superstition of the people. See _Klemm_, Kulturgeschichte, I, 266.

368 In the whole of Hesse, there were under Philip the Magnanimous, only
two apothecaries, one at Cassel and one at Marburg. _Rommel_, Gesch.
v. Hessen, IV, p. 419, note. And there were no bakers among the
Romans before the time of the war with Perseus. All the bread needed
by the family was baked by the wife or by female domestics. _Plin._,
H. N. XVIII, 28. The common oven in new towns marks the period of
transition. Even yet, in the central part of France, there are
localities where each family bakes its own bread for a whole month
in advance; and, in the Alpine departments for even a year in
advance. _M. Chevalier_, Cours II, 366.

369 It is obvious from the foregoing that, in decaying nations, in which
the market contracts and capital decreases, the division of labor
also must grow less.

370 According to _Arago_, a horse uses the same amount of force to draw
20 cwt. along an ordinary road that he does to draw 200 over a
railroad track, or 1,200 on a canal. He could carry scarcely 2 or 3
on his back! Moniteur, 1838, No. 116. It is, however, certain that
the introduction of our railroads has somewhat detracted from the
advantages of coasts.

371 Compare _Humboldt_, Essai politique sur l’Ile de Cuba, II, 205.

_ 372 Strabo_, II, 121 ff. In Europe, there is one mile of coast to every
31 square miles in the interior; in North America, to 56; in South
America, 91; in Asia, 100; in Africa, 142. (_Humboldt._)

373 If the original connection of the Caspian sea and the sea of Aral
with the Frozen Ocean were still in existence, it is probable that
an Asiatic Scandinavia would have been formed in consequence.

374 What is true of the sea in this respect may be claimed, also, though
in a less degree, for the streams that carry the civilizing fruits
of the coasts far into the interior. Nearly all large cities not
situated on the harbors of coasts derive their importance from
rivers; especially when they have been built on spots adapted by
nature to the transhipment of merchandise. That Venice finally
eclipsed Genoa is to be ascribed, in greatest part, to its control
of an important stream, the Po. The economic importance of Holland,
of Hamburg and Bremen will, in the long run, bear the same relation
to one another as the geographical importance of the valleys of the
Rhine, Elbe and Weser. As nothing is more disastrous to a nation
than the loss of its coast (we need only cite the efforts of the
Lybian kings and, later, of Philip of Macedon to conquer the Greek
colonies on their coasts; and in more recent times, of Russia before
Peter the Great, or of the Zollverein without the shores of the
German sea), so, also, the economic and political influence of a
stream increases as one approaches its mouth. Hence the
justification of the great interest taken by Germany and Austria in
the question of the Danubian principalities. The United States
recognized this fact when they purchased Louisiana for 80,000,000
francs. _Bignon_, Hist. de France III, 111 seq. Readers of history
are familiar with the important part played by the three Asiatic
Mesopotamias: that between the Euphrates and the Tigris; that
between the Ganges and the Brahmapootra; that between the Hoang-Ho
and the Yang-tse-Kiang, to which finally the Punjab might be added.
This relation is recognized by popular consciousness, in the case of
the Ganges, by the belief in the sacredness of the stream. No river
has had so much influence on civilization as the Nile: its
periodical risings have made the labor of agriculture
extraordinarily easy; their extent and regularity favored the
progress of astronomy; the flooding over of the land led to geodesy;
the hydraulic labors necessitated by the rising of the waters
produced a school of architecture to which the river furnished an
excellent means of transportation for the enormous masses to be
moved. _K. Ritter_, Erdkunde, I, p. 880 seq; VI, p. 1,168 seq. In
this matter, also, America and Europe have the advantage over Asia
and Africa. While the Danube is, in places, scarcely three German
miles from the Rhine—which, however, flows in an almost opposite
direction—in Asia, the eastern streams are separated from the
western, and the northern from the southern, by a strip of land
difficult to be traveled, and about 300 German miles in extent.
Besides, the principal streams of northern Asia have their exit into
the Frozen Ocean, a fact which diminishes their importance greatly.
The source of the Missouri is only about one mile distant from the
Columbia river, although the two flow towards opposite seas.

375 The law governing the march of civilization from the mountain to the
plain and to coast lands was observed even by _Strabo_, XIII, 592,
and partly by _Plato_, De Leg., 677 ff.

376 Thus, for instance, that all the customers of a shoemaker together
form a shoe-association etc. _Dunoyer_, Liberté du Travail, L. IV,
ch. 10.

_ 377 Storch_, Handbuch, III, 188 ff. The Dutch traveler, _Usselinx_,
speaks in a similar way of the imitativeness and many-sidedness of
the Swedes (Argonautica Gustavica, 20). Chilian servants (_peones_)
are a good combination of the cook, the muleteer, builder, courier
etc. Once they have passed over a road, they never forget it. A
knife stands them in stead of most tools, and pieces of leather in
stead of nails. _Pöppig_, Reise, I, 171 ff.

_ 378 von Haxthausen_, Studien, I, 63, 113. In 1827, a Russian hatter got
12 rubles for a hat, a German one 35 (_Schön_, N. Œkonomie, 78).

379 See the report of a large manufacturer in _Kohl_, England und Wales,
p. 332 seq.

_ 380 Raynal_, Histoire des Indes (1780), L. XV. And so _Rousseau_,
Discours sur l’Inegalité (1754), who also declaims against all kinds
of capital; were there no ladders, men would climb better; and throw
a stone better if they had no slings. There is certainly a
misunderstood truth in this saying. It is assuredly very salutary,
in the actual state of society, in which every one’s business is
transacted for him by some one else, that a time should occasionally
come when no one can take our place, and a man can only call upon
himself. And herein lies the immense value which just war, when not
much prolonged, but which is brought to a happy termination,
sometimes has upon the life of a people.

381 The American savages are, on an average, weaker than the whites. In
a fist-fight the Kentuckians and Virginians showed themselves far
superior to the Indians. See _Lawrence_, Lectures, 403, _supra_, §
40.

382 For a very unprejudiced estimate of the dark and bright sides of the
division _of labor_, even before Adam Smith’s time, see _Ferguson_,
History of of Civil Society (1767), IV, I, V, 3 ff. Also _Garve_,
Versuche, III, 41. _Adam Smith_ was not blind to the dark side of
the division _of_ labor, which, in part, he would remove by popular
instruction at the expense of the state, and by a species of
compulsory education. W. of N., V, ch. 1, 3, art. 2. One of the
chief peculiarities of _J. Möser’s_ Political Economy is his great
opposition to all highly developed division of labor. Patr. Ph., I,
2, 21, III, 32, 34.

_ 383 von Ledebur_, Reise in Altai, I, 384. The working together of wife
and child, introduced recently by manufacturers, cannot be
considered as a higher grade of the division of labor, but only as a
very unfavorable change in the kind of it; inasmuch as it were
better to employ the women in their domestic avocations and to leave
children to their studies and their sports. Among the higher
classes, it should be made the part of female education, to
counterbalance, in the family, the effects of the ever increasing
division of labor among the male portion, by the development of that
which is universally human—art, sociability, house-keeping etc.

_ 384 Schleiermacher_, Christliche Sitte, 465 ff., 676 ff., 154 ff. From
a similar feeling, although much exaggerated, the Greeks of the
classic age proper considered all callings followed for gain
dishonorable, not excepting even those of the physician and of the
teacher. _Plato_, de Rep., I, 347 ff. _Aristot._, Rhet., I, 9, 27:
μηδεμίαν ἐργάζεσθαι βὰναυσον τέχνην, ἐλευθέρον γάρ τὸ μὴ πρὸς ἄλλον
ζην.

385 As, for instance, the superintendent of a manufactory must have a
better general training, but can get along with less of a special,
than his workmen.

_ 386 Thucydides_ says of the contemporaries of Pericles: “The same men
devote themselves, among us, in part to domestic and political
business; in part, others who busy themselves with agriculture and
industry have no mean knowledge of the affairs of state. We call
those who take no part in the former not people loving their ease,
but useless men.” (II, 40.) During the succeeding period, Athens was
destroyed mainly by the ever increasing division of labor between
citizens and soldiers. For, “to separate the arts which form the
citizen and the statesman, the arts of policy and war, is an attempt
to dismember the human character, and to destroy those very arts we
mean to improve.” (_Ferguson._) We know from _Valerius Maximus_,
that the Roman soldiers from the time of Marius had, doubtless, a
better technic training than their ancestors who who defeated
Hannibal; but was it in a military or political sense that they were
thus better trained? The beautiful definition of Cato intimates
something of the same nature; the good orator was _vir bonus dicendi
peritus_. (_Quintilian_, XII, I.) And so _Garve_, Versuche, IV, 51
ff., expects from the political elevation of citizenship, of those
possessed of the right of citizens, not only usefulness in a
particular direction but the development of the whole man, a thing
hitherto expected only of the nobility.

387 As one’s peculiar calling does not take up all his life, we must
draw a clear distinction between the one-sidedness of labor and the
one-sidedness of life, (_von Mangoldt_, Volkswirthschaftslehre,
227.) Only the last is to be avoided at all hazards; and we find it
in the middle ages, with its limited divisions of labor, perhaps
more frequently than where civilization has attained a higher stage.
During the middle ages, it was not unusual to make feelings which
every one should cultivate at times, if only temporarily, the
lasting calling of some. Thus one prayed his whole life long, or was
engaged in contemplation, and relieved others of the necessity of
performing these duties. The consequence was, that the latter sank
as deeply in worldliness and want of the interior spirit as the
former were plunged in idleness and hypocrisy. But, on the other
hand, when, in our day, the printer relieves the writer of a portion
of the labor which might be his, the personal development of neither
suffers.

_ 388 L’uomo è un’ tal potenza, che unita all’ altra non fa un eguale
alla somma, ma al quadrato della somma._ (_Genovesi._) As to how the
action of every individual man is a species of division and union of
different kinds of labor, see _Stein_, Lehrbuch, 24.