Part 10 (1/2)

I should have regretted the need of pointing out inconsistency in any portion of Mr. Mill's work, had not the value of his work proceeded from its inconsistencies. He deserves honour among economists by inadvertently disclaiming the principles which he states, and tacitly introducing the moral considerations with which he declares his science has no connection. Many of his chapters, are, therefore, true and valuable; and the only conclusions of his which I have to dispute are those which follow from his premises.

Thus, the idea which lies at the root of the pa.s.sage we have just been examining, namely, that labour applied to produce luxuries will not support so many persons as labour applied to produce useful articles, is entirely true; but the instance given fails--and in four directions of failure at once--because Mr. Mill has not defined the real meaning of usefulness. The definition which he has given--”capacity to satisfy a desire, or serve a purpose” (III. i. 2)--applies equally to the iron and silver; while the true definition,--which he has not given, but which nevertheless underlies the false verbal definition in his mind, and comes out once or twice by accident (as in the words ”any support to life or strength” in I. i. 5)--applies to some articles of iron, but not to others, and to some articles of silver, but not to others.

It applies to ploughs, but not to bayonets; and to forks, but not to filigree.[48]

[48] Filigree: that is to say, generally, ornament dependent on complexity, not on art.

The eliciting of the true definition will give us the reply to our first question, ”What is value?” respecting which, however, we must first hear the popular statements.

”The word 'value,' when used without adjunct, always means, in political economy, value in exchange” (Mill, III. i. 3). So that, if two s.h.i.+ps cannot exchange their rudders, their rudders are, in politico-economic language, of no value to either.

But ”the subject of political economy is wealth.”--(Preliminary remarks, page 1.)

And wealth ”consists of all useful and agreeable objects which possess exchangeable value.”--(Preliminary remarks, page 10.)

It appears then, according to Mr. Mill, that usefulness and agreeableness underlie the exchange value, and must be ascertained to exist in the thing, before we can esteem it an object of wealth.

Now, the economical usefulness of a thing depends not merely on its own nature, but on the number of people who can and will use it. A horse is useless, and therefore unsaleable, if no one can ride,--a sword if no one can strike, and meat, if no one can eat. Thus every material utility depends on its relative human capacity.

Similarly: The agreeableness of a thing depends not merely on its own likeableness, but on the number of people who can be got to like it.

The relative agreeableness, and therefore saleableness, of ”a pot of the smallest ale,” and of ”Adonis painted by a running brook,” depends virtually on the opinion of Demos, in the shape of Christopher Sly.

That is to say, the agreeableness of a thing depends on its relative human disposition.[49] Therefore, political economy, being a science of wealth, must be a science respecting human capacities and dispositions. But moral considerations have nothing to do with political economy (III. i. 2). Therefore, moral considerations have nothing to do with human capacities and dispositions.

[49] These statements sound crude in their brevity; but will be found of the utmost importance when they are developed.

Thus, in the above instance, economists have never perceived that disposition to buy is a wholly _moral_ element in demand: that is to say, when you give a man half-a-crown, it depends on his disposition whether he is rich or poor with it--whether he will buy disease, ruin, and hatred, or buy health, advancement, and domestic love. And thus the agreeableness or exchange value of every offered commodity depends on production, not merely of the commodity, but of buyers of it; therefore on the education of buyers, and on all the moral elements by which their disposition to buy this, or that, is formed. I will ill.u.s.trate and expand into final consequences every one of these definitions in its place: at present they can only be given with extremest brevity; for in order to put the subject at once in a connected form before the reader, I have thrown into one, the opening definitions of four chapters; namely, of that on Value (”Ad Valorem”); on Price (”Thirty Pieces”); on Production (”Demeter”); and on Economy (”The Law of the House”).

I do not wholly like the look of this conclusion from Mr. Mill's statements:--let us try Mr. Ricardo's.

”Utility is not the measure of exchangeable value, though it is absolutely essential to it.”--(Chap. 1. sect. i.) Essential to what degree, Mr. Ricardo? There may be greater and less degrees of utility.

Meat, for instance, may be so good as to be fit for any one to eat, or so bad as to be fit for no one to eat. What is the exact degree of goodness which is ”essential” to its exchangeable value, but not ”the measure” of it? How good must the meat be, in order to possess any exchangeable value; and how bad must it be--(I wish this were a settled question in London markets)--in order to possess none?

There appears to be some hitch, I think, in the working even of Mr.

Ricardo's principles; but let him take his own example. ”Suppose that in the early stages of society the bows and arrows of the hunter were of equal value with the implements of the fisherman. Under such circ.u.mstances the value of the deer, the produce of the hunter's day's labour, would be _exactly_” (italics mine) ”equal to the value of the fish, the product of the fisherman's day's labour. The comparative value of the fish and game would be _entirely_ regulated by the quant.i.ty of labour realized in each.” (Ricardo, chap. iii. On Value.)

Indeed! Therefore, if the fisherman catches one sprat, and the huntsman one deer, one sprat will be equal in value to one deer; but if the fisherman catches no sprat, and the huntsman two deer, no sprat will be equal in value to two deer?

Nay; but--Mr. Ricardo's supporters may say--he means, on an average;--if the average product of a day's work of fisher and hunter be one fish and one deer, the one fish will always be equal in value to the one deer.

Might I inquire the species of fish. Whale? or whitebait?[50]

[50] Perhaps it may be said, in farther support of Mr. Ricardo, that he meant, ”when the utility is constant or given, the price varies as the quant.i.ty of labour.” If he meant this, he should have said it; but, had he meant it, he could have hardly missed the necessary result, that utility would be one measure of price (which he expressly denies it to be); and that, to prove saleableness, he had to prove a given quant.i.ty of utility, as well as a given quant.i.ty of labour: to wit, in his own instance, that the deer and fish would each feed the same number of men, for the same number of days, with equal pleasure to their palates. The fact is, he did not know what he meant himself. The general idea which he had derived from commercial experience, without being able to a.n.a.lyse it, was, that when the demand is constant, the price varies as the quant.i.ty of labour required for production; or,--using the formula I gave in last paper--when _y_ is constant, _xy_ varies as _x_. But demand never is, nor can be, ultimately constant, if _x_ varies distinctly; for, as price rises, consumers fall away; and as soon as there is a monopoly (and all scarcity is a form of monopoly; so that every commodity is affected occasionally by some colour of monopoly), _y_ becomes the most influential condition of the price. Thus the price of a painting depends less on its merit than on the interest taken in it by the public; the price of singing less on the labour of the singer than the number of persons who desire to hear him; and the price of gold less on the scarcity which affects it in common with cerium or iridium, than on the sun-light colour and unalterable purity by which it attracts the admiration and answers the trust of mankind.

It must be kept in mind, however, that I use the word ”demand” in a somewhat different sense from economists usually. They mean by it ”the quant.i.ty of a thing sold.” I mean by it ”the force of the buyer's capable intention to buy.” In good English, a person's ”demand” signifies, not what he gets, but what he asks for.

Economists also do not notice that objects are not valued by absolute bulk or weight, but by such bulk and weight as is necessary to bring them into use. They say, for instance, that water bears no price in the market. It is true that a cupful does not, but a lake does; just as a handful of dust does not, but an acre does. And were it possible to make even the possession of the cupful or handful permanent (_i.e._, to find a place for them), the earth and sea would be bought up by handfuls and cupfuls.

It would be waste of time to pursue these fallacies farther; we will seek for a true definition.

Much store has been set for centuries upon the use of our English cla.s.sical education. It were to be wished that our well-educated merchants recalled to mind always this much of their Latin schooling,--that the nominative of _valorem_ (a word already sufficiently familiar to them) is _valor_; a word which, therefore, ought to be familiar to them. _Valor_, from _valere_, to be well, or strong ([Greek: hugiaino]);--strong, _in_ life (if a man), or valiant; strong, _for_ life (if a thing), or valuable. To be ”valuable,”

therefore, is to ”avail towards life.” A truly valuable or availing thing is that which leads to life with its whole strength. In proportion as it does not lead to life, or as its strength is broken, it is less valuable; in proportion as it leads away from life, it is unvaluable or malignant.

The value of a thing, therefore, is independent of opinion, and of quant.i.ty. Think what you will of it, gain how much you may of it, the value of the thing itself is neither greater nor less. For ever it avails, or avails not; no estimate can raise, no disdain depress, the power which it holds from the Maker of things and of men.