Part 13 (2/2)

It will, I know, be insisted that it is advantageous to a nation to import the raw material, whether or not it be the result of labor; and to export enerally received opinion

”In proportion,” says the petition of Bordeaux, ”as raw material is abundant, manufactures will increase and flourish”

”The abundance of raw ives an unlimited scope to labor in those countries where it prevails”

”Rawthe eleulated on a different systeht to be admitted _immediately_ and at the _lowest rate_”

The same petition asks, that the protection of manufactured articles should be reduced, not _immediately_, but at some indeterminate time, not to the _lowest rate_ of entrance, but to twenty per cent

”A other articles,” says the petition of Lyons, ”of which the low price and the abundance are necessary, the manufacturers name all _raw material_”

All this is based upon error

All _value_ is, we have seen, the representative of labor Now it is undoubtedly true thatlabor increases ten-fold, a hundred-fold, the value of rawten, a hundred-fold increased profits throughout the nation; and frouain of only fifteen francs to the various workers therein engaged This hundred weight of iron, converted into watch-springs, is increased in value by this process, ten thousand francs Who can pretend that the nation is notthe ten thousand francs, than the fifteen francs worth of labor?

In this reasoning it is forgotten, that international exchanges are, no ht and ht of uns, nor between a pound of wool just shorn, and a pound of wool just manufactured into cashmere, but between a fixed value in one of these articles, and a fixed equal value in another To exchange equal value with equal value, is to exchange equal labor with equal labor, and it is therefore not true that the nation which sells its hundred francs worth of cloth or of watch-springs, gains more than the one which furnishes its hundred francs worth of wool or of iron

In a country where no law can be passed, no contribution ioverned, the public can be robbed, only after it has first been cheated Our own ignorance is the primary, the _raw material_ of every act of extortion to which we are subjected, and it may safely be predicted of every _Sophism_, that it is the forerunner of an act of Spoliation Good Public, whenever therefore you detect a Sophism in a petition, let me advise you, put your hand upon your pocket, for be assured, it is that which is particularly the point of attack

Let us then exan which the shi+p-owners of Bordeaux and Havre, and the le in upon us by this distinction between agricultural produce and manufactured produce

”It is,” say the petitioners of Bordeaux, ”principally in this first class (that which comprehends raw material, _untouched by huement of our merchant vessels_ A wise system of political economy would require that this class should not be taxed The second class (articles which have received some preparation) may be considered as taxable The third (articles which have received froard as _,” say the petitioners of Havre, ”that it is indispensable to reduce _immediately_ and to the _lowest rate_, the raw ive employment to our merchant vessels, which furnish its first and indispensable means of labor”

The manufacturers could not allow themselves to be behindhand in civilities towards the shi+p-owners, and accordingly the petition of Lyons demands the free introduction of raw material, ”in order to prove,” it re towns are not opposed to those of h; but it must be confessed that both, taken in the sense of the petitioners, are terribly adverse to the interest of agriculture and of consuentlemen, is the aim of all your subtle distinctions! You wish the law to oppose the maritime transportation of _manufactured_ articles, in order that the much more expensive transportation of the raw h, dirty and unimproved condition, furnish a more extensive business to your _merchant vessels_ And this is what you call a _wise system of political econo that fir-trees, imported from Russia, should not be adold should be imported in the state of ore, and Buenos Ayres leathers only allowed an entrance into our ports, while still hanging to the dead bones and putrefying bodies to which they belong?

The stockholders of railroads, if they can obtain a majority in the Cha the nac, of the brandy used in Paris For, surely, they would consider it a wise lahich would, by forcing the transportation of ten casks of wine instead of one of brandy, thus furnish to Parisian industry an _indispensable encourageive employment to railroad loco our eyes upon the following sieneral object, have but one legitiood To create useless industrial pursuits, to favor superfluous transportation, to ood of the public, but at the expense of the public, is to act upon a _petitio principii_ For it is the result of labor, and not labor itself, which is a desirable object All labor, without a result, is clear loss To pay sailors for transporting rough dirt and filthy refuse across the ocean, is about as reasonable as it would be to engage their services, and pay the the water with pebbles

Thus we arrive at the conclusion that _political Sophis their infinite variety, have one point in co of the _means_ with the _end_, and the development of the former at the expense of the latter

XXII

METAPHORS

A Sophish the whole tissue of a long and tedious theory Oftener it contracts into a principle, and hides itself in one word

”Heaven preserve us,” said Paul Louis, ”from the Devil and froht be difficult to determine which of the two sheds the most noxious influence over our planet The Devil, you will say, because it is he who implants in our hearts the spirit of spoliation Aye; but he leaves the capacity for checking abuses, by the resistance of those who suffer It is the genius of Sophism which paralyzes this resistance The shich the spirit of evil places in the hands of the aggressor, would fall powerless, if the shi+eld of hirasp by the spirit of Sophisreat truth, inscribed upon the frontispiece of his book this sentence: _Error is the cause of human misery_

Let us notice what passes in the world A, for instance, the germ of national eneneral conflagration, check civilization, spill torrents of blood, and draw upon the country that es, _invasion_ Such hateful sentirade, in the opinion of other nations, the people a whom they prevail, and force those who retain some love of justice to blush for their country These are fearful evils, and it would be enough that the public should have a clear view of the of those ould expose them to such heavy chances How, then, are they kept in darkness? How, but by ed, and depraved--and all is said