INFLUENCE EXERCISED BY PHYSICAL LAWS OVER THE ORGANIZATION OF
SOCIETY AND OVER THE CHARACTER OF INDIVIDUALS.
If we inquire what those physical agents are by which the human race is
most powerfully influenced, we shall find that they may be classed under
four heads: namely, Climate, Food, Soil, and the General Aspect of
Nature; by which last, I mean those appearances which, though presented
chiefly to the sight, have, through the medium of that or other senses,
directed the association of ideas, and hence in different countries have
given rise to different habits of national thought. To one of these four
classes, may be referred all the external phenomena by which Man has
been permanently affected. The last of these classes, or what I call the
General Aspect of Nature, produces its principal results by exciting the
imagination, and by suggesting those innumerable superstitions which are
the great obstacles to advancing knowledge. And as, in the infancy of a
people, the power of such superstitions is supreme, it has happened that
the various Aspects of Nature have caused corresponding varieties in the
popular character, and have imparted to the national religion
peculiarities which, under certain circumstances, it is impossible to
efface. The other three agents, namely, Climate, Food, and Soil, have,
so far as we are aware, had no direct influence of this sort; but they
have, as I am about to prove, originated the most important consequences
in regard to the general organization of society, and from them there
have followed many of those large and conspicuous differences between
nations, which are often ascribed to some fundamental difference in the
various races into which mankind is divided. But while such original
distinctions of race are altogether hypothetical,[38] the discrepancies
which are caused by difference of climate, food, and soil, are capable
of a satisfactory explanation, and, when understood, will be found to
clear up many of the difficulties which still obscure the study of
history. I purpose, therefore, in the first place, to examine the laws
of these three vast agents in so far as they are connected with Man in
his social condition; and having traced the working of those laws with
as much precision as the present state of physical knowledge will allow,
I shall then examine the remaining agent, namely, the General Aspect of
Nature, and shall endeavour to point out the most important divergencies
to which its variations have, in different countries, naturally given
rise.
[38] I cordially subscribe to the remark of one of the greatest thinkers
of our time, who says of the supposed differences of race, 'of all
vulgar modes of escaping from the consideration of the effect of
social and moral influences on the human mind, the most vulgar is
that of attributing the diversities of conduct and character to
inherent natural differences.' _Mill's Principles of Political
Economy_, vol. i. p. 390. Ordinary writers are constantly falling
into the error of assuming the existence of this difference, which
may or may not exist but which most assuredly has never been
proved. Some singular instances of this will be found in _Alison's
History of Europe_, vol. ii. p. 336, vol. vi. p. 136, vol. viii.
pp. 525, 526, vol. xiii. p. 347; where the historian thinks that
by a few strokes of his pen he can settle a question of the
greatest difficulty, connected with some of the most intricate
problems in physiology. On the supposed relation between race and
temperament, see _Comte_, _Philosophie Positive_, vol. iii. p. 355.
Beginning, then, with climate, food, and soil, it is evident that these
three physical powers are in no small degree dependent on each other:
that is to say, there is a very close connexion between the climate of a
country and the food which will ordinarily be grown in that country;
while at the same time the food is itself influenced by the soil which
produces it, as also by the elevation or depression of the land, by the
state of the atmosphere, and, in a word, by all those conditions to the
assemblage of which the name of Physical Geography is, in its largest
sense, commonly given.[39]
[39] As to the proper limits of physical geography, see _Prichard on
Ethnology_, in _Report of the British Association for_ 1847,
p. 235. The word 'climate' I always use in the narrow and popular
sense. Dr. Forry and many previous writers make it nearly coincide
with 'physical geography:' 'Climate constitutes the aggregate of
all the external physical circumstances appertaining to each
locality in its relation to organic nature.' _Forry's Climate of
the United States and its Endemic Influences_, New York, 1842,
p. 127.
The union between these physical agents being thus intimate, it seems
advisable to consider them not under their own separate heads, but
rather under the separate heads of the effects produced by their united
action. In this way we shall rise at once to a more comprehensive view
of the whole question; we shall avoid the confusion that would be caused
by artificially separating phenomena which are in themselves
inseparable; and we shall be able to see more clearly the extent of that
remarkable influence, which, in an early stage of society, the powers of
Nature exercise over the fortunes of Man.
Of all the results which are produced among a people by their climate,
food, and soil, the accumulation of wealth is the earliest, and in many
respects the most important. For although the progress of knowledge
eventually accelerates the increase of wealth, it is nevertheless
certain that, in the first formation of society, the wealth must
accumulate before the knowledge can begin. As long as every man is
engaged in collecting the materials necessary for his own subsistence,
there will be neither leisure nor taste for higher pursuits; no science
can possibly be created, and the utmost that can be effected will be an
attempt to economise labour by the contrivance of such rude and
imperfect instruments as even the most barbarous people are able to
invent.
In a state of society like this, the accumulation of wealth is the first
great step that can be taken, because without wealth there can be no
leisure, and without leisure there can be no knowledge. If what a people
consume is always exactly equal to what they possess, there will be no
residue, and therefore, no capital being accumulated, there will be no
means by which the unemployed classes may be maintained.[40] But if the
produce is greater than the consumption, an overplus arises, which,
according to well-known principles, increases itself, and eventually
becomes a fund out of which, immediately or remotely, every one is
supported who does not create the wealth upon which he lives. And now it
is that the existence of an intellectual class first becomes possible,
because for the first time there exists a previous accumulation, by
means of which men can use what they did not produce, and are thus
enabled to devote themselves to subjects for which at an earlier period
the pressure of their daily wants would have left them no time.
[40] By unemployed classes, I mean what Adam Smith calls the
unproductive classes; and though both expressions are strictly
speaking inaccurate, the word 'unemployed' seems to convey more
clearly than any other the idea in the text.
Thus it is that of all the great social improvements the accumulation of
wealth must be the first, because without it there can be neither taste
nor leisure for that acquisition of knowledge on which, as I shall
hereafter prove, the progress of civilization depends. Now, it is
evident that among an entirely ignorant people, the rapidity with which
wealth is created will be solely regulated by the physical peculiarities
of their country. At a later period, and when the wealth has been
capitalized, other causes come into play; but until this occurs, the
progress can only depend on two circumstances: first on the energy and
regularity with which labour is conducted, and secondly on the returns
made to that labour by the bounty of nature. And these two causes are
themselves the result of physical antecedents. The returns made to
labour are governed by the fertility of the soil, which is itself
regulated partly by the admixture of its chemical components, partly by
the extent to which, from rivers or from other natural causes, the soil
is irrigated, and partly by the heat and humidity of the atmosphere. On
the other hand, the energy and regularity with which labour is
conducted, will be entirely dependent on the influence of climate. This
will display itself in two different ways. The first, which is a very
obvious consideration, is, that if the heat is intense, men will be
indisposed, and in some degree unfitted, for that active industry which
in a milder climate they might willingly have exerted. The other
consideration, which has been less noticed, but is equally important,
is, that climate influences labour not only by enervating the labourer
or by invigorating him, but also by the effect it produces on the
regularity of his habits.[41] Thus we find that no people living in a
very northern latitude have ever possessed that steady and unflinching
industry for which the inhabitants of temperate regions are remarkable.
The reason of this becomes clear, when we remember that in the more
northern countries the severity of the weather, and, at some seasons,
the deficiency of light, render it impossible for the people to continue
their usual out-of-door employments. The result is, that the working
classes being compelled to cease from their ordinary pursuits, are
rendered more prone to desultory habits; the chain of their industry is
as it were broken, and they lose that impetus which long-continued and
uninterrupted practice never fails to give. Hence there arises a
national character more fitful and capricious than that possessed by a
people whose climate permits the regular exercise of their ordinary
industry. Indeed, so powerful is this principle, that we may perceive
its operation even under the most opposite circumstances. It would be
difficult to conceive a greater difference in government, laws,
religion, and manners, than that which distinguishes Sweden and Norway
on the one hand, from Spain and Portugal on the other. But these four
countries have one great point in common. In all of them, continued
agricultural industry is impracticable. In the two southern countries,
labour is interrupted by the heat, by the dryness of the weather, and
by the consequent state of the soil. In the two northern countries, the
same effect is produced by the severity of the winter and the shortness
of the days. The consequence is, that these four nations, though so
different in other respects, are all remarkable for a certain
instability and fickleness of character; presenting a striking contrast
to the more regular and settled habits which are established in
countries whose climate subjects the working classes to fewer
interruptions, and imposes on them the necessity of a more constant and
unremitting employment.[42]
[41] This has been entirely neglected by the three most philosophical
writers on climate: Montesquieu, Hume, and M. Charles Comte in his
_Traité de Législation_. It is also omitted in the remarks of
M. Guizot on the influence of climate, _Civilisation en Europe_,
p. 97.
[42] See the admirable remarks in _Laing's Denmark_, 1852, pp. 204, 366,
367; though Norway appears to be a better illustration than
Denmark. In _Rey's Science Sociale_, vol. i. pp. 195, 196, there
are some calculations respecting the average loss to agricultural
industry caused by changes in the weather; but no notice is taken
of the connexion between these changes, when abrupt, and the tone
of the national character.
These are the great physical causes by which the creation of wealth is
governed. There are, no doubt, other circumstances which operate with
considerable force, and which, in a more advanced state of society,
possess an equal, and sometimes a superior, influence. But this is at a
later period; and looking at the history of wealth in its earliest
stage, it will be found to depend entirely on soil and climate: the soil
regulating the returns made to any given amount of labour; the climate
regulating the energy and constancy of the labour itself. It requires
but a hasty glance at past events, to prove the immense power of these
two great physical conditions. For there is no instance in history of
any country being civilized by its own efforts, unless it has possessed
one of these conditions in a very favourable form. In Asia, civilization
has always been confined to that vast tract where a rich and alluvial
soil has secured to man that wealth without some share of which no
intellectual progress can begin. This great region extends, with a few
interruptions, from the east of Southern China to the western coasts of
Asia Minor, of Ph[oe]nicia, and of Palestine. To the north of this
immense belt, there is a long line of barren country which has
invariably been peopled by rude and wandering tribes, who are kept in
poverty by the ungenial nature of the soil, and who, as long as they
remained on it, have never emerged from their uncivilized state. How
entirely this depends on physical causes, is evident from the fact that
these same Mongolian and Tartarian hordes have, at different periods,
founded great monarchies in China, in India, and in Persia, and have, on
all such occasions, attained a civilization nowise inferior to that
possessed by the most nourishing of the ancient kingdoms. For in the
fertile plains of Southern Asia,[43] nature has supplied all the
materials of wealth; and there it was that these barbarous tribes
acquired for the first time some degree of refinement, produced a
national literature, and organized a national polity; none of which
things they, in their native land, had been able to effect.[44] In the
same way, the Arabs in their own country have, owing to the extreme
aridity of their soil,[45] always been a rude and uncultivated people;
for in their case, as in all others, great ignorance is the fruit of
great poverty. But in the seventh century they conquered Persia;[46] in
the eighth century they conquered the best part of Spain;[47] in the
ninth century they conquered the Punjaub, and eventually nearly the
whole of India.[48] Scarcely were they established in their fresh
settlements, when their character seemed to undergo a great change.
They, who in their original land were little else than roving savages,
were now for the first time able to accumulate wealth, and, therefore,
for the first time did they make some progress in the arts of
civilization. In Arabia they had been a mere race of wandering
shepherds;[49] in their new abodes they became the founders of mighty
empires--they built cities, endowed schools, collected libraries; and
the traces of their power are still to be seen at Cordova, at Bagdad,
and at Delhi.[50] Precisely in the same manner, there is adjoining
Arabia at the north, and only separated from it elsewhere by the narrow
waters of the Red Sea, an immense sandy plain, which, covering the whole
of Africa in the same latitude, extends westward until it reaches the
shores of the Atlantic.[51] This enormous tract is, like Arabia, a
barren waste;[52] and therefore, as in Arabia, the inhabitants have
always been entirely uncivilized, acquiring no knowledge, simply because
they have accumulated no wealth.[53] But this great desert is, in its
eastern part, irrigated by the waters of the Nile, the overflowing of
which covers the sand with a rich alluvial deposit, that yields to
labour the most abundant, and indeed the most extraordinary,
returns.[54] The consequence is, that in that spot, wealth was rapidly
accumulated, the cultivation of knowledge quickly followed, and this
narrow strip of land[55] became the seat of Egyptian civilization; a
civilization which, though grossly exaggerated,[56] forms a striking
contrast to the barbarism of the other nations of Africa, none of which
have been able to work out their own progress, or emerge, in any degree,
from the ignorance to which the penury of nature has doomed them.
[43] This expression has been used by different geographers in different
senses; but I take it in its common acceptation, without reference
to the more strictly physical view of Ritter and his followers in
regard to Central Asia. See _Prichard's Physical History of
Mankind_, vol. iv. p. 278, edit. 1844. At p. 92, Prichard makes the
Himalaya the southern boundary of Central Asia.
[44] There is reason to believe that the Tartars of Thibet received even
their alphabet from India. See the interesting Essay on Tartarian
Coins in _Journal of Asiatic Society_, vol. iv. pp. 276, 277; and
on the Scythian Alphabet, see vol. xii. p. 336.
[45] In _Somerville's Physical Geography_, vol. i. p. 132, it is said
that in Arabia there are 'no rivers;' but Mr. Wellsted (_Travels in
Arabia_, vol. ii. p. 409) mentions one which empties itself into
the sea five miles west of Aden. On the streams in Arabia, see
_Meiners über die Fruchtbarkeit der Länder_, vol. i. pp. 149, 150.
That the sole deficiency is want of irrigation appears from
Burckhardt, who says (_Travels in Arabia_, vol. i. p. 240), 'In
Arabia, wherever the ground can be irrigated by wells, the sands
may be soon made productive.' And for a striking description of one
of the oases of Oman, which shows what Arabia might have been with
a good river system, see _Journal of Geographical Society_, vol.
vii. pp. 106, 107.
[46] Mr. Morier (_Journal of Geog. Soc._ vol. vii. p. 230) says, 'the
conquest of Persia by the Saracens A.D. 651.' However, the fate of
Persia was decided by the battles of Kudseah and Nahavund, which
were fought in 638 and 641: see _Malcolm's History of Persia_,
vol. i. pp. xvi. 139, 142.
[47] In 712. _Hallam's Middle Ages_, vol. i. p. 369.
[48] They were established in the Punjaub early in the ninth century,
but did not conquer Guzerat and Malwa until five hundred years
later. Compare Wilson's note in the _Vishnu Purana_, pp. 481, 482,
with _Asiatic Researches_, vol. ix. pp. 187, 188, 203. On their
progress in the more southern part of the Peninsula, see _Journal
of Asiatic Society_, vol. iii. pp. 222, 223, vol. iv. pp. 28-30.
[49] 'A race of pastoral barbarians.' _Dickinson on the Arabic
Language_, in _Journal of Asiat. Society_, vol. v. p. 323. Compare
_Reynier_, _Economie des Arabes_, pp. 27, 28; where, however, a
very simple question is needlessly complicated. The old Persian
writers bestowed on them the courteous appellation of 'a band of
naked lizard-eaters.' _Malcolm's Hist. of Persia_, vol. i. p. 133.
Indeed, there are few things in history better proved than the
barbarism of a people whom some writers wish to invest with a
romantic interest. The eulogy passed on them by Meiners is rather
suspicious, for he concludes by saying, 'die Eroberungen der
Araber waren höchst selten so blutig und zerstörend, als die
Eroberungen der Tataren, Persen, Türken, u.s.w. in ältern und
neuern Zeiten waren.' _Fruchtbarkeit der Länder_, vol. i. p. 153.
If this is the best that can be said, the comparison with Tartars
and Turks does not prove much; but it is singular that this learned
author should have forgotten a passage in Diodorus Siculus which
gives a pleasant description of them nineteen centuries ago on the
eastern side: _Bibliothec. Hist._ lib. ii. vol. ii. p. 137.
[Greek: echousi de bion lêstrikon, kai pollên tês homorou chôras
katatrechontes lêsteuousin], &c.
[50] The only branch of knowledge which the Arabians ever raised to a
science was astronomy, which began to be cultivated under the
caliphs about the middle of the eighth century, and went on
improving until 'la ville de Bagdad fut, pendant le dixième siècle,
le théâtre principal de l'astronomie chez les orientaux.'
_Montucla_, _Histoire des Mathématiques_, vol. i. pp. 355, 364. The
old Pagan Arabs, like most barbarous people living in a clear
atmosphere, had such an empirical acquaintance with the celestial
phenomena as was used for practical purposes; but there is no
evidence to justify the common opinion that they studied this
subject as a science. Dr. Dorn (_Transactions of the Asiatic
Society_, vol. ii. p. 371) says, 'of a scientific knowledge of
astronomy among them no traces can be discovered.' Beausobre
(_Histoire de Manichée_, vol. i. p. 20) is quite enthusiastic about
the philosophy of the Arabs in the time of Pythagoras! and he tells
us, that 'ces peuples out toujours cultivé les sciences.' To
establish this fact, he quotes a long passage from a life of
Mohammed written early in the eighteenth century by
Boulainvilliers, whom he calls, 'un des plus beaux génies de
France.' If this is an accurate description, those who have read
the works of Boulainvilliers will think that France was badly off
for men of genius; and as to his life of Mohammed, it is little
better than a romance: the author was ignorant of Arabic, and knew
nothing which had not been already communicated by Maracci and
Pococke. See _Biographie Universelle_, vol. v. p. 321.
In regard to the later Arabian astronomers, one of their great
merits was to approximate to the value of the annual precession
much closer than Ptolemy had done. See _Grant's History of
Physical Astronomy_, 1852, p. 319.
[51] Indeed it goes beyond it: 'the trackless sands of the Sahara
desert, which is even prolonged for miles into the Atlantic Ocean
in the form of sandbanks.' _Somerville's Physical Geography_,
vol. i. p. 149. For a singular instance of one of these sandbanks
being formed into an island, see _Journal of Geograph. Society_,
vol. ii. p. 284. The Sahara desert, exclusive of Bornou and
Darfour, covers an area of 194,000 square leagues; that is, nearly
three times the size of France, or twice the size of the
Mediterranean. Compare _Lyell's Geology_, p. 694, with
_Somerville's Connexion of the Sciences_, p. 294. As to the
probable southern limits of the plateau of the Sahara, see
_Richardson's Mission to Central Africa_, 1853, vol. ii. pp. 146,
156; and as to the part of it adjoining the Mandingo country, see
_Mungo Park's Travels_, vol. i. pp. 237, 238. Respecting the
country south of Mandara, some scanty information was collected by
Denham in the neighbourhood of Lake Tchad. _Denham's Northern and
Central Africa_, pp. 121, 122, 144-146.
[52] Richardson, who travelled through it south of Tripoli, notices its
'features of sterility, of unconquerable barrenness.' _Richardson's
Sahara_, 1848, vol. i. p. 86; and see the striking picture at
p. 409. The long and dreary route from Mourzouk to Yeou, on Lake
Tchad, is described by Denham, one of the extremely few Europeans
who have performed that hazardous journey. _Denham's Central
Africa_, pp. 2-60. Even on the shore of the Tchad there is hardly
any vegetation, 'a coarse grass and a small bell-flower being the
only plants that I could discover,' p. 90. Compare his remark on
Bornou, p. 317. The condition of part of the desert in the
fourteenth century is described in the _Travels of Ibn Batuta_,
p. 233, which should be compared with the account given by Diodorus
Siculus of the journey of Alexander to the temple of Ammon.
_Bibliothec. Historic._ lib. xvii. vol. vii. p. 348.
[53] Richardson, who travelled in 1850 from Tripoli to within a few days
of Lake Tchad, was struck by the stationary character of the
people. He says, 'neither in the desert nor in the kingdoms of
Central Africa is there any march of civilization. All goes on
according to a certain routine established for ages past.'
_Mission to Central Africa_, vol. i. pp. 304, 305. See similar
remarks in _Pallme's Travels in Kordofan_, pp. 108, 109.
[54] Abd-Allatif, who was in Egypt early in the thirteenth century,
gives an interesting account of the rising of the Nile, to which
Egypt owes its fertility. _Abd-Allatif_, _Relation de l'Egypte_,
pp. 329-340, 374-376, and Appendix, p. 504. See also on these
periodical inundations. _Wilkinson's Ancient Egyptians_, vol. iv.
pp. 101-104; and on the half-astronomical half theological notions
connected with them, pp. 372-377, vol. v. pp. 291, 292. Compare on
the religious importance of the Nile _Bunsen's Egypt_, vol. i.
p. 409. The expression, therefore, of Herodotus (book ii. chap.
v. vol. i. p. 484), [Greek: dôron tou potamou] is true in a much
larger sense than he intended; since to the Nile Egypt owes all
the physical peculiarities which distinguish it from Arabia and
the great African desert. Compare _Heeren's African Nations_,
vol. ii. p. 58; _Reynier_, _Economie des Arabes_, p. 3; _Postan's
on the Nile and Indus_, in _Journal of Asiatic Society_, vol. vii.
p. 275; and on the difference between the soil of the Nile and
that of the surrounding desert, see _Volney_, _Voyage en Syrie et
en Egypte_, vol. i. p. 14.
[55] 'The average breadth of the valley from one mountain-range to the
other, between Cairo in Lower, and Edfoo in Upper Egypt, is only
about seven miles; and that of the cultivable land, whose limits
depend on the inundation, scarcely exceeds five and a half.'
_Wilkinson's Ancient Egyptians_, vol. i. p. 216. According to
Gerard, 'the mean width of the valley between Syene and Cairo is
about nine miles.' Note in _Heeren's African Nations_, vol. ii.
p. 62.
[56] I will give one instance of this from an otherwise sensible writer,
and a man too of considerable learning: 'As to the physical
knowledge of the Egyptians, their cotemporaries gave them credit
for the astonishing power of their magic; and as we cannot suppose
that the instances recorded in Scripture were to be attributed to
the exertion of supernatural powers, we must conclude that they
were in possession of a more intimate knowledge of the laws and
combinations of nature than what is professed by the most learned
men of the present age.' _Hamilton's Ægyptiaca_, pp. 61, 62. It is
a shame that such nonsense should be written in the nineteenth
century: and yet a still more recent author (_Vyse on the
Pyramids_, vol. i. p. 28) assures us that 'the Egyptians, for
especial purposes, were endowed with great wisdom and science.'
Science properly so called, the Egyptians had none; and as to
their wisdom, it was considerable enough to distinguish them from
barbarous nations like the old Hebrews, but it was inferior to
that of the Greeks, and it was of course immeasurably below that
of modern Europe.
These considerations clearly prove that of the two primary causes of
civilization, the fertility of the soil is the one which in the ancient
world exercised most influence. But in European civilization, the other
great cause, that is to say, climate, has been the most powerful; and
this, as we have seen, produces an effect partly on the capacity of the
labourer for work, partly on the regularity or irregularity of his
habits. The difference in the result has curiously corresponded with the
difference in the cause. For, although all civilization must have for
its antecedent the accumulation of wealth, still what subsequently
occurs will be in no small degree determined by the conditions under
which the accumulation took place. In Asia, and in Africa, the condition
was a fertile soil, causing an abundant return; in Europe, it was a
happier climate, causing more successful labour. In the former case, the
effect depends on the relation between the soil and its produce; in
other words, the mere operation of one part of external nature upon
another. In the latter case, the effect depends on the relation between
the climate and the labourer; that is, the operation of external nature
not upon itself, but upon man. Of these two classes of relations, the
first, being the less complicated, is the less liable to disturbance,
and therefore came sooner into play. Hence it is, that, in the march of
civilization, the priority is unquestionably due to the most fertile
parts of Asia and Africa. But although their civilization was the
earliest, it was very far, indeed, from being the best or most
permanent. Owing to circumstances which I shall presently state, the
only progress which is really effective depends, not upon the bounty of
nature, but upon the energy of man. Therefore it is, that the
civilization of Europe, which, in its earliest stage, was governed by
climate, has shown a capacity of development unknown to those
civilizations which were originated by soil. For the powers of nature,
notwithstanding their apparent magnitude, are limited and stationary; at
all events, we have not the slightest proof that they have ever
increased, or that they will ever be able to increase. But the powers of
man, so far as experience and analogy can guide us, are unlimited; nor
are we possessed of any evidence which authorizes us to assign even an
imaginary boundary at which the human intellect will, of necessity, be
brought to a stand. And as this power which the mind possesses of
increasing its own resources, is a peculiarity confined to man, and one
eminently distinguishing him from what is commonly called external
nature, it becomes evident that the agency of climate, which gives him
wealth by stimulating his labour, is more favourable to his ultimate
progress than the agency of soil, which likewise gives him wealth, but
which does so, not by exciting his energies, but by virtue of a mere
physical relation between the character of the soil and the quantity or
value of the produce that it almost spontaneously affords.
Thus far as to the different ways in which climate and soil affect the
creation of wealth. But another point of equal, or perhaps of superior,
importance remains behind. After the wealth has been created, a question
arises as to how it is to be distributed; that is to say, what
proportion is to go to the upper classes, and what to the lower. In an
advanced stage of society, this depends upon several circumstances of
great complexity, and which it is not necessary here to examine.[57] But
in a very early stage of society, and before its later and refined
complications have begun, it may, I think, be proved that the
distribution of wealth is, like its creation, governed entirely by
physical laws; and that those laws are moreover so active as to have
invariably kept a vast majority of the inhabitants of the fairest
portion of the globe in a condition of constant and inextricable
poverty. If this can be demonstrated, the immense importance of such
laws is manifest. For since wealth is an undoubted source of power, it
is evident that, supposing other things equal, an inquiry into the
distribution of wealth is an inquiry into the distribution of power,
and, as such, will throw great light on the origin of those social and
political inequalities, the play and opposition of which form a
considerable part of the history of every civilized country.
[57] Indeed many of them are still unknown; for, as M. Rey justly
observes, most writers pay too exclusive an attention to the
production of wealth, and neglect the laws of its distribution.
_Rey_, _Science Sociale_, vol. iii. p. 271. In confirmation of
this, I may mention the theory of rent, which was only discovered
about half a century ago, and which is connected with so many
subtle arguments that it is not yet generally adopted; and even
some of its advocates have shown themselves unequal to defending
their own cause. The great law of the ratio between the cost of
labour and the profits of stock, is the highest generalization we
have reached respecting the distribution of wealth; but it cannot
be consistently admitted by anyone who holds that rent enters into
price.
If we take a general view of this subject, we may say that after the
creation and accumulation of wealth have once fairly begun, it will be
distributed among two classes, those who labour, and those who do not
labour; the latter being, as a class, the more able, the former the more
numerous. The fund by which both classes are supported is immediately
created by the lower class, whose physical energies are directed,
combined, and as it were economized, by the superior skill of the upper
class. The reward of the workmen is called their wages; the reward of
the contrivers is called their profits. At a later period, there will
arise what may be called the saving class; that is, a body of men who
neither contrive nor work, but lend their accumulations to those who
contrive, and in return for the loan, receive a part of that reward
which belongs to the contriving class. In this case, the members of the
saving class are rewarded for their abstinence in refraining from
spending their accumulations, and this reward is termed the interest of
their money; so that there is made a threefold division--Interest,
Profits, and Wages. But this is a subsequent arrangement, which can only
take place to any extent when wealth has been considerably accumulated;
and in the stage of society we are now considering, this third, or
saving class, can hardly be said to have a separate existence.[58] For
our present purpose, therefore, it is enough to ascertain what those
natural laws are, which, as soon as wealth is accumulated, regulate the
proportion in which it is distributed to the two classes of labourers
and employers.
Now, it is evident that wages being the price paid for labour, the rate
of wages must, like the price of all other commodities, vary according
to the changes in the market. If the supply of labourers outstrips the
demand, wages will fall; if the demand exceeds the supply, they will
rise. Supposing, therefore, that in any country there is a given amount
of wealth to be divided between employers and workmen, every increase in
the number of the workmen will tend to lessen the average reward each
can receive. And if we set aside those disturbing causes by which all
general views are affected, it will be found that, in the long-run, the
question of wages is a question of population; for although the total
sum of the wages actually paid depends upon the largeness of the fund
from which they are drawn, still the amount of wages received by each
man must diminish as the claimants increase, unless, owing to other
circumstances, the fund itself should so advance as to keep pace with
the greater demands made upon it.[59]
[58] In a still more advanced stage, there is a fourth division of
wealth, and part of the produce of labour is absorbed by rent.
This, however, is not an element of price, but a consequence of it;
and in the ordinary march of affairs, considerable time must elapse
before it can begin. Rent, in the proper sense of the word, is the
price paid for using the natural and indestructible powers of the
soil, and must not be confused with rent commonly so called; for
this last also includes the profits of stock. I notice this,
because several of the opponents of Ricardo have placed the
beginning of rent too early, by overlooking the fact that apparent
rent is very often profits disguised.
[59] 'Wages depend, then, on the proportion between the number of the
labouring population, and the capital or other funds devoted to the
purchase of labour; we will say, for shortness, the capital. If
wages are higher at one time or place than at another, if the
subsistence and comfort of the class of hired labourers are more
ample, it is, and can be, for no other reason than because capital
bears a greater proportion to population. It is not the absolute
amount of accumulation or of production that is of importance to
the labouring class; it is not the amount even of the funds
destined for distribution among the labourers; it is the proportion
between those funds and the numbers among whom they are shared. The
condition of the class can be bettered in no other way than by
altering that proportion to their advantage; and every scheme for
their benefit which does not proceed on this as its foundation, is,
for all permanent purposes, a delusion.' _Mill's Principles of
Political Economy_, 1849, vol. i. p. 425. See also vol. ii.
pp. 264, 265, and _M'Culloch's Political Economy_, pp. 379, 380.
Ricardo, in his _Essay on the Influence of a Low Price of Corn_,
has stated, with his usual terseness, the three possible forms of
this question: 'The rise or fall of wages is common to all states
of society, whether it be the stationary, the advancing, or the
retrograde state. In the stationary state, it is regulated wholly
by the increase or falling-off of the population. In the advancing
state, it depends on whether the capital or the population advance
at the more rapid course. In the retrograde state, it depends on
whether population or capital decrease with the greater rapidity.'
_Ricardo's Works_, p. 379.
To know the circumstances most favourable to the increase of what may be
termed the wages-fund is a matter of great moment, but is one with which
we are not immediately concerned. The question we have now before us,
regards not the accumulation of wealth, but its distribution; and the
object is, to ascertain what those physical conditions are, which, by
encouraging a rapid growth of population, over-supply the labour market,
and thus keep the average rate of wages at a very low point.
Of all the physical agents by which the increase of the labouring
classes is affected, that of food is the most active and universal. If
two countries, equal in all other respects, differ solely in this--that
in one the national food is cheap and abundant, and in the other scarce
and dear, the population of the former country will inevitably increase
more rapidly than the population of the latter.[60] And, by a parity of
reasoning, the average rate of wages will be lower in the former than in
the latter, simply because the labour-market will be more amply
stocked.[61] An inquiry, therefore, into the physical laws on which the
food of different countries depends, is, for our present purpose, of the
greatest importance; and fortunately it is one respecting which we are
able, in the present state of chemistry and physiology, to arrive at
some precise and definite conclusions.
[60] The standard of comfort being of course supposed the same.
[61] 'No point is better established, than that the supply of labourers
will always ultimately be in proportion to the means of supporting
them.' _Principles of Political Economy_, chap. xxi. in _Ricardo's
Works_, p. 176. Compare _Smith's Wealth of Nations_, book i.
chap. xi. p. 86, and _M'Culloch's Political Economy_, p. 222.
The food consumed by man produces two, and only two, effects necessary
to his existence. These are, first to supply him with that animal heat
without which the functions of life would stop; and secondly, to repair
the waste constantly taking place in his tissues, that is, in the
mechanism of his frame. For each of these separate purposes there is a
separate food. The temperature of our body is kept up by substances
which contain no nitrogen, and are called non-azotized; the incessant
decay in our organism is repaired by what are known as azotized
substances, in which nitrogen is always found.[62] In the former case,
the carbon of non-azotized food combines with the oxygen we take in, and
gives rise to that internal combustion by which our animal heat is
renewed. In the latter case, nitrogen having little affinity for
oxygen,[63] the nitrogenous or azotized food is, as it were, guarded
against combustion;[64] and being thus preserved, is able to perform its
duty of repairing the tissues, and supplying those losses which the
human organism constantly suffers in the wear and tear of daily life.
[62] The division of food into azotized and non-azotized is said to have
been first pointed out by Magendie. See _Müller's Physiology_,
vol. i. p. 525. It is now recognised by most of the best
authorities. See, for instance, _Liebig's Animal Chemistry_,
p. 134; _Carpenter's Human Physiology_, p. 685; _Brande's
Chemistry_, vol. ii. pp. 1218, 1870. The first tables of food
constructed according to it were by Boussingault; see an elaborate
essay by Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert on _The Composition of Foods_,
in _Report of British Association for 1852_, p. 323: but the
experiments made by these gentlemen are neither numerous nor
diversified enough to establish a general law; still less can we
accept their singular assertion, p. 346, that the comparative
prices of different foods are a test of the nutriment they
comparatively contain.
[63] 'Of all the elements of the animal body, nitrogen has the feeblest
attraction for oxygen; and, what is still more remarkable, it
deprives all combustible elements with which it combines, to a
greater or less extent, of the power of combining with oxygen, that
is, of undergoing combustion.' _Liebig's Letters on Chemistry_,
p. 372.
[64] The doctrine of what may be called the protecting power of some
substances is still imperfectly understood, and until late in the
eighteenth century, its existence was hardly suspected. It is now
known to be connected with the general theory of poisons. See
_Turner's Chemistry_, vol. i. p. 516. To this we must probably
ascribe the fact that several poisons which are fatal when applied
to a wounded surface, may be taken into the stomach with impunity.
_Brodie's Physiological Researches_, 1851, pp. 137, 138. It seems
more reasonable to refer this to chemical laws than to hold, with
Sir Benjamin Brodie, that some poisons 'destroy life by paralysing
the muscles of respiration without immediately affecting the
action of the heart.'
These are the two great divisions of food;[65] and if we inquire into
the laws which regulate the relation they bear to man, we shall find
that in each division the most important agent is climate. When men live
in a hot country, their animal heat is more easily kept up than when
they live in a cold one; therefore they require a smaller amount of that
non-azotized food, the sole business of which is to maintain at a
certain point the temperature of the body. In the same way, they, in the
hot country, require a smaller amount of azotized food, because on the
whole their bodily exertions are less frequent, and on that account the
decay of their tissues is less rapid.[66]
[65] Prout's well-known division into saccharine, oily, and albuminous,
appears to me of much inferior value, though I observe that it is
adopted in the last edition of _Elliotson's Human Physiology_,
pp. 65, 160. The division by M. Lepelletier into 'les alimens
solides et les boissons' is of course purely empirical.
_Lepelletier_, _Physiologie Médicale_, vol. ii. p. 100, Paris,
1832. In regard to Prout's classification, compare _Burdach's
Traité de Physiologie_, vol. ix. p. 240, with _Wagner's
Physiology_, p. 452.
[66] The evidence of an universal connexion in the animal frame between
exertion and decay, is now almost complete. In regard to the
muscular system, see _Carpenter's Human Physiology_, pp. 440, 441,
581, edit. 1846: 'there is strong reason to believe the waste or
decomposition of the muscular tissue to be in exact proportion to
the degree in which it is exerted.' This perhaps would be generally
anticipated even in the absence of direct proof; but what is more
interesting, is that the same principle holds good of the nervous
system. The human brain of an adult contains about one and a half
per cent of phosphorus; and it has been ascertained, that after
the mind has been much exercised, phosphates are excreted, and
that in the case of inflammation of the brain their excretion (by
the kidneys) is very considerable. See _Paget's Lectures on
Surgical Pathology_, 1853, vol. i. pp. 6, 7, 434; _Carpenter's
Human Physiology_, pp. 192, 193, 222; _Simon's Animal Chemistry_,
vol. ii. p. 426; _Henle_, _Anatomie Générale_, vol. ii. p. 172.
The reader may also consult respecting the phosphorus of the brain
the recent very able work of MM. Robin et Verdeil, _Chimie
Anatomique_, vol. i. p. 215, vol. ii. p. 348, Paris, 1853.
According to these writers (vol. iii. p. 445), its existence in
the brain was first announced by Hensing, in 1779.
Since, therefore, the inhabitants of hot climates do, in their natural
and ordinary state, consume less food than the inhabitants of cold ones,
it inevitably follows that, provided other things remain equal, the
growth of population will be more rapid in countries which are hot than
in those which are cold. For practical purposes, it is immaterial
whether the greater plenty of a substance by which the people are fed
arises from a larger supply, or whether it arises from a smaller
consumption. When men eat less, the result will be just the same as if
they had more; because the same amount of nutriment will go farther, and
thus population will gain a power of increasing more quickly than it
could do in a colder country, where, even if provisions were equally
abundant, they, owing to the climate, would be sooner exhausted.
This is the first point of view in which the laws of climate are,
through the medium of food, connected with the laws of population, and
therefore with the laws of the distribution of wealth. But there is also
another point of view, which follows the same line of thought, and will
be found to strengthen the argument just stated. This is, that in cold
countries, not only are men compelled to eat more than in hot ones, but
their food is dearer, that is to say, to get it is more difficult, and
requires a greater expenditure of labour. The reason of this I will
state as briefly as possible, without entering into any details beyond
those which are absolutely necessary for a right understanding of this
interesting subject.
The objects of food are, as we have seen, only two: namely, to keep up
the warmth of the body, and repair the waste in the tissues.[67] Of
these two objects, the former is effected by the oxygen of the air
entering our lungs, and, as it travels through the system, combining
with the carbon which we take in our food.[68] This combination of
oxygen and carbon never can occur without producing a considerable
amount of heat, and it is in this way that the human frame is maintained
at its necessary temperature.[69] By virtue of a law familiar to
chemists, carbon and oxygen, like all other elements, will only unite in
certain definite proportions;[70] so that to keep up a healthy balance,
it is needful that the food which contains the carbon should vary
according to the amount of oxygen taken in: while it is equally needful
that we should increase the quantity of both of these constituents
whenever a greater external cold lowers the temperature of the body. Now
it is obvious that in a very cold climate, this necessity of providing a
nutriment more highly carbonized will arise in two distinct ways. In the
first place, the air being denser, men imbibe at each inspiration a
greater volume of oxygen than they would do in a climate where the air
is rarefied by heat.[71] In the second place, cold accelerates their
respiration, and thus obliging them to inhale more frequently than the
inhabitants of hot countries, increases the amount of oxygen which they
on an average take in.[72] On both these grounds the consumption of
oxygen becomes greater: it is therefore requisite that the consumption
of carbon should also be greater; since by the union of these two
elements in certain definite proportions, the temperature of the body
and the balance of the human frame can alone be maintained.[73]
[67] Though both objects are equally essential, the former is usually
the more pressing; and it has been ascertained by experiment, what
we should expect from theory, that when animals are starved to
death, there is a progressive decline in the temperature of their
bodies; so that the proximate cause of death by starvation is not
weakness, but cold. See _Williams's Principles of Medicine_,
p. 36; and on the connexion between the loss of animal heat and
the appearance of _rigor mortis_ in the contractile parts of the
body, see _Vogel's Pathological Anatomy of the Human Body_, p. 532.
Compare the important and thoughtful work of Burdach, _Physiologie
comme Science d'Observation_, vol. v. pp. 144, 436, vol. ix.
p. 231.
[68] Until the last twenty or five-and-twenty years, it used to be
supposed that this combination took place in the lungs; but more
careful experiments have made it probable that the oxygen unites
with the carbon in the circulation, and that the blood-corpuscules
are the carriers of the oxygen. Compare _Liebig's Animal
Chemistry_, p. 78; _Letters on Chemistry_, pp. 335, 336; _Turner's
Chemistry_, vol. ii. p. 1319; _Müller's Physiology_, vol. i.
pp. 92, 159. That the combination does not take place in the
air-cells is moreover proved by the fact that the lungs are not
hotter than other parts of the body. See _Müller_, vol. i. p. 348;
_Thomson's Animal Chemistry_, p. 633; and _Brodie's Physiol.
Researches_, p. 33. Another argument in favour of the red
corpuscules being the carriers of oxygen, is that they are most
abundant in those classes of the vertebrata which maintain the
highest temperature; while the blood of invertebrata contains very
few of them; and it has been doubted if they even exist in the
lower articulata and mollusca. See _Carpenter's Human Physiol._
pp. 109, 532; _Grant's Comparative Anatomy_, p. 472; _Elliotson's
Human Physiol._ p. 159. In regard to the different dimensions of
corpuscules, see _Henle_, _Anatomie Générale_, vol. i. pp. 457-467,
494, 495; _Blainville_, _Physiologie Comparée_, vol. i. pp. 298,
299, 301-304; _Milne Edwards_, _Zoologie_, part i. pp. 54-56;
_Fourth Report of British Association_, pp. 117, 118; _Simon's
Animal Chemistry_, vol. i. pp. 103, 104; and, above all, the
important observations of Mr. Gulliver (_Carpenter_, pp. 105, 106).
These additions to our knowledge, besides being connected with the
laws of animal heat and of nutrition, will, when generalized,
assist speculative minds in raising pathology to a science. In the
mean time I may mention the relation between an examination of the
corpuscules and the theory of inflammation which Hunter and
Broussais were unable to settle: this is, that the proximate cause
of inflammation is the obstruction of the vessels by the adhesion
of the pale corpuscules. Respecting this striking generalization,
which is still on its trial, compare _Williams's Principles of
Medicine_, 1848, pp. 258-265, with _Paget's Surgical Pathology_,
1853, vol. i. pp. 313-317; _Jones and Sieveking's Pathological
Anatomy_, 1854, pp. 28, 105, 106. The difficulties connected with
the scientific study of inflammation are evaded in _Vogel's
Pathological Anatomy_, p. 418; a work which appears to me to have
been greatly overrated.
[69] On the amount of heat disengaged by the union of carbon and oxygen,
see the experiments of Dulong, in _Liebig's Animal Chemistry_,
p. 44; and those of Despretz, in _Thomson's Animal Chemistry_,
p. 634. Just in the same way, we find that the temperature of
plants is maintained by the combination of oxygen with carbon: see
_Balfour's Botany_, pp. 231, 232, 322, 323. As to the amount of
heat caused generally by chemical combination, there is an essay
well worth reading by Dr. Thomas Andrews in _Report of British
Association for 1849_, pp. 63-78. See also _Report for 1852,
Transac. of Sec._ p. 40, and _Liebig and Kopp's Reports on the
Progress of Chemistry_, vol. i. p. 34, vol. iii. p. 16, vol. iv.
p. 20; also _Pouillet_, _Elémens de Physique_, Paris, 1832,
vol. i. part i. p. 411.
[70] The law of definite proportions, which, since the brilliant
discoveries by Dalton, is the corner-stone of chemical knowledge,
is laid down with admirable clearness in _Turner's Elements of
Chemistry_, vol. i. pp. 146-151. Compare _Brande's Chemistry_,
vol. i. pp. 139-144; _Cuvier_, _Progrès des Sciences_, vol. ii.
p. 255; _Somerville's Connexion of the Sciences_, pp. 120, 121.
But none of these writers have considered the law so
philosophically as M. A. Comte, _Philosophie Positive_, vol. iii.
pp. 133-176, one of the best chapters in his very profound, but
ill-understood work.
[71] 'Ainsi, dans des temps égaux, la quantité d'oxygène consommée par
le même animal est d'autant plus grande que la température ambiante
est moins élevée.' _Robin et Verdeil_, _Chimie Anatomique_,
vol. ii. p. 44. Compare _Simon's Lectures on Pathology_, 1850,
p. 188, for the diminished quantity of respiration in a high
temperature; though one may question Mr. Simon's inference that
_therefore_ the blood is more venous in hot countries than in cold
ones. This is not making allowance for the difference of diet,
which corrects the difference of temperature.
[72] 'The consumption of oxygen in a given time may be expressed by the
number of respirations.' _Liebig's Letters on Chemistry_, p. 314;
and see _Thomson's Animal Chemistry_, p. 611. It is also certain
that exercise increases the number of respirations; and birds,
which are the most active of all animals, consume more oxygen than
any others. _Milne Edwards_, _Zoologie_, part i. p. 88, part ii.
p. 371; _Flourens_, _Travaux de Cuvier_, pp. 153, 154, 265, 266.
Compare, on the connexion between respiration and the locomotive
organs, _Beclard_, _Anatomie Générale_, pp. 39, 44; _Burdach_,
_Traité de Physiologie_, vol. ix. pp. 485, 556-559; _Carus's
Comparative Anatomy_, vol. i. pp. 99, 164, 358, vol. ii. pp. 142,
160; _Grant's Comparative Anatomy_, pp. 455, 495, 522, 529, 537;
_Rymer Jones's Animal Kingdom_, pp. 369, 440, 692, 714, 720;
_Owen's Invertebrata_, pp. 322, 345, 386, 505. Thus too it has been
experimentally ascertained, that in human beings exercise increases
the amount of carbonic-acid gas. _Mayo's Human Physiology_, p. 64;
_Liebig and Kopp's Reports_, vol. iii. p. 359.
If we now put these facts together, their bearing on the
propositions in the text will become evident; because, on the
whole, there is more exercise taken in cold climates than in hot
ones, and there must therefore be an increased respiratory action.
For proof that greater exercise is both taken and required,
compare _Wrangel's Polar Expedition_, pp. 79, 102; _Richardson's
Arctic Expedition_, vol. i. p. 385; _Simpson's North Coast of
America_, pp. 49,88, which should be contrasted with the contempt
for such amusements in hot countries. Indeed, in polar regions all
this is so essential to preserve a normal state, that scurvy can
only be kept off in the northern part of the American continent by
taking considerable exercise: see _Crantz_, _History of Greenland_,
vol. i. pp. 46, 62, 338.
[73] See the note at the end of this chapter.
Proceeding from these chemical and physiological principles, we arrive
at the conclusion, that the colder the country is in which a people
live, the more highly carbonized will be their food. And this, which is
a purely scientific inference, has been verified by actual experiment.
The inhabitants of the polar regions consume large quantities of
whale-oil and blubber; while within the tropics such food would soon put
an end to life, and therefore the ordinary diet consists almost entirely
of fruit, rice, and other vegetables. Now it has been ascertained by
careful analysis, that in the polar food there is an excess of carbon;
in the tropical food an excess of oxygen. Without entering into details,
which to the majority of readers would be distasteful, it may be said
generally, that the oils contain about six times as much carbon as the
fruits, and that they have in them very little oxygen;[74] while
starch, which is the most universal, and, in reference to nutrition,
the most important constituent in the vegetable world,[75] is nearly
half oxygen.[76]
[74] 'The fruits used by the inhabitants of southern climes do not
contain, in a fresh state, more than 12 per cent. of carbon; while
the blubber and train-oil which feed the inhabitants of polar
regions contain 66 to 80 per cent. of that element.' _Liebig's
Letters on Chemistry_, p. 320; see also p. 375, and _Turner's
Chemistry_, vol. ii. p. 1315. According to Prout (_Mayo's Human
Physiol._ p. 136), 'the proportion of carbon in oily bodies varies
from about 60 to 80 per cent.' The quantity of oil and fat
habitually consumed in cold countries is remarkable. Wrangel
(_Polar Expedition_, p. 21) says of the tribes in the north-east
of Siberia, 'fat is their greatest delicacy. They eat it in every
possible shape; raw, melted, fresh, or spoilt.' See also _Simpson's
Discoveries on the North Coast of America_, pp. 147, 404.
[75] 'So common, that no plant is destitute of it.' _Lindley's Botany_,
vol. i. p. 111; and at p. 121, 'starch is the most common of all
vegetable productions.' Dr. Lindley adds (vol. i. p. 292), that it
is difficult to distinguish the grains of starch secreted by plants
from cytoblasts. See also on the starch-granules, first noticed by
M. Link, _Reports on Botany by the Ray Society_, pp. 223, 370; and
respecting its predominance in the vegetable world, compare
_Thomson's Chemistry of Vegetables_, pp. 650-652, 875; _Brande's
Chemistry_, vol. ii. p. 1160; _Turner's Chemistry_, vol. ii.
p. 1236; _Liebig and Kopp's Reports_, vol. ii. pp. 97, 98, 122.
[76] The oxygen is 49.39 out of 100. See the table in _Liebig's Letters
on Chemistry_, p. 379. Amidin, which is the soluble part of starch,
contains 53.33 per cent. of oxygen. See _Thomson's Chemistry of
Vegetables_, p. 654, on the authority of Prout, who has the
reputation of being an accurate experimenter.
The connexion between this circumstance and the subject before us is
highly curious: for it is a most remarkable fact, and one to which I
would call particular attention, that owing to some more general law, of
which we are ignorant, highly carbonized food is more costly than food
in which comparatively little carbon is found. The fruits of the earth,
of which oxygen is the most active principle, are very abundant; they
may be obtained without danger, and almost without trouble. But that
highly carbonized food, which in a very cold climate is absolutely
necessary to life, is not produced in so facile and spontaneous a
manner. It is not, like vegetables, thrown up by the soil; but it
consists of the fat, the blubber, and the oil[77] of powerful and
ferocious animals. To procure it, man must incur great risk and expend
great labour. And although this is undoubtedly a contrast of extreme
cases, still it is evident that the nearer a people approach to either
extremity, the more subject will they be to the conditions by which that
extremity is governed. It is evident that, as a general rule, the colder
a country is, the more its food will be carbonized; the warmer it is,
the more its food will be oxidized.[78] At the same time, carbonized
food, being chiefly drawn from the animal world, is more difficult to
obtain than oxidized food, which is drawn from the vegetable world.[79]
The result has been that among nations where the coldness of the climate
renders a highly carbonized diet essential, there is for the most part
displayed, even in the infancy of society, a bolder and more adventurous
character, than we find among those other nations whose ordinary
nutriment, being highly oxidized, is easily obtained, and indeed is
supplied to them, by the bounty of nature, gratuitously and without a
struggle.[80] From this original divergence there follow many other
consequences, which, however, I am not now concerned to trace; my
present object being merely to point out how this difference of food
affects the proportion in which wealth is distributed to the different
classes.
[77] Of which a single whale will yield 'cent vingt tonneaux.' _Cuvier_,
_Règne Animal_, vol. i. p. 297. In regard to the solid food,
Sir J. Richardson (_Arctic Expedition_, 1851, vol. i. p. 243)
says that the inhabitants of the Arctic regions only maintain
themselves by chasing whales and 'consuming blubber.'
[78] It is said, that to keep a person in health, his food, even in the
temperate parts of Europe, should contain 'a full eighth more
carbon in winter than in summer.' _Liebig's Animal Chemistry_,
p. 16.
[79] The most highly carbonized of all foods are undoubtedly yielded by
animals; the most highly oxidized by vegetables. In the vegetable
kingdom there is, however, so much carbon, that its predominance,
accompanied with the rarity of nitrogen, has induced chemical
botanists to characterize plants as carbonized, and animals as
azotized. But we have here to attend to a double antithesis.
Vegetables are carbonized in so far as they are non-azotized; but
they are oxidized in opposition to the highly carbonized animal
food of cold countries. Besides this, it is important to observe
that the carbon of vegetables is most abundant in the woody and
unnutritious part, which is not eaten; while the carbon of animals
is found in the fatty and oily parts, which are not only eaten,
but are, in cold countries, greedily devoured.
[80] Sir J. Malcolm (_History of Persia_, vol. ii. p. 380), speaking of
the cheapness of vegetables in the East, says, 'in some parts of
Persia fruit has hardly any value.' Cuvier, in a striking passage
(_Règne Animal_, vol. i. pp. 73, 74), has contrasted vegetable
with animal food, and thinks that the former, being so easily
obtained, is the more natural. But the truth is that both are
equally natural: though when Cuvier wrote scarcely anything was
known of the laws which govern the relation between climate and
food. On the skill and energy required to obtain food in cold
countries, see _Wrangel's Polar Expedition_, pp. 70, 71, 191, 192;
_Simpson's Discoveries on the North Coast of America_, p. 249;
_Crantz_, _History of Greenland_, vol. i. pp. 22, 32, 105, 131,
154, 155, vol. ii. pp. 203, 265, 324.
The way in which this proportion is actually altered has, I hope, been
made clear by the preceding argument; but it may be useful to
recapitulate the facts on which the argument is based. The facts, then,
are simply these. The rate of wages fluctuates with the population;
increasing when the labour-market is under-supplied, diminishing when it
is over-supplied. The population itself, though affected by many other
circumstances, does undoubtedly fluctuate with the supply of food;
advancing when the supply is plentiful, halting or receding when the
supply is scanty. The food essential to life is scarcer in cold
countries than in hot ones; and not only is it scarcer, but more of it
is required;[81] so that on both grounds smaller encouragement is given
to the growth of that population from whose ranks the labour-market is
stocked. To express, therefore, the conclusion in its simplest form, we
may say, that there is a strong and constant tendency in hot countries
for wages to be low, in cold countries for them to be high.
[81] 'Cabanis' (_Rapports du Physique et du Moral_, p. 313) says, 'Dans
les temps et dans les pays froids on mange et l'on agit davantage.'
That much food is eaten in cold countries, and little in hot ones,
is mentioned by numerous travellers, none of whom are aware of the
cause. See _Simpson's Discov. on North Coast of America_, p. 218;
_Custine's Russie_, vol. iv. p. 66; _Wrangel's Expedition_, pp. 21,
327; _Crantz_, _History of Greenland_, vol. i. pp. 145, 360;
_Richardson's Central Africa_, vol. ii. p. 46; _Richardson's
Sahara_, vol. i. p. 137; _Denham's Africa_, p. 37; _Journal of
Asiatic Society_, vol. v. p. 144, vol. viii. p. 188; _Burckhardt's
Travels in Arabia_, vol. ii. p. 265; _Niebuhr_, _Description de
l'Arabie_, p. 45; _Ulloa's Voyage to South America_, vol. i.
pp. 403, 408; _Journal of Geograph. Society_, vol. iii. p. 283,
vol. vi. p. 85, vol. xix. p. 121; _Spix and Martius's Travels in
Brazil_, vol. i. p. 164; _Southey's History of Brazil_, vol. iii.
p. 848; _Volney_, _Voyage en Syrie et en Egypte_, vol. i. pp. 379,
380, 460; _Low's Sarawak_, p. 140.
Applying now this great principle to the general course of history, we
shall find proofs of its accuracy in every direction. Indeed, there is
not a single instance to the contrary. In Asia, in Africa, and in
America, all the ancient civilizations were seated in hot climates; and
in all of them the rate of wages was very low, and therefore the
condition of the labouring classes very depressed. In Europe, for the
first time, civilization arose in a colder climate: hence the reward of
labour was increased, and the distribution of wealth rendered more equal
than was possible in countries where an excessive abundance of food
stimulated the growth of population. This difference produced, as we
shall presently see, many social and political consequences of immense
importance. But before discussing them, it may be remarked that the only
apparent exception to what has been stated is one which strikingly
verifies the general law. There is one instance, and only one, of a
great European people possessing a very cheap national food. This
people, I need hardly say, are the Irish. In Ireland the labouring
classes have for more than two hundred years been principally fed by
potatoes, which were introduced into their country late in the
sixteenth, or early in the seventeenth century.[82] Now, the peculiarity
of the potato is, that until the appearance of the late disease, it was
and perhaps still is, cheaper than any other food equally wholesome. If
we compare its reproductive power with the amount of nutriment contained
in it, we find that one acre of average land sown with potatoes will
support twice as many persons as the same quantity of land sown with
wheat.[83] The consequence is, that in a country where men live on
potatoes, the population will, if other things are tolerably equal,
increase twice as fast as in a country where they live on wheat. And so
it has actually occurred. Until a very few years ago, when the face of
affairs was entirely altered by pestilence and emigration, the
population of Ireland was, in round numbers, increasing annually three
per cent.; the population of England during the same period increasing
one and a half per cent.[84] The result was, that in these two countries
the distribution of wealth was altogether different. Even in England the
growth of population is somewhat too rapid; and the labour-market being
overstocked, the working classes are not sufficiently paid for their
labour.[85] But their condition is one of sumptuous splendour, compared
to that in which only a few years ago the Irish were forced to live. The
misery in which they were plunged has no doubt always been aggravated by
the ignorance of their rulers, and by that scandalous misgovernment
which, until very recently, formed one of the darkest blots on the
glory of England. The most active cause, however, was, that their wages
were so low as to debar them, not only from the comforts, but from the
common decencies of civilized life; and this evil condition was the
natural result of that cheap and abundant food, which encouraged the
people to so rapid an increase, that the labour-market was constantly
gorged.[86] So far was this carried, that an intelligent observer who
travelled through Ireland twenty years ago, mentioned that at that time
the average wages were fourpence a day, and that even this wretched
pittance could not always be relied upon for regular employment.[87]
[82] Meyen (_Geography of Plants_, 1846, p. 313) says that the potato
was introduced into Ireland in 1586; but according to
Mr. M'Culloch (_Dictionary of Commerce_, 1849, p. 1048), 'potatoes,
it is commonly thought, were not introduced into Ireland till 1610,
when a small quantity was sent by Sir Walter Raleigh to be planted
in a garden on his estate in the vicinity of Youghall.' Compare
_Loudon's Encyclop. of Agriculture_, p. 845: 'first planted by Sir
Walter Raleigh on his estate of Youghall, near Cork.'
[83] Adam Smith (_Wealth of Nations_, book i. chap. xi. p. 67) supposes
that it will support three times as many; but the statistics of
this great writer are the weakest part of his work, and the more
careful calculations made since he wrote bear out the statement in
the text. 'It admits of demonstration that an acre of potatoes will
feed double the number of people that can be fed from an acre of
wheat.' _Loudon's Encyclop. of Agriculture_, 5th edit. 1844,
p. 845. So, too, in _M'Culloch's Dict._ p. 1048, 'an acre of
potatoes will feed double the number of individuals that can be
fed from an acre of wheat.' The daily average consumption of an
able-bodied labourer in Ireland is estimated at nine and a half
pounds of potatoes for men, and seven and a half for women. See
_Phillips on Scrofula_, 1846, p. 177.
[84] _Malthus_, _Essay on Population_, vol. i. pp. 424, 425, 431, 435,
441, 442; _M'Culloch's Political Economy_, pp. 381, 382.
[85] The lowest agricultural wages in our time have been in England
about 1_s._ a day; while from the evidence collected by
Mr. Thornton in 1845, the highest wages then paid were in
Lincolnshire, and were rather more than 13_s._ a week; those in
Yorkshire and Northumberland being nearly as high. _Thornton on
Over-Population_, pp. 12-15, 24, 25. Godwin, writing in 1820,
estimates the average at 1_s._ 6_d._ a day. _Godwin on Population_,
p. 574. Mr. Phillips, in his work _On Scrofula_, 1846, p. 345,
says, 'at present the ratio of wages is from 9_s._ to 10_s._'
[86] The most miserable part, namely Connaught, in 1733, contained
242,160 inhabitants; and in 1821, 1,110,229. See _Sadler's Law of
Population_, vol. ii. p. 490.
[87] Mr. Inglis, who in 1834 travelled through Ireland with a particular
view to its economical state, says, as the result of very careful
inquiries, 'I am quite confident, that if the whole yearly earnings
of the labourers of Ireland were divided by the whole number of
labourers, the result would be under this sum--_Fourpence_ a day
for the labourers of Ireland.' _Inglis_, _Journey throughout
Ireland in 1834_, Lond. 1835, 2nd edit. vol. ii. p. 300. At
Balinasloe, in the county of Galway, 'A gentleman with whom I was
accidentally in company offered to procure, on an hour's warning,
a couple of hundred labourers at fourpence even for temporary
employment.' _Inglis_, vol. ii. p. 17. The same writer says
(vol. i. p. 263), that at Tralee 'it often happens that the
labourers, after working in the canal from five in the morning
until eleven in the forenoon, are discharged for the day with the
pittance of twopence.' Compare, in _Cloncurry's Recollections_,
Dublin, 1849, p. 310, a letter from Dr. Doyle written in 1829,
describing Ireland as 'a country where the market is always
overstocked with labour, and in which a man's labour is not worth,
at an average, more than threepence a day.'
Such have been the consequences of cheap food in a country which, on the
whole, possesses greater natural resources than any other in Europe.[88]
And if we investigate on a larger scale the social and economical
condition of nations, we shall see the same principle everywhere at
work. We shall see that, other things remaining equal, the food of a
people determines the increase of their numbers, and the increase of
their numbers determines the rate of their wages. We shall moreover
find, that when the wages are invariably low,[89] the distribution of
wealth being thus very unequal, the distribution of political power and
social influence will also be very unequal; in other words, it will
appear that the normal and average relation between the upper and lower
classes will, in its origin, depend upon those peculiarities of nature,
the operations of which I have endeavoured to indicate.[90] After
putting all these things together, we shall, I trust, be able to
discern, with a clearness hitherto unknown, the intimate connexion
between the physical and moral world; the laws by which that connexion
is governed; and the reasons why so many ancient civilizations reached a
certain stage of development, and then fell away, unable to resist the
pressure of nature, or make head against those external obstacles by
which their progress was effectually retarded.
[88] It is singular that so acute a thinker as Mr. Kay should, in his
otherwise just remarks on the Irish, entirely overlook the effect
produced on their wages by the increase of population. _Kay's
Social Condition of the People_, vol. i. pp. 8, 9, 92, 223,
306-324. This is the more observable, because the disadvantages of
cheap food have been noticed not only by several common writers,
but by the highest of all authorities on population, Mr. Malthus:
see the sixth edition of his _Essay on Population_, vol. i. p. 469,
vol. ii. pp. 123, 124, 383, 384. If these things were oftener
considered, we should not hear so much about the idleness and
levity of the Celtic race; the simple fact being, that the Irish
are unwilling to work, not because they are Celts, but because
their work is badly paid. When they go abroad, they get good wages,
and therefore they become as industrious as any other people.
Compare _Journal of Statistical Society_, vol. vii. p. 24, with
_Thornton on Over-Population_, p. 425; a very valuable work. Even
in 1799, it was observed that the Irish as soon as they left their
own country became industrious and energetic. See _Parliamentary
History_, vol. xxxiv. p. 222. So, too, in North America, 'they are
most willing to work hard.' _Lyell's Second Visit to the United
States_, 1849, vol. i. p. 187.
[89] By low wages, I mean low reward of labour, which is of course
independent both of the cost of labour and of the money-rate of
wages.
[90] In a recent work of considerable ingenuity (_Doubleday's True Law
of Population_, 1847, pp. 25-29, 69, 78, 123, 124, &c.) it is
noticed that countries are more populous when the ordinary food is
vegetable than when it is animal; and an attempt is made to explain
this on the ground that a poor diet is more favourable to fecundity
than a rich one. But though the fact of the greater increase of
population is indisputable, there are several reasons for being
dissatisfied with Mr. Doubleday's explanation.
1st. That the power of propagation is heightened by poor living, is
a proposition which has never been established physiologically;
while the observations of travellers and of governments are not
sufficiently numerous to establish it statistically.
2nd. Vegetable diet is as generous for a hot country as animal diet
is for a cold country; and since we know that, notwithstanding the
difference of food and climate, the temperature of the body varies
little between the equator and the poles (compare _Liebig's Animal
Chemistry_, p. 19; _Holland's Medical Notes_, p. 473; _Pouillet_,
_Elémens de Physique_, vol. i. part i. p. 414; _Burdach's Traité de
Physiologie_, vol. ix. p. 663), we have no reason to believe that
there is any other normal variation, but should rather suppose
that, in regard to all essential functions, vegetable diet and
external heat are equivalent to animal diet and external cold.
3rd. Even conceding, for the sake of argument, that vegetable
food increases the procreative power, this would only affect the
number of births, and not the density of population; for a
greater number of births may be, and often are, remedied by a
greater mortality; a point in regard to which Godwin, in trying
to refute Malthus, falls into serious error. _Godwin on
Population_, p. 317.
Since writing the above, I have found that these views of Mr.
Doubleday's were in a great measure anticipated by Fourier. See
_Rey_, _Science Sociale_; vol. i. p. 185.
If, in the first place, we turn to Asia, we shall see an admirable
illustration of what may be called the collision between internal and
external phenomena. Owing to circumstances already stated, Asiatic
civilization has always been confined to that rich tract where alone
wealth could be easily obtained. This immense zone comprises some of the
most fertile parts of the globe; and of all its provinces, Hindostan is
certainly the one which for the longest period has possessed the
greatest civilization.[91] And as the materials for forming an opinion
respecting India are more ample than those respecting any other part of
Asia,[92] I purpose to select it as an example, and use it to illustrate
those laws which, though generalized from political economy, chemistry,
and physiology, may be verified by that more extensive survey, the means
of which history alone can supply.
[91] I use the word 'Hindostan' in the popular sense, as extending south
to Cape Comorin; though, properly speaking, it only includes the
country north of the Nerbudda. Compare _Mill's History of India_,
vol. ii. p. 178; _Bohlen_, _das alte Indien_, vol. i. p. 11;
_Meiners über die Länder in Asien_, vol. i. p. 224. The word
itself is not found in the old Sanscrit, and is of Persian origin.
_Halhed's Preface to the Gentoo Laws_, pp. xx. xxi.; _Asiatic
Researches_, vol. iii. pp. 368, 369.
[92] So that, in addition to works published on their philosophy,
religion, and jurisprudence, a learned geographer stated several
years ago, that 'kein anderes Asiatisches Reich ist in den letzten
drey Jahrhunderten von so vielen und so einsichtsvollen Europäern
durchreist und beschrieben worden, als Hindostan.' _Meiners_,
_Länder in Asien_, vol. i. p. 225. Since the time of Meiners, such
evidence has become still more precise and extensive; and is, I
think, too much neglected by M. Rhode in his valuable work on
India: 'Dem Zwecke dieser Arbeit gemäss, betrachten wir hier nur
Werke der Hindus selbst, oder Auszüge aus denselben als Quellen.'
_Rhode_, _Religiöse Bildung der Hindus_, vol. i. p. 43.
In India, the great heat of the climate brings into play that law
already pointed out, by virtue of which the ordinary food is of an
oxygenous rather than of a carbonaceous character. This, according to
another law, obliges the people to derive their usual diet not from the
animal, but from the vegetable world, of which starch is the most
important constituent. At the same time the high temperature,
incapacitating men for arduous labour, makes necessary a food of which
the returns will be abundant, and which will contain much nutriment in a
comparatively small space. Here, then, we have some characteristics,
which, if the preceding views are correct, ought to be found in the
ordinary food of the Indian nations. So they all are. From the earliest
period the most general food in India has been rice,[93] which is the
most nutritive of all the cerealia;[94] which contains an enormous
proportion of starch;[95] and which yields to the labourer an average
return of at least sixty fold.[96]
[93] This is evident from the frequent and familiar mention of it in
that remarkable relic of antiquity, the Institutes of Menu. See
the _Institutes_, in _Works of Sir W. Jones_, vol. iii. pp. 87,
132, 156, 200, 215, 366, 400, 403, 434. Thus too, in the
enumeration of Foods in _Vishnu Purana_, pp. 46, 47, rice is the
first mentioned. See further evidence in _Bohlen_, _das alte
Indien_, vol. i. p. 22, vol. ii. pp. 159, 160; _Wilson's Theatre
of the Hindus_, vol. i. part ii. pp. 15, 16, 37, 92, 95, vol. ii.
part ii. p. 35, part iii. p. 64; _Notes on the Ma-habharata_, in
_Journal of Asiatic Society_, vol. vii. p. 141; _Travels of Ibn
Batuta in Fourteenth Century_, p. 164; _Colebrooke's Digest of
Hindu Law_, vol. i. p. 499, vol. ii. pp. 44, 48, 436, 569, vol.
iii. pp. 11, 148, 205, 206, 207, 266, 364, 530; _Asiatic
Researches_, vol. vii. pp. 299, 302; _Ward on the Hindoos_, vol.
i. p. 209, vol. iii. p. 105.
[94] 'It contains a greater proportion of nutritious matter than any of
the cerealia.' _Somerville's Physical Geography_, vol. ii. p. 220.
[95] It contains from 83.8 to 85.07 percent of starch. _Brande's
Chemistry_, vol. ii. p. 1624; _Thomson's Chemistry of Organic
Bodies_, p. 883.
[96] It is difficult to collect sufficient evidence to strike an
average; but in Egypt, according to Savary, rice 'produces eighty
bushels for one.' _Loudon's Encyclop. of Agriculture_, p. 173. In
Tennasserim, the yield is from 80 to 100. _Low's History of
Tennasserim_, in _Journal of Asiatic Society_, vol. iii. p. 29. In
South America, 250 fold, according to Spix and Martius (_Travels
in Brazil_, vol. ii. p. 79); or from 200 to 300, according to
Southey (_History of Brazil_, vol. iii. pp. 658, 806). The lowest
estimate given by M. Meyen is forty fold; the highest, which is
marsh rice in the Philippine Islands, 400 fold. _Meyen's Geography
of Plants_, 1846, p. 301.
Thus possible is it, by the application of a few physical laws, to
anticipate what the national food of a country will be, and therefore to
anticipate a long train of ulterior consequences. What in this case is
no less remarkable, is that though in the south of the peninsula, rice
is not so much used as formerly, it has been replaced, not by animal
food, but by another grain called ragi.[97] The original rice, however,
is so suited to the circumstances I have described, that it is still the
most general food of nearly all the hottest countries of Asia,[98] from
which at different times it has been transplanted to other parts of the
world.[99]
[97] _Elphinstone's History of India_, p. 7. Ragi is the Cynosurus
Corocanus of Linnæus; and, considering its importance, it has been
strangely neglected by botanical writers. The best account I have
seen of it is in _Buchanan's Journey through the Countries of
Mysore, Canara, and Malabar_, vol. i. pp. 100-104, 285, 286, 375,
376, 403, vol. ii. pp. 103, 104, vol. iii. pp. 239, 240, 296, 297.
In the large cities, millet is generally used; of which 'a
quantity sufficient for two meals may be purchased for about a
halfpenny.' _Gibson on Indian Agriculture_, in _Journal of Asiatic
Society_, vol. viii. p. 100.
[98] _Marsden's History of Sumatra_, pp. 56, 59; _Raffles' History of
Java_, vol. i. pp. 39, 106, 119, 129, 240; _Percival's Ceylon_,
pp. 337, 364; _Transac. of Society of Bombay_, vol. ii. p. 155;
_Transac. of Asiatic Society_, vol. i. p. 510; _Journal of Asiatic
Society_, vol. i. pp. 228, 247, vol. ii. pp. 44, 64, 251, 257,
262, 336, 344, vol. iii. pp. 8, 25, 300, 340, vol. iv. pp. 82, 83,
104, vol. v. pp. 241, 246; _Asiatic Researches_, vol. v. pp. 124,
229, vol. xii. p. 148, vol. xvi. pp. 171, 172; _Journal of
Geograph. Society_, vol. ii. p. 86, vol. iii. pp. 124, 295, 300,
vol. v. p. 263, vol. viii. pp. 341, 359, vol. xix. pp. 132, 137.
[99] Rice, so far as I have been able to trace it, has travelled
westward. Besides the historical evidence, there are philological
probabilities in favour of its being indigenous to Asia, and the
Sanscrit name for it has been very widely diffused. Compare
_Humboldt's Cosmos_, vol. ii. p. 472, with _Crawfurd's History of
the Indian Archipelago_, vol. i. p. 358. In the fourteenth
century, it was the common food on the Zanguebar Coast; and is now
universal in Madagascar. _Travels of Ibn Batuta in Fourteenth
Century_, p. 56; _Ellis's History of Madagascar_, vol. i. pp. 39,
297-304, vol. ii. p. 292; _Journal of Geograph. Society_, vol. iii.
p. 212. From Madagascar its seeds were, according to _M'Culloch's
Dictionary of Commerce_, p. 1105, carried to Carolina late in the
seventeenth century. It is now cultivated in Nicaragua (_Squier's
Central America_, vol. i. p. 38) and in South America
(_Henderson's Hist. of Brazil_, pp. 292, 307, 395, 440, 488),
where it is said to grow wild. Compare _Meyen's Geography of
Plants_, pp. 291, 297, with _Azara_, _Voyages dans l'Amérique
Méridionale_, vol. i. p. 100, vol. ii. p. 80. The ancient Greeks,
though acquainted with rice, did not cultivate it; and its
cultivation was first introduced into Europe by the Arabs. See
_Humboldt_, _Nouvelle Espagne_, vol. ii. pp. 409, 410.
In consequence of these peculiarities of climate, and of food, there has
arisen in India that unequal distribution of wealth which we must expect
to find in countries where the labour-market is always redundant.[100]
If we examine the earliest Indian records which have been
preserved--records between two and three thousand years old--we find
evidence of a state of things similar to that which now exists, and
which, we may rely upon it, always has existed ever since the
accumulation of capital once fairly began. We find the upper classes
enormously rich, and the lower classes miserably poor. We find those by
whose labour the wealth is created, receiving the smallest possible
share of it; the remainder being absorbed by the higher ranks in the
form either of rent or of profit. And as wealth is, after intellect, the
most permanent source of power, it has naturally happened that a great
inequality of wealth has been accompanied by a corresponding inequality
of social and political power. It is not, therefore, surprising that
from the earliest period to which our knowledge of India extends, an
immense majority of the people, pinched by the most galling poverty, and
just living from hand to mouth, should always have remained in a state
of stupid debasement, broken by incessant misfortune, crouching before
their superiors in abject submission, and only fit either to be slaves
themselves or to be led to battle to make slaves of others.[101]
[100] So far as food is concerned, Diodorus Siculus notices the
remarkable fertility of India, and the consequent accumulation of
wealth. See two interesting passages in _Bibliothec. Hist._ lib.
ii. vol. ii. pp. 49, 50, 108, 109. But of the economical laws of
distribution he, like all the ancient writers, was perfectly
ignorant.
[101] An able and very learned apologist for this miserable people says,
'The servility so generally ascribed to the Hindu is never more
conspicuous than when he is examined as an evidence. But if it be
admitted that he acts as a slave, why blame him for not
possessing the virtues of a free man? _The oppression of ages has
taught him implicit submission._' _Vans Kennedy_, in
_Transactions of the Society of Bombay_, vol. iii. p. 144.
Compare the observations of Charles Hamilton in _Asiatic
Researches_, vol. i. p. 305.
To ascertain the precise value of the average rate of wages in India for
any long period, is impossible; because, although the amount might be
expressed in money, still the value of money, that is, its purchasing
power, is subject to incalculable fluctuations, arising from changes in
the cost of production.[102] But, for our present purpose, there is a
method of investigation which will lead to results far more accurate
than any statement could be that depended merely on a collection of
evidence respecting the wages themselves. The method is simply this:
that inasmuch as the wealth of a country can only be divided into wages,
rent, profits, and interest, and inasmuch as interest is on an average
an exact measure of profits,[103] it follows that if among any people
rent and interest are both high, wages must be low.[104] If, therefore,
we can ascertain the current interest of money, and the proportion of
the produce of the soil which is absorbed by rent, we shall get a
perfectly accurate idea of the wages; because wages are the residue,
that is, they are what is left to the labourers after rent, profits, and
interest have been paid.
[102] The impossibility of having a standard of value, is clearly
pointed out in _Turgot's Réflexions sur la Formation et la
Distribution des Richesses_, in _[OE]uvres_, vol. v. pp. 51, 52.
Compare _Ricardo's Works_, pp. 11, 28-30, 46, 166, 253, 270, 401,
with _M'Culloch's Principles of Political Economy_, pp. 298, 299,
307.
[103] _Smith's Wealth of Nations_, book i. chap. ix. p. 37; where,
however, the proposition is stated rather too absolutely, since
the risks arising from an insecure state of society must be taken
into consideration. But that there is an average ratio between
interest and profits is obvious, and is distinctly laid down by
the Sanscrit jurists. See _Colebrooke's Digest of Hindu Law_,
vol. i. pp. 72, 81.
[104] Ricardo (_Principles of Political Economy_, chap. vi. in _Works_,
p. 65) says, 'whatever increases wages, necessarily reduces
profits.' And in chap. xv. p. 122, 'whatever raises the wages of
labour, lowers the profits of stock.' In several other places he
makes the same assertion, very much to the discomfort of the
ordinary reader, who knows that in the United States, for
instance, wages and profits are both high. But the ambiguity is
in the language, not in the thought; and in these and similar
passages Ricardo by wages meant cost of labour, in which sense
the proposition is quite accurate. If by wages we mean the reward
of labour, then there is no relation between wages and profits;
for when rent is low, both of them may be high, as is the case in
the United States. That this was the view of Ricardo is evident
from the following passage: 'Profits, it cannot be too often
repeated, depend on wages; not on nominal but real wages; not on
the number of pounds that may be annually paid to the labourer,
but on the number of days' work necessary to obtain those
pounds.' _Political Economy_, chap. vii., _Ricardo's Works_, p.
82. Compare _Mill's Principles of Political Economy_, vol. i. p.
509, vol. ii. p. 225.
Now it is remarkable, that in India both interest and rent have always
been very high. In the _Institutes of Menu_, which were drawn up about
B.C. 900,[105] the lowest legal interest for money is fixed at fifteen
per cent., the highest at sixty per cent.[106] Nor is this to be
considered as a mere ancient law now fallen into disuse. So far from
that, the _Institutes of Menu_ are still the basis of Indian
jurisprudence;[107] and we know on very good authority, that in 1810 the
interest paid for the use of money varied from thirty-six to sixty per
cent.[108]
[105] I take the estimate of Mr. Elphinstone (_History of India_, pp.
225-228) as midway between Sir William Jones (_Works_, vol. iii.
p. 56) and Mr. Wilson (_Rig Veda Sanhita_, vol. i. p. xlvii.).
[106] _Institutes of Menu_, chap. viii. sec. 140-142, in _Works of Sir
W. Jones_, vol. iii. p. 295. The subsequent Sanscrit commentators
recognize nearly the same rate of interest, the minimum being
fifteen per cent. See _Colebrooke's Digest of Hindu Law_, vol. i.
pp. 29, 36, 43, 98, 99, 237, vol. ii. p. 70.
[107] In _Colebrooke's Digest_, vol. i. p. 454, and vol. iii. p. 229,
Menu is called 'the highest authority of memorial law,' and 'the
founder of memorial law.' The most recent historian of India, Mr.
Elphinstone, says (_Hist. of India_, p. 83) 'the code of Menu is
still the basis of the Hindu jurisprudence; and the principal
features remain unaltered to the present day.' This remarkable
code is also the basis of the laws of the Burmese, and even of
those of the Laos. _Journal of the Asiatic Society_, vol. ii. p.
271, vol. iii. pp. 28, 296, 332, vol. v. p. 252.
[108] See, in _Mill's History of India_, vol. i. p. 317, the report of a
committee of the House of Commons in 1810, in which it is stated
that the ryots paid 'the heavy interest of three, four, and five
per cent. per month.' Ward, writing about the same time, mentions
as much as seventy-five per cent. being given, and this
apparently without the lender incurring any extraordinary risk.
_Ward on the Hindoos_, vol. ii. p. 190.
Thus much as to one of the elements of our present calculation. As to
the other element, namely, the rent, we have information equally precise
and trustworthy. In England and Scotland, the rent paid by the
cultivator for the use of land is estimated in round numbers, taking one
farm with another, at a fourth of the gross produce.[109] In France, the
average proportion is about a third;[110] while in the United States of
North America it is well known to be much less, and, indeed, in some
parts, to be merely nominal.[111] But in India the legal rent, that is,
the lowest rate recognized by the law and usage of the country, is
one-half of the produce; and even this cruel regulation is not strictly
enforced, since in many cases rents are raised so high, that the
cultivator not only receives less than half the produce, but receives so
little as to have scarcely the means of providing seed to sow the ground
for the next harvest.[112]
[109] Compare the table in _Loudon's Encyclopædia of Agriculture_, p.
778, with _Mavor's note in Tusser's Five Hundred Points of
Husbandry_, p. 195, Lond. 1812, and _M'Culloch's Statistical
Account of the British Empire_, 1847, vol. i. p. 560.
[110] This is the estimate I have received from persons well acquainted
with French agriculture. The rent, of course, varies in each
separate instance, according to the natural powers of the soil,
according to the extent to which those powers have been improved,
and according to the facilities for bringing the produce to
market. But, notwithstanding these variations, there must be in
every country an average rent, depending upon the operation of
general causes.
[111] Owing to the immense supply of land preventing the necessity of
cultivating those inferior soils which older countries are glad
to use, and are therefore willing to pay a rent for the right of
using. In the United States, profits and wages (i.e. the reward
of the labourer, not the cost of labour) are both high, which
would be impossible if rent were also high.
[112] See _Rammohun Roy on the Judicial and Revenue Systems of India_,
1832, pp. 59-61, 63, 69, 92, 94. At p. 69, this high authority
says of the agricultural peasantry of Bengal: 'In an abundant
season, when the price of corn is low, the sale of their whole
crops is required to meet the demands of the landholder, leaving
little or nothing for seed or subsistence to the labourer or his
family.' In Cashmere, the sovereign received half the produce of
the rice-crop, leaving the other half to the cultivator.
_Moorcroft's Notices of Cashmere_, in _Journal of Geog. Society_,
vol. ii. p. 266.
The conclusion to be drawn from these facts is manifest. Rent and
interest being always very high, and interest varying, as it must do,
according to the rate of profits, it is evident that wages must have
been very low; for since there was in India a specific amount of wealth
to be divided into rent, interest, profits, and wages, it is clear that
the first three could only have been increased at the expense of the
fourth; which is saying, in other words, that the reward of the
labourers was very small in proportion to the reward received by the
upper classes. And though this, being an inevitable inference, does not
require extraneous support, it may be mentioned that in modern times,
for which alone we have direct evidence, wages have in India always been
excessively low, and the people have been, and still are, obliged to
work for a sum barely sufficient to meet the exigencies of life.[113]