In principle, the work-stuff stored in the muscles of the new-born child
is comparable to that stored in the gun-barrel. The infant is launched
into altogether new surroundings; and these operate through the
mechanism of the nervous machinery, with the result that the potential
energy of some of the work-stuff in the muscles which bring about
inspiration is suddenly converted into actual energy; and this,
operating through the mechanism of the respiratory apparatus, gives rise
to an act of inspiration. As the bullet is propelled by the "going off"
of the powder, as it might be said that the ribs are raised and the
midriff depressed by the "going off" of certain portions of muscular
work-stuff. This work-stuff is part of a stock or capital of that
commodity stored up in the child s organism before birth, at the expense
of the mother; and the mother has made good her expenditure by drawing
upon the capital of food-stuffs which furnished her daily maintenance.
Under these circumstances, it does not appear to me to be open to doubt
that the primary act of outward labour in the series which necessarily
accompany the life of man is dependent upon the pre-existence of a stock
of material which is not only of use to him, but which is disposed in
such a manner as to be utilisable with facility. And I further imagine
that the propriety of the application of the term "capital" to this
stock of useful substance cannot be justly called in question; inasmuch
as it is easy to prove that the essential constituents of the work-stuff
accumulated in the child's muscles have merely been transferred from the
store of food-stuffs, which everybody admits to be capital, by means
of the maternal organism to that of the child, in which they are again
deposited to await use. Every subsequent act of labour, in like
manner, involves an equivalent consumption of the child's store of
work-stuff--its vital capital; and one of the main objects of the
process of breathing is to get rid of some of the effects of that
consumption. It follows, then, that, even if no other than the
respiratory work were going on in the organism, the capital of
work-stuff, which the child brought with it into the world, must sooner
or later be used up, and the movements of breathing must come to an end;
just as the see-saw of the piston of a steam-engine stops when the coal
in the fireplace has burnt away. Milk, however, is a stock of materials
which essentially consists of savings from the food-stuffs supplied
to the mother. And these savings are in such a physical and chemical
condition that the organism of the child can easily convert them into
work-stuff. That is to say, by borrowing directly from the vital
capital of the mother, indirectly from the store in the natural bodies
accessible to her; it can make good the loss of its own. The operation
of borrowing, however, involves further work; that is, the labour of
sucking, which is a mechanical operation of much the same nature as
breathing. The child thus pays for the capital it borrows m labour; but
as the value in work-stuff of the milk obtained is very far greater than
the value of that labour, estimated by the consumption of work-stuff
it involves, the operation yields a large profit to the infant. The
overplus of food-stuff suffices to increase the child's capital of
work-stuff; and to supply not only the materials for the enlargement of
the "buildings and machinery" which is expressed by the child's growth,
but also the energy required to put all these materials together, and
to carry them to their proper places. Thus, throughout the years of
infancy, and so long thereafter as the youth or man is not thrown upon
his own resources, he lives by consuming the vital capital provided by
others.