saying this. Actually, while these sheets are passing through the press,
the blunt, broad, unmitigated fallacy is enunciated, formally and
precisely, by the common councilmen of New York, in their report on the
present commercial crisis. Here is their collective opinion, published
in the _Times_ of November 23rd, 1857:--"Another erroneous idea is that
luxurious living, extravagant dressing, splendid turn-outs and fine
houses, are the cause of distress to a nation. No more erroneous
impression could exist. Every extravagance that the man of 100,000 or
1,000,000 dollars indulges in adds to the means, the support, the wealth
of ten or a hundred who had little or nothing else but their labour,
their intellect, or their taste. If a man of 1,000,000 dollars spends
principal and interest in ten years, and finds himself beggared at the
end of that time, he has actually made a hundred who have catered to his
extravagance, employers or employed, so much richer by the division of
his wealth. He may be ruined, but the nation is better off and richer,
for one hundred minds and hands, with 10,000 dollars apiece, are far
more productive than one with the whole."
Yes, gentlemen of the common council; but what has been doing in the
time of the transfer? The spending of the fortune has taken a certain
number of years (suppose ten), and during that time 1,000,000 dollars'
worth of work has been done by the people, who have been paid that sum
for it. Where is the product of that work? By your own statements,
wholly consumed; for the man for whom it has been done is now a beggar.
You have given therefore, as a nation, 1,000,000 dollars' worth of work,
and ten years of time, and you have produced, as ultimate result, one
beggar. Excellent economy, gentlemen! and sure to conduce, in due
sequence, to the production of _more_ than one beggar. Perhaps the
matter may be made clearer to you, however, by a more familiar instance.
If a schoolboy goes out in the morning with five shillings in his
pocket, and comes home penniless, having spent his all in tarts,
principal and interest are gone, and fruiterer and baker are enriched.
So far so good. But suppose the schoolboy, instead, has bought a book
and a knife; principal and interest are gone, and book-seller and cutler
are enriched. But the schoolboy is enriched also, and may help his
school-fellows next day with knife and book, instead of lying in bed and
incurring a debt to the doctor.]
139. The enervating influence of luxury, and its tendencies to increase
vice, are points which I keep entirely out of consideration in the
present essay; but, so far as they bear on any question discussed, they
merely furnish additional evidence on the side which I have taken. Thus,
in the present case, I assume that the luxuries of civilized life are in
possession harmless, and in acquirement serviceable as a motive for
exertion; and even on those favourable terms, we arrive at the
conclusion that the nation ought not to indulge in them except under
severe limitations. Much less ought it to indulge in them if the
temptation consequent on their possession, or fatality incident to their
manufacture, more than counter-balances the good done by the effort to
obtain them.
* * * * *
Note 6th, p. 74.--"_Economy of literature._"
140. I have been much impressed lately by one of the results of the
quantity of our books; namely, the stern impossibility of getting
anything understood, that required patience to understand. I observe
always, in the case of my own writings, that if ever I state anything
which has cost me any trouble to ascertain, and which, therefore, will
probably require a minute or two of reflection from the reader before it
can be accepted,--that statement will not only be misunderstood, but in
all probability taken to mean something very nearly the reverse of what
it does mean. Now, whatever faults there may be in my modes of
expression, I know that the words I use will always be found, by
Johnson's dictionary, to bear, first of all, the sense I use them in;
and that the sentences, whether awkwardly turned or not, will, by the
ordinary rules of grammar, bear no other interpretation than that I mean
them to bear; so that the misunderstanding of them must result,
ultimately, from the mere fact that their matter sometimes requires a
little patience. And I see the same kind of misinterpretation put on
the words of other writers, whenever they require the same kind of
thought.
141. I was at first a little despondent about this; but, on the whole, I
believe it will have a good effect upon our literature for some time to
come; and then, perhaps, the public may recover its patience again. For
certainly it is excellent discipline for an author to feel that he must
say all he has to say in the fewest possible words, or his reader is
sure to skip them; and in the plainest possible words, or his reader
will certainly misunderstand them. Generally, also, a downright fact may
be told in a plain way; and we want downright facts at present more than
anything else. And though I often hear moral people complaining of the
bad effects of want of thought, for my part, it seems to me that one of
the worst diseases to which the human creature is liable is its disease
of thinking. If it would only just _look_[19] at a thing instead of
thinking what it must be like, or _do_ a thing instead of thinking it
cannot be done, we should all get on far better.
[Note 19: There can be no question, however, of the mischievous
tendency of the hurry of the present day, in the way people undertake
this very _looking_. I gave three years' close and incessant labour to
the examination of the chronology of the architecture of Venice; two
long winters being wholly spent in the drawing of details on the spot;
and yet I see constantly that architects who pass three or four days in
a gondola going up and down the Grand Canal, think that their first
impressions are just as likely to be true as my patiently wrought
conclusions. Mr. Street, for instance, glances hastily at the façade of
the Ducal Palace--so hastily that he does not even see what its pattern
is, and misses the alternation of red and black in the centres of its
squares--and yet he instantly ventures on an opinion on the chronology
of its capitals, which is one of the most complicated and difficult
subjects in the whole range of Gothic archæology. It may, nevertheless,
be ascertained with very fair probability of correctness by any person
who will give a month's hard work to it, but it can be ascertained no
otherwise.]
* * * * *
Note 7th, p. 147.--"_Pilots of the State._"
142. While, however, undoubtedly, these responsibilities attach to every
person possessed of wealth, it is necessary both to avoid any stringency
of statement respecting the benevolent modes of spending money, and to
admit and approve so much liberty of spending it for selfish pleasures
as may distinctly make wealth a personal _reward_ for toil, and secure
in the minds of all men the right of property. For although, without
doubt, the purest pleasures it can procure are not selfish, it is only
as a means of personal gratification that it will be desired by a large
majority of workers; and it would be no less false ethics than false
policy to check their energy by any forms of public opinion which bore
hardly against the wanton expenditure of honestly got wealth. It would
be hard if a man who has passed the greater part of his life at the desk
or counter could not at last innocently gratify a caprice; and all the
best and most sacred ends of almsgiving would be at once disappointed,
if the idea of a moral claim took the place of affectionate gratitude in
the mind of the receiver.
143. Some distinction is made by us naturally in this respect between
earned and inherited wealth; that which is inherited appearing to
involve the most definite responsibilities, especially when consisting
in revenues derived from the soil. The form of taxation which
constitutes rental of lands places annually a certain portion of the
national wealth in the hands of the nobles, or other proprietors of the
soil, under conditions peculiarly calculated to induce them to give
their best care to its efficient administration. The want of
instruction in even the simplest principles of commerce and economy,
which hitherto has disgraced our schools and universities, has indeed
been the cause of ruin or total inutility of life to multitudes of our
men of estate; but this deficiency in our public education cannot exist
much longer, and it appears to be highly advantageous for the State that
a certain number of persons distinguished by race should be permitted to
set examples of wise expenditure, whether in the advancement of science,
or in patronage of art and literature; only they must see to it that
they take their right standing more firmly than they have done hitherto,
for the position of a rich man in relation to those around him is, in
our present real life, and is also contemplated generally by political
economists as being, precisely the reverse of what it ought to be. A
rich man ought to be continually examining how he may spend his money
for the advantage of others: at present, others are continually plotting
how they may beguile him into spending it apparently for his own. The
aspect which he presents to the eyes of the world is generally that of
a person holding a bag of money with a staunch grasp, and resolved to
part with none of it unless he is forced, and all the people about him
are plotting how they may force him: that is to say, how they may
persuade him that he wants this thing or that; or how they may produce
things that he will covet and buy. One man tries to persuade him that he
wants perfumes; another that he wants jewellery; another that he wants
sugarplums; another that he wants roses at Christmas. Anybody who can
invent a new want for him is supposed to be a benefactor to society: and
thus the energies of the poorer people about him are continually
directed to the production of covetable, instead of serviceable, things;
and the rich man has the general aspect of a fool, plotted against by
the world. Whereas the real aspect which he ought to have is that of a
person wiser than others, entrusted with the management of a larger
quantity of capital, which he administers for the profit of all,
directing each man to the labour which is most healthy for him, and most
serviceable for the community.
* * * * *
Note 8th, p. 148.--"_Silk and purple._"
144. In various places throughout these lectures I have had to allude to
the distinction between productive and unproductive labour, and between
true and false wealth. I shall here endeavour, as clearly as I can, to
explain the distinction I mean.
Property may be divided generally into two kinds; that which produces
life, and that which produces the objects of life. That which produces
or maintains life consists of food, in so far as it is nourishing; of
furniture and clothing, in so far as they are protective or cherishing;
of fuel; and of all land, instruments, or materials necessary to produce
food, houses, clothes, and fuel. It is specially and rightly called
useful property.
The property which produces the objects of life consists of all that
gives pleasure or suggests and preserves thought: of food, furniture,
and land, in so far as they are pleasing to the appetite or the eye; of
luxurious dress, and all other kinds of luxuries; of books, pictures,
and architecture. But the modes of connection of certain minor forms of
property with human labour render it desirable to arrange them under
more than these two heads. Property may therefore be conveniently
considered as of five kinds.
145. (1) Property necessary to life, but not producible by labour, and
therefore belonging of right, in a due measure, to every human being as
soon as he is born, and morally inalienable. As for instance, his proper
share of the atmosphere, without which he cannot breathe, and of water,
which he needs to quench his thirst. As much land as he needs to feed
from is also inalienable; but in well-regulated communities this
quantity of land may often be represented by other possessions, or its
need supplied by wages and privileges.
(2) Property necessary to life, but only producible by labour, and of
which the possession is morally connected with labour, so that no person
capable of doing the work necessary for its production has a right to it
until he has done that work;--"he that will not work, neither should he
eat." It consists of simple food, clothing, and habitation, with their
seeds and materials, or instruments and machinery, and animals used for
necessary draught or locomotion, etc. It is to be observed of this kind
of property, that its increase cannot usually be carried beyond a
certain point, because it depends not on labour only, but on things of
which the supply is limited by nature. The possible accumulation of corn
depends on the quantity of corn-growing land possessed or commercially
accessible; and that of steel, similarly on the accessible quantity of
coal and iron-stone. It follows from this natural limitation of supply
that the accumulation of property of this kind in large masses at one
point, or in one person's hands, commonly involves, more or less, the
scarcity of it at another point and in other persons' hands; so that the
accidents or energies which may enable one man to procure a great deal
of it, may, and in all likelihood will, partially prevent other men
procuring a sufficiency of it, however willing they may be to work for
it; therefore, the modes of its accumulation and distribution need to be
in some degree regulated by law and by national treaties, in order to
secure justice to all men.
Another point requiring notice respecting this sort of property is, that
no work can be wasted in producing it, provided only the kind of it
produced be preservable and distributable, since for every grain of such
commodities we produce we are rendering so much more life possible on
earth.[20] But though we are sure, thus, that we are employing people
well, we cannot be sure we might not have employed them _better_; for it
is possible to direct labour to the production of life, until little or
none is left for that of the objects of life, and thus to increase
population at the expense of civilization, learning, and morality: on
the other hand, it is just as possible--and the error is one to which
the world is, on the whole, more liable--to direct labour to the objects
of life till too little is left for life, and thus to increase luxury or
learning at the expense of population. Right political economy holds its
aim poised justly between the two extremes, desiring neither to crowd
its dominions with a race of savages, nor to found courts and colleges
in the midst of a desert.
[Note 20: This point has sometimes been disputed; for instance,
opening Mill's 'Political Economy' the other day, I chanced on a passage
in which he says that a man who makes a coat, if the person who wears
the coat does nothing useful while he wears it, has done no more good to
society than the man who has only raised a pineapple. But this is a
fallacy induced by endeavour after too much subtlety. None of us have a
right to say that the life of a man is of no use to _him_, though it may
be of no use to _us_; and the man who made the coat, and thereby
prolonged another man's life, has done a gracious and useful work,
whatever may come of the life so prolonged. We may say to the wearer of
the coat, "You who are wearing coats, and doing nothing in them, are at
present wasting your own life and other people's;" but we have no right
to say that his existence, however wasted, is wasted _away_. It may be
just dragging itself on, in its thin golden line, with nothing dependent
upon it, to the point where it is to strengthen into good chain cable,
and have thousands of other lives dependent on it. Meantime, the simple
fact respecting the coat-maker is, that he has given so much life to the
creature, the results of which he cannot calculate; they may be--in all
probability will be--infinite results in some way. But the raiser of
pines, who has only given a pleasant taste in the mouth to some one, may
see with tolerable clearness to the end of the taste in the mouth, and
of all conceivable results therefrom.]
146. (3) The third kind of property is that which conduces to bodily
pleasures and conveniences, without directly tending to sustain life;
perhaps sometimes indirectly tending to destroy it. All dainty (as
distinguished from nourishing) food, and means of producing it; all
scents not needed for health; substances valued only for their
appearance and rarity (as gold and jewels); flowers of difficult
culture; animals used for delight (as horses for racing), and such
like, form property of this class; to which the term 'luxury,' or
'luxuries,' ought exclusively to belong.
Respecting which we have to note, first, that all such property is of
doubtful advantage even to its possessor. Furniture tempting to
indolence, sweet odours, and luscious food, are more or less injurious
to health: while jewels, liveries, and other such common belongings of
wealthy people, certainly convey no pleasure to their owners
proportionate to their cost.
Farther, such property, for the most part, perishes in the using. Jewels
form a great exception--but rich food, fine dresses, horses and
carriages, are consumed by the owner's use. It ought much oftener to be
brought to the notice of rich men what sums of interest of money they
are paying towards the close of their lives, for luxuries consumed in
the middle of them. It would be very interesting, for instance, to know
the exact sum which the money spent in London for ices, at its desserts
and balls, during the last twenty years, had it been saved and put out
at compound interest, would at this moment have furnished for useful
purposes.
Also, in most cases, the enjoyment of such property is wholly selfish,
and limited to its possessor. Splendid dress and equipage, however, when
so arranged as to produce real beauty of effect, may often be rather a
generous than a selfish channel of expenditure. They will, however,
necessarily in such cases involve some of the arts of design; and
therefore take their place in a higher category than that of luxuries
merely.
147. (4) The fourth kind of property is that which bestows intellectual
or emotional pleasure, consisting of land set apart for purposes of
delight more than for agriculture, of books, works of art, and objects
of natural history.
It is, of course, impossible to fix an accurate limit between property
of the last class and of this class, since things which are a mere
luxury to one person are a means of intellectual occupation to another.
Flowers in a London ball-room are a luxury; in a botanical garden, a
delight of the intellect; and in their native fields, both; while the
most noble works of art are continually made material of vulgar luxury
or of criminal pride; but, when rightly used, property of this fourth
class is the only kind which deserves the name of _real_ property, it is
the only kind which a man can truly be said to 'possess.' What a man
eats, or drinks, or wears, so long as it is only what is needful for
life, can no more be thought of as his possession than the air he
breathes. The air is as needful to him as the food; but we do not talk
of a man's wealth of air, and what food or clothing a man possesses more
than he himself requires must be for others to use (and, to him,
therefore, not a real property in itself, but only a means of obtaining
some real property in exchange for it). Whereas the things that give
intellectual or emotional enjoyment may be accumulated, and do not
perish in using; but continually supply new pleasures and new powers of
giving pleasures to others. And these, therefore, are the only things
which can rightly be thought of as giving 'wealth' or 'well being.' Food
conduces only to 'being,' but these to '_well_ being.' And there is not
any broader general distinction between lower and higher orders of men
than rests on their possession of this real property. The human race
may be properly divided by zoologists into "men who have gardens,
libraries, or works of art; and those who have none;" and the former
class will include all noble persons, except only a few who make the
world their garden or museum; while the people who have not, or, which
is the same thing, do not care for gardens or libraries, but care for
nothing but money or luxuries, will include none but ignoble persons:
only it is necessary to understand that I mean by the term 'garden' as
much the Carthusian's plot of ground fifteen feet square between his
monastery buttresses, as I do the grounds of Chatsworth or Kew; and I
mean by the term 'art' as much the old sailor's print of the _Arethusa_
bearing up to engage the _Belle Poule_, as I do Raphael's "Disputa," and
even rather more; for when abundant, beautiful possessions of this kind
are almost always associated with vulgar luxury, and become then
anything but indicative of noble character in their possessors. The
ideal of human life is a union of Spartan simplicity of manners with
Athenian sensibility and imagination; but in actual results, we are
continually mistaking ignorance for simplicity, and sensuality for
refinement.
148. (5) The fifth kind of property is representative property,
consisting of documents or money, or rather documents only--for money
itself is only a transferable document, current among societies of men,
giving claim, at sight, to some definite benefit or advantage, most
commonly to a certain share of real property existing in those
societies. The money is only genuine when the property it gives claim to
is real, or the advantages it gives claim to certain; otherwise, it is
false money, and may be considered as much 'forged' when issued by a
government, or a bank, as when by an individual. Thus, if a dozen of
men, cast ashore on a desert island, pick up a number of stones, put a
red spot on each stone, and pass a law that every stone marked with a
red spot shall give claim to a peck of wheat;--so long as no wheat
exists, or can exist, on the island, the stones are not money. But the
moment as much wheat exists as shall render it possible for the society
always to give a peck for every spotted stone, the spotted stones would
become money, and might be exchanged by their possessors for whatever
other commodities they chose, to the value of the peck of wheat which
the stones represented. If more stones were issued than the quantity of
wheat could answer the demand of, the value of the stone coinage would
be depreciated, in proportion to its increase above the quantity needed
to answer it.