第79章 Economic Heretics(3)

A manufacturer,he observes,only makes his own article.15The economists somehow imagine that he also supports himself.You see a prosperous 'shawl-making village.'You infer that its ruin would cause the destitution of so many families.It would only mean the loss of so many shawls.The food which supports the shawl-makers would still be produced,and would be only diverted to support makers of some other luxury.16There would be a temporary injury to individuals,but no permanent weakening of national resources.Hence we have his division of the population.The agriculturists,and those who make the 'second necessaries'(the cottages,ploughs,and so forth,required by the agriculturist),create the great wealth of the country.Besides these we have the 'disposable'population,which is employed in making luxuries for the landowners,and,finally,the 'redundant'or what he calls in his later book the 'excrescent'or 'superinduced'population,17which is really supported by foreign trade.Commerce,then,is merely 'the efflorescence of our agriculture.'18Were it annihilated this instant,we should still retain our whole disposable population.The effect of war is simply to find a different employment for this part of the nation.Napoleon,he says,is 'emptying our shops and filling our battalions.'19All the 'redundant'population might be supported by simply diminishing the number of our cart-horses.20Similarly,the destruction of the commerce of France 'created her armies.'

It only transferred men from trade to war,and 'millions of artisans'were 'transformed into soldiers.'21Pitt was really strengthening when he supposed himself to be ruining his enemy.'Excrescence'and 'efflorescence'are Chalmers's equivalent for the 'sterility'of the French economists.

The backbone of all industry is agriculture,and the manufacturers simply employed by the landowner for such purposes as he pleases.Whether he uses them to make his luxuries or to fight his battles,the real resources of the nation remain untouched,the Ricardians insist upon the vital importance of 'capital.'The one economic end of the statesmen,as the capitalist class naturally thinks,should be to give every facility for its accumulation,and consequently for allowing it to distribute itself in the most efficient way.Chalmers,on the contrary,argues that we may easily have too much capital.He was a firm believer in gluts.He admits that the extension of commerce was of great good at the end of the feudal period,but not as the 'efficient cause'of wealth,only as 'unlocking the capabilities of the soil.'22This change produced the illusion that commerce has a 'creative virtue,'whereas its absolute dependence upon agriculture is a truth of capital importance in political economy.More Malthusian than Malthus,Chalmers argues that the of capital is strictly parallel to the case of population.23They may be redundant as much as men,and the real causes of every economic calamity are the 'over-speculation of capitalists,'and the 'over-population of the community at large.'24In this question,however,Chalmers gets into difficulties,which show so hopeless a confusion between 'capital,'income,and money,but I need not attempt to unravel his meaning.25Anyhow,he is led to approve the French doctrine of the single tax.Ultimately,he thinks,all taxes fall upon rent.26Agriculture fills the great reservoir from which all the subsidiary channels are filed.Whether the stream be tapped at the source or further down makes no difference.Hence he infers that,as the landlords necessarily pay the taxes,they should pay them openly.

By an odd coincidence,he would tax rents like Mill,though upon opposite grounds,He holds that the interest of the landowners is not opposed to,but identical with,the interest of all classes.Politically,as well as economically,they should be supreme,they are,'naturally and properly,the lords of the ascendant,'and,as he oddly complains in the year of the Reform Bill,not,sufficiently represented in parliament,'27A 'splendid aristocracy'is,he thinks,a necessary part of the social edifice;28the law of primogeniture is necessary to support them;and the division of land will cause the decay of France,the aristocracy are wanted to keep up a high standard of civilisation and promote philosophy,science,and art.29The British aristocracy in the reign of George IV scarcely realised this ideal,and would hardly have perceived that to place all the taxes upon their shoulders would be to give them a blessing in disguise.According to Chalmers,however,an established church represents an essential part of the upper classes,and is required to promote a high standard of life among the poor.30In connection with this,he writes a really forcible chapter criticising the economical distinction of productive and unproductive labour,and shows at least that the direct creation of material wealth is not a sufficient criterion of the utility of a class.