the capital of the farmer and all its profits, they CHA P. regularly occafion the reproduction of the rent of the landlord. This rent may be confidered as the produce of those powers of nature, the use of which the landlord lends to the farmer. It is greater or smaller according to the fuppofed extent of those powers, or in other words, according to the supposed natural or improved fertility of the land. It is the work of nature which remains after deducting or compenfating every thing which can be regarded as the work of man. It is feldom lefs than a fourth, and frequently more than a third of the whole produce. No equal quantity of productive labour employed in manufactures can ever occafion fo great a reproduction. In them nature does nothing; man does all; and the reproduction must always be in proportion to the strength of the agents that occafion it. The capital employed in agriculture, therefore, not only puts into motion a greater quantity of productive labour than any equal capital employed in manufactures, but in proportion too to the quantity of productive labour which it employs, it adds a much greater value to the annual produce of the land and labour of the country, to the real wealth and revenue of its inhabitants. Of all the ways in which a capital can be employed, it is by far the most advantageous to the fociety. THE capitals employed in the agriculture and in the retail trade of any fociety, muft always refide within that fociety. Their employment is confined almoft to a precife fpot, to the farm, II. BOOK and to the fhop of the retailer. They muft generally too, though there are fome exceptions to this, belong to refident members of the fociety. THE capital of a wholesale merchant, on the contrary, feems to have no fixed or neceffary refidence any-where, but may wander about from place to place, according as it can either buy cheap or fell dear. THE capital of the manufacturer muft no doubt refide where the manufacture is carried on; but where this fhall be is not always neceffarily determined. It may frequently be at a great distance both from the place where the materials grow, and from that where the complete manufacture is confumed. Lyons is very diftant both from the places which afford the materials of its manufactures, and from those which confume them. The people of fashión in Sicily are clothed in filks made in other countries, from the materials which their own produces. Part of the wool of Spain is manufactured in Great Britain, and some part of that cloth is afterwards fent back to Spain. WHETHER the merchant whofe capital exports the furplus produce of any fociety be a native or a foreigner, is of very little importance. If he is a foreigner, the number of their productive labourers is neceffarily less than if he had been a native by one man only; and the value of their annual produce, by the profits of that one man. The failors or carriers whom he employs may still belong indifferently either to his country, or to their country, or to fome third country, in the fame V. fame manner as if he had been a native. The c H a p. capital of a foreigner gives a value to their furplus produce equally with that of a native, by exchanging it for fomething for which there is a demand at home. It as effectually replaces the capital of the perfon who produces that furplus, and as effectually enables him to continue his bufinefs; the service by which the capital of a wholefale merchant chiefly contributes to fupport the productive labour, and to augment the value of the annual produce of the fociety to which he belongs. It is of more confequence that the capital of the manufacturer fhould refide within the country. It neceffarily puts into motion a greater quantity of productive labour, and adds a greater value to the annual produce of the land and labour of the fociety. It may, however, be very ufeful to the country, though it should not refide within it. The capitals of the British manufacturers who work up the flax and hemp annually imported from the coafts of the Baltic, are furely very useful to the countries which produce them. Those materials are a part of the furplus produce of those countries which, unless it was annually exchanged for fomething which is in demand there, would be of no value, and would foon cease to be produced. The merchants who export it, replace the capitals of the people who produce it, and thereby encourage them to continue the production; and the British manufacturers replace the capitals of thofe merchants. BOOK II. A PARTICULAR country, in the fame manner as a particular perfon, may frequently not have capital fufficient both to improve and cultivate all its lands, to manufacture and prepare their whole rude produce for immediate use and consumption, and to transport the furplus part either of the rude or manufactured produce to those distant markets where it can be exchanged for fomething for which there is a demand at home. The inhabitants of many different parts of Great Britain have not capital fufficient to improve and cultivate all their lands. The wool of the southern counties of Scotland is, a great part of it, after a long land carriage through very bad roads, manufactured in Yorkshire, for want of a capital to manufacture it at home. There are many little manufacturing towns in Great Britain, of which the inhabitants have not capital fufficient to transport the produce of their own industry to thofe diftant markets where there is demand and confumption for it. If there are any merchants among them, they are properly only the agents of wealthier merchants who refide in fome of the greater commercial cities. WHEN the capital of any country is not fufficient for all thofe three purposes, in proportion as a greater fhare of it is employed in agriculture, the greater will be the quantity of productive labour which it puts into motion within the country; as will likewife be the value which its employment adds to the annual produce of the land and labour of the fociety. After agriculture, the capital employed in manufactures puts V. puts into motion the greatest quantity of pro- CHAP ductive labour, and adds the greatest value to the annual produce. That which is employed in the trade of exportation, has the least effect of any of the three. THE Country, indeed, which has not capital fufficient for all thofe three purposes, has not arrived at that degree of opulence for which it seems naturally destined. To attempt, however, prematurely and with an infufficient capital, to do all the three, is certainly not the shortest way for a fociety, no more than it would be for an individual, to acquire a fufficient one. The capital of all the individuals of a nation, has its limits in the fame manner as that of a fingle individual, and is capable of executing only certain purposes. The capital of all the individuals. of a nation is increased in the fame manner as that of a fingle individual, by their continually accumulating and adding to it whatever they fave out of their revenue. It is likely to increase the fafteft, therefore, when it is employed in the way that affords the greatest revenue to all the inhabitants of the country, as they will thus be enabled to make the greatest favings. But the revenue of all the inhabitants of the country is neceffarily in proportion to the value of the annual produce of their land and labour. IT has been the principal caufe of the rapid progrefs of our American colonies towards wealth and greatness, that almost their whole capitals have hitherto been employed in agriculture. They have no manufactures, thofe houfhold and coarfer |