We have here supposed, for the sake of perspicuity, that the value of money was invariable, but whether it is rising or falling has no effect on these conclusions. Like every other commodity, the exchangeable value of money varies as the labour of producing it is increased or diminished.
It does not follow, from the very important principles which Mr Ricardo has with so much talent and ingenuity endeavoured to establish, that wages may be increased in one country, though they should remain stationary in others, without any mischievous consequences being experienced. If the wages of labour in Great Britain, from the effects of taxation,—from the operation of the corn laws,—or from any other cause,—are higher than in any other country of Europe, the profits of stock must be proportionally lower. Hence, there is an inducement to remit capital abroad to where it will yield a larger return; and although capitalists, as well as other men, have a natural repugnance to remove to foreign countries from the land of their fathers and their friends, yet, as Mr Ricardo has justly observed, "There are assuredly limits to the price, which, in the form of perpetual taxation, individuals will submit to pay for the privilege merely of living in their native country."
The vast number of English families which have emigrated to the continent since the peace, is a too convincing proof of the accuracy of this statement; and until the weight of our taxation is diminished, and the profits of stock rendered as high, and the expense of house-keeping as cheap, in this country as on the other side of the water, the tide of emigration will continue to roll on.
Besides adventitious causes, such as taxation, &c. which may raise the wages of labour and lower the rate of profit, Mr Ricardo lays it down as a general principle, that in every country the profits of stock must be diminished according as it becomes more difficult to raise food. If corn, or manufactured goods, always sold at the same price, profits would be high or low, in proportion as wages were low or high. But although corn rises in price because more labour is necessary to produce it, that cause will not raise the price of manufactured goods, in the production of which no additional quantity of labour is required. "If then," says Mr Ricardo, "wages continued the same, profits would remain the same; but if, as is absolutely certain, wages should rise with the rise of corn, then profits would necessarily fall."
Mr Ricardo had already developed this principle, though more concisely, in his "Essay on the Profits of Stock," and had successfully applied it to shew the folly of restricting the corn trade; for, by forcing us to have recourse to land of a very inferior quality for our supplies of food, the restrictive system necessarily lowers the profits of every kind of stock throughout the country, and increases the desire to transfer capital abroad.
Mr Ricardo has also given a satisfactory, and in many respects an original, view of the nature of rent, and of the effects of taxation. As our limits, however, will not permit us to enter on these topics, we earnestly recommend our readers to have recourse to the work itself, which contains much valuable and profound discussion, as well on these as on subjects to which it has not been possible for us even to allude.
Mr Ricardo's style is simple and unaffected; but there are some parts of his work in which, perhaps, he is a little obscure, and others in which there appears too much of controversy. Of all the writers on Political Economy, M. Say stands unrivalled for perspicuity,—for natural and luminous arrangement,—and for instructive and elegant illustration.
This work well entitles its author to rank among the friends of youth. It is really what it pretends to be, a repository of useful knowledge, containing a clear and interesting account of many of these productions which are useful to man in the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms.
That part of it which treats of animals has been executed on a plan
