180 THE POVERTY OF PHILOSOPHY
disappear, even while the improvements remain incor- porated in the land.
In the first place this actually; happens every time that rent, properly so-called, is extinguished by the competi- tion of new and more fertile soils; further, the improve- ments which have a value at a certain period, cease to have that value from the moment that they become uni- versal through the development of agricultural science.
The representative of land-capital is not the land- owner but the farmer. The revenue which land gives as capital is industrial interest and profit, and not rent. There are some lands which return this interest and profit, but which pay no rent.
To sum up, land in so far as it gives interest, is land- capital, and, as land-capital, it returns no rent, it does not constitute landed property. Rent results from the social relations in which exploitation is carried on. It cannot result from the nature, more or less fixed, more or less durable, of land. Rent proceeds from society and not from the soil.
According to M. Proudhon “the improvement in the use of land”—a result of “the improvement of industry,” is the cause of the constant rise of rent. This improve- ment, on the contrary, causes it to periodically fall,
In what, in general, does all improvement consist, whether it be in agriculture or in manufacture? It is to produce more with the same amount of labor, it is to produce as much, or even more, with less labor. Thanks to these improvements the farmer can dispense with the employment of a greater quantity of labor for a product proportionally less. He has no need then to have te- course to the inferior soils, and the portions of capital successively applied to the same land are equally produc- tive. Therefore these improvements, so far from caus+
