greatly decline in value, for the reason that it is dependent, in great part, on the wants generated by vanity, or by the desire of outshining others. Beer, tobacco etc., would rise in the scale as goods, because the circle of those to whose wants they minister would have been very greatly extended. On the whole, advancement in civilization has uniformly the effect, of itself, to increase the quantity and number of goods, the wants and knowledge of men being thereby increased. We should reach the ideal here, if all men experienced only true or legitimate wants, but these completely; if they could see their way, clearly, to the satisfaction of them, and find the means of satisfying them with just the amount of effort most conducive to their physico-intellectual development.11 SECTION II. GOODS. ECONOMIC GOODS. By economy (Wirthschaft=husbandry or housekeeping), we mean the systematized activity of man, to satisfy his need (Bedarf requisite) of external goods. This treatise is concerned only with economic goods (ends or means of economy). The greater the advance of civilization or human cul = 11 Since observation shows, that, as time runs on, matter tends more and more to become goods, the blind forms of motion in nature to become useful labor and useful sustenance, impersonal and objectless existence to be transformed into personal property and personal culture, Schäffle inclines to the belief that the whole mechanism of unconsciously governing nature is destined ultimately to aid in the realization of moral good, which alone is really valuable. Das gesellschaftliche System der menschlichen Wirthschaft, III, Auff., 1873, I, 3. 1 Hermann, loc. cit., 1st ed., 1, calls internal goods whatever each of us finds in himself, the free gift of nature; also that which we develop in ourselves by our own free action; and external, whatever we create or obtain, through the external world, as a means of satisfying our wants. The internal goods of one man may be external goods to another, as, for instance, when the former conveys them directly to the latter to be enjoyed, by words, demeanor, etc., or indirectly, in combination with other external goods. The exclusion of all else, has, indeed, been called one-sidedness and ma ture, the less apt are men to pursue the satisfaction of their wants, isolated from their fellows, or, in other words, to carry on their economies or husbandries apart from one another. The more numerous the wants of men, and the more different in kind their faculties are, the more natural does exchange3 become. Since all goods derive their character as goods from the fact that they are destined to satisfy human wants, the very possibility of exchange must greatly increase the possibility of things to become goods. Think of the machinist, whose products are used only by the astronomer, while the latter is never in a way to manufacture them for himself. (Hufeland.) Commerce is the series of combinations, created by the interchange of services: "a living net of relations, which wants and services are ever weaving and unweaving." (Hermann.) As a rule, with an advance in civilization, there is an increase in the number of goods, which become economic goods, and in the number of economic goods which become commercial goods (objects or means promotive of commerce).* But this is to be considered a real advancement only to the extent that that which is obtained is superior to that which was possessed before, in consequence of the specialization of callings or the greater division of labor (§ 48 ff.). When a little street Arab exacts money from a stranger for pointing out the way, we rightly censure him; but no one would find terialism. But, as Senior says, no one blames the writer on tactics, because he confines his attention to military subjects; nor is the objection raised, that by so doing, he is encouraging eternal war. On the other hand, J. B. Storch (1815) devoted a special division of his work to the consideration of "internal goods" (health, knowledge, morality, security, leisure, etc.). See Rau's translation of his Manual, II, 337 ff. Compare Gioja, Nuovo Prospetto delle Scienze economiche, 1815 ff. VIII. 3 The inclination to exchange is, according to Adam Smith, one of the most important marks which distinguish man from the brute. (Wealth of Nations, I, ch. 2). But see Büsch, Geldumlanf (1780), I, § 29, on exchange among the lower animals. 4 Observed by Aristot. Polit. I, ch. 6. it improper if he should first fit himself to play the part of a guide, and then live by his calling.5 SECTION III. GOODS. THE THREE CLASSES OF GOODS. All economic goods are divided into three classes: A. Persons or personal services. It is entirely repugnant to the feeling of humanity to regard a man's person in its entirety as an instrument intended to satisfy the wants of another.1 5 The efforts of political economists to select from among the infinite number of goods, those which should constitute the subject of their investigations, have taken two directions in recent times. Bastiat here confines himself too exclusively to commerce. The political economist should concern himself only with wants and satisfactions, where the labor, which is the connecting link between them, is undertaken by some other person for a consideration. Thus the ordinary act of respiration lies outside the circle, that of the diver, which is paid for, does not. (Harmonies économiques, 1850, 68 ff.) But even Robinson Crusoe had his own system of economy. Are the products which the farmer consumes in his own home, the work he does himself, any the less matters of economic moment than the products he sells, or the labors of his servants? Schäffle is right when he says that ordinary respiration is no economic function, because it is an unconscious necessity of nature. But his definition is too broad, inasmuch as he places the essence of the economic character of goods or of an act, in the conscious adaptation of means to human ends. (Tübinger Progr. z. 27 Sept. 1862, 9, 24 seq.) To take a walk is no economic operation, although it may be the best means to a very important end, health. The same goods or the same act may have, frequently, according to the end proposed, an economic or non-economic character. The beauty of the human body, for instance, however systematically made use of for purposes of vanity, is not economic goods. But it is an economic speculation, base though it be, when a man relies on his handsome figure to secure a wealthy wife, or, for purposes of gain, allows her to pose as a model to artists or to take part in tableaux vivants. According to C. Menger, Grundsätze der Volkswirthschaftslehre (1871) I, 51 ff., there are no economic goods, but those the disposable supply of which is, at most, equal to the quantity that is required. But is not the largest navigable stream, even in the most thinly populated country, an economic good? 'Hegel, Rechtsphilosophie, § 67. Even the use of a corpse as manure, or for any mercantile purpose, is repugnant to our feelings, "because of the dig Yet this happens wherever slavery exists; in its coarsest form, in cannibalism. Among civilized nations, we can speak, under this head, only of individual services or capabilities of persons; or, indeed, of the aggregate of the services rendered by them during a time determined at pleasure, or a short time.? B. Things, both moveable and immovable.3 C. Relations to persons or things which may frequently be estimated just as accurately as material goods. (The res innity of personality." (Schäffle, National Ekonomie, 1860, 28.) In this respect, prostitution is a remnant of slavery. Schäffle is right, when he says that to repay personal services with material commodities which do not afford as much food, etc., as the former have cost in expenditure of vital energy, is a slow and frequently a very cruel kind of cannibalism. (Kapitalismus und Socialismus, 1870, 18). 2 Bornitz, De rerum Sufficientia in Republica procuranda, 1625, gives in this encyclopædia of political science, together with a dissertation on agriculture, commerce and manufactures, a complete survey of the ministeria. Several modern writers refuse to look upon personal services, or the ability to render such services, as elements of wealth: compare Kaufmann, Untersuchungen im Gebiete der politischen Ekonomie, 1830, II, Heft I. They demonstrate, however, no more than this, that that class of goods has something very peculiar. Thus Malthus, Principles of Political Economy (1820), chap. I, sect. I, objects that they cannot be inventoried or taxed; but can material goods be so completely? Can all the parts of the wealth of a nation be so inventoried and taxed? Rau, Lehrbuch der pol. Ekonomie (1826) I, § 46, remarks that the personal aptitude to perform services dies with the person, and that personal services cannot be stored up (?), etc. I appeal simply to the definition I have given above of economic goods, and which applies equally to services of every kind which can be performed for other people. Besides, those who oppose this view are unable to give a satisfactory explanation of all the phenomena of commerce. Of course, the qualification "recognized as useful" is of the utmost importance as a mark to determine what is goods. But a prima donna, or a world-renowned physician, cast naked by shipwreck on the shores of North America, is certainly, better off than a blind beggar, his fellow sufferer. Compare Storch, Handbuch II, 335 ff. and his Considérations sur la Nature du Revenu National. 3 Ad. Müller compares persons, so far as they render any kind of service, to things, and, so far as they are required to be preserved in their individuality, to persons. The children in the "status" of a country gentleman, for instance, are treated more as persons, and domestics, more like things; the land partakes of a species of personality, but not the implements of labor. (Nothwendigkeit einer theolog. Grundlage der Staatswissenschaft, 1819, 48.) corporales of the Roman law.) I need only mention what is called good-will, which freely, and to the advantage of customers themselves, but still with a limited amount of certainty, attaches to certain localities, and for which tavern-keepers, sometimes, as in theaters, dépôts and clubs, pay so enormous a rent. When a newspaper is sold, the purchaser frequently buys nothing but the existing relations between his colaborers, subscribers etc. No small part of the value of a good business firm consists in the confidence with which it inspires all who deal with it, thus sparing them a world of care and trouble. A general may be of incalculable value to an army which he has himself helped organize. In another, or in the service of a country not his own, he might be entirely valueless, incapable of accomplishing anything. With the progress of civilization, as man becomes more social, the number of valuable relations increases, while that of legalized monopolies is wont to decrease. (Schäffle.)" 4 The privilege of selling refreshments in the garden of the Palais Royal was formerly let for 38,000 francs a year. 5 See the cases cited by Hermann, Staatswirtsch. Untersuchungen, 6 ff. and by Bernouilli, Schweiz. Archiv. für Statistik und N. ŒŒkon. II, 55. Think of the firm of J. M. Farina! In Athens, good stands were leased at a very high rent, even where there was no investment of the lessee's. capital. (Demosthenes, pro. Phorm., 948; adv, Steph. I, 1111.) There is, again, the sale of inventions, while they are still "mere ideas." According to Schäffie, Theorie der ausschliessendnen Verhältnisse, 1867, II ff., the value in exchange of these relations depends on the extra income which is assured in fact, or in law, against diminution, by the exclusion of competition. He, therefore, recommends, instead of the word "relations," "custom," or "publicum." But these words, by no means, exhaust the meaning expressed by "relation." Thus, the good administration of public affairs, although it has no value in exchange, is one of the most valuable economic goods which a people can possess. The relation mentioned above of a general to an army may even have great value in exchange. Instance, the Italian condottieri in the fifteenth century! 'Relations which take from one man, as much as they afford to their possessor, are of value as components of a man's private fortune, but not of the wealth of the nation. To this class belong debts due from persons or |