Imagine, in a vast and fertile country, a population of a thousand inhabitants, destitute of all capital thus defined.  It will assuredly perish by the pangs of hunger.  Let us suppose a case hardly less cruel.  Let us suppose that ten of these savages are provided with instruments and provisions sufficient to work and to live themselves until harvest time, as well as to remunerate the services of eighty labourers.  The inevitable result will be the death of nine hundred human beings.  It is clear, then, that since 990 men, urged by want, will crowd upon the supports which would only maintain a hundred, the ten capitalists will be masters of the market.  They will obtain labour on the hardest conditions, for they will put it up to auction, or the highest bidder.  And observe this,—­if these capitalists entertain such pious sentiments as would induce them to impose personal privations on themselves, in order to diminish the sufferings of some of their brethren, this generosity, which attaches to morality, will be as noble in its principle as useful in its effects.  But if, duped by that false philosophy which persons wish so inconsiderately to mingle with economic laws, they take to remunerating labour largely, far from doing good, they will do harm.  They will give double wages, it may be.  But then, forty-five men will be better provided for, whilst forty-five others will come to augment the number of those who are sinking into the grave.  Upon this supposition, it is not the lowering of wages which is the mischief, it is the scarcity of capital.  Low wages are not the cause, but the effect of the evil.  I may add, that they are to a certain extent the remedy.  It acts in this way:  it distributes the burden of suffering as much as it can, and saves as many lives as a limited quantity of sustenance permits.

Suppose now, that instead of ten capitalists, there should be a hundred, two hundred, five hundred,—­is it not evident that the condition of the whole population, and, above all, that of the “proletaires,"[3] will be more and more improved?  Is it not evident that, apart from every consideration of generosity, they would obtain more work and better pay for it?—­that they themselves will be in a better condition, to form capitals, without being able to fix the limits to this ever-increasing facility of realising equality and well-being?  Would it not be madness in them to admit such doctrines, and to act in a way which would drain the source of wages, and paralyse the activity and stimulus of saving?  Let them learn this lesson, then; doubtless, capitals are good for those who possess them:  who denies it?  But they are also useful to those who have not yet been able to form them; and it is important to those who have them not, that others should have them.