The Relations of Labor and Capital. 53 



ject It renders a very important service. Yet the benefit it 

 confers may all be resolved into tbe greater facility it furnishes 

 for the transfer of values in the form of tools and machinery — 

 materials and the means of sustenance — into one or other of 

 which all capital must be brought in order to be made product- 

 ive. The proper and legitimate business of a bank is to fur- 

 nish just these facilities for the productive industry of the 

 community in which it is located. When the banks of New 

 York permit their fu.nds to be absorbed in the gambling specu- 

 lations of Wall street, they work mischief rather than benefit 

 to productive industry. The wealth represented by their capi- 

 tal stock is withdrawn from production. It forms no part of 

 cajntal in the true sense of the term. They are, for the time, 

 so far, turned into nothing better than faro-banks, mere reser. 

 voirs of wealth, to be played with and shifted fi'om hand to 

 hand at the turning of cards. Wealth so absorbed can by no 

 possibility come into union with labor. It is of the highest 

 consequence to the clear understanding of our subject that the 

 term cajntal be held strictly to its technical meaning, and that 

 it be conceived of as existing mainly in the instruments, the 

 materials, the wages, directly or indirectly provided for the 

 employment of labor. Apprehending thus the nature of capi- 

 tal, I must content myself with the bare statement of a few 

 fundamental propositions laid down and illustrated at length 

 by Mr. Mill. 



1. Industry is limited hy capital. Every increase of capital 

 may give additional employment to industry. Industry can- 

 not go beyond the limit of capital ; it may not, through lack of 

 laborers, come up to it. This recognizes the mutual depend- 

 ence of these two elements, labor and capital. It says, simply, 

 that the most stalwart or skilled laborer can do nothing until 

 he has tools and materials and something to live on while he 

 is working, i. e., capital. If he has acquired these by former 

 labor, then is he owner of the needed capital, and in a sense 



indciDendent ; if he has not these he must wait the will and 

 E. 



