144 PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS—SECTION F. 
employment to the rising generation) with the least expenditure of 
individual effort. 
Tf Mr. Henry M. Hoyt, who has so ably defended the American 
policy of Protection, had premised that he was referring solely to 
countries rich in all natural sources—far surpassing the demands of 
all possible local requirements-—we might agree with his ideal as 
regards the policy to be pursued, viz:—-“‘The nearer we come 
to organising and conducting our competing industries, as if we 
were the only nation on the planet, the more we shall make, and 
the more we shall divide among the makers. Let us, at least, 
enter upon all the industries authorised by the nature of our 
things. Thus we shall reach the greatest annual product of the 
industry of the society.” 
When, however, any country’s population fails or is unable to 
cultivate 2°81 acres per head within her own borders, the policy 
suggested by Mr. Hoyt must of necessity be abandoned in 
favour of Free Trade. This necessity—involving the population 
difficulty—is, however, an evil, and not an advantage to the 
masses. 
NatruraL Limits to THE NuMBERS ENGAGED IN VARIOUS 
OccuUPATIONS. 
Most writers on social problems tacitly assume that no other 
considerations than those of Supply and Demand, or Competition 
and Remuneration, need be taken into account when questions 
relating to the numbers that may be employed in the various 
branches of human industry are concerned. Indeed, so able an 
exponent of the principles of Political Economy as Mr. Henry 
Sidgwick assumes with confidence that the adjustment of the 
apportionment of the employed in the various divisions of industry 
is sufficiently determined by “rates of remuneration.” He states 
(p. 182, Principles of Political Economy)—“ We assume that 
labour and capital are modile, or capable of being attracted by a 
higher rate of remuneration both from district to district and 
from industry to industry, so that not merely are the wages paid 
for the same quality in any one industry approximately the same, 
but also, when the remuneration of labourers or capitalists in any 
industry is known to be higher than that of labourer or capitalist 
in some other industry entailing no more sacrifice or outlay and 
requiring no scarcer qualifications, the difference tends to be 
gradually reduced by the attractions which this higher remunera- 
tion exercises on actual or prospective labourers or employers.” 
There is not the faintest recognition here of natural limits to 
or absolute necessity for employment in a given direction, irre- 
spective of the aggregate intensity of energies expended or market 
rates and prices. Neither does he recognise the universal truth 
in matters animate and inanimate that mobility or movement in 
