298 LAND AND LABOR. 



trade over and above him that is poorly paid, but also 

 pays double the profit. The business experience of 

 our country within the past twenty-five years amply 

 illustrates these principles. Perhaps they will be bet- 

 ter understood when the manufacturers, traders, and 

 capitalists of society can be made to understand the 

 selfevident truth uttered by Adam Smith, that the 

 great masses " servants, laborers, and workmen of 

 different kinds make up far the greater part of a great 

 political society " and that " no society can surely 

 be flourishing and happy of which the greater part 

 of the members are poor and miserable." 



During the last twenty-five years the workingman's 

 power of production has been increased at least four 

 fold. That being the case it necessarily follows that 

 his condition should be proportionately improved. 

 When the powers of an individual or of society are 

 so developed as to increase his or its means of sub- 

 sistence or comfort, it follows that no useful result is 

 reached if that individual or society does not receive 

 a corresponding benefit, either in the greater abun- 

 dance of subsistence and increase in comfort, or in 

 lessening the amount of toil or labor required in their 

 production, or in both. But during this period the 

 workingman's compensation has not increased either 

 in kind or in its representative his subsistence has 

 not become more abundant nor his comfort greater, 

 except for a short season, and now his condition is 

 worse than ever, as is evidenced by the universal dis- 

 tress and the hosts without any means of sustenance. 



Therefore, to the question, "What, shall the la- 

 borer be paid the same for working six hours as he 



