98 POLITICAL ECONOMY. 



employer must finally replace it to him out of the 

 profits of stock. 



Dr. Smith further admits that no tax can fall on 

 the profits of stock, as it must be replaced by the 

 consumers in the advanced price, or by the landholder 

 in diminished rent, or by the monied capitalist in 

 diminished rate of interest. 



But interest of money differs in no respect from 

 the immediate profits of stock, it being precisely of 

 the same nature, and, in the operations of national 

 wealth, governed by the same rules. All taxes, 

 therefore, whether imposed on the wages of labour, 

 or upon the profits of stock, are finally paid either 

 by the consumers in increased price, or by the land- 

 lord in a diminished rent. 



Now, the consumers compose the whole population 

 of the state, and they can only pay taxes, as they pay 

 all other parts of price, from their respective reve- 

 nues, which revenue must be derived from wages, 

 profit, or rent. But no taxes can fall on profit or 

 wages, therefore those that are levied are all ulti- 

 mately paid from rent. 



We are thus led to conclude from the admission 

 of Dr. Smith, that all taxes, however levied, are 

 finally incident on the net produce, and are ultimately 

 paid by the landlord, either by a diminution of his 

 rent, or in an increase in the wages and prices of 

 labour, which out of his actual rent he distributes 

 among the other classes of the community.* 



* A want of clearness pervades all this reasoning, and is indeed 

 a grand defect in modern works on political economy, the lan- 

 guage of which has degenerated to a mere jargon, quite unintel- 

 ligible to common readers, for no two writers attach precisely the 

 same meaning to such terms as value, price, rent, wages, capital, 

 interest, profits of stock, &c. &c. on which tiiey ring the changes 

 with words piled on words. It may be said that political econo- 

 mists are not hound to find their readers in brains and comprehen- 

 sion, but when a matter so vitally interesting to the great bulk 



