CHARLES DARWIN. ;129 



economy." It is a certain " discovery," he says; and 

 that discovery is " the theory of rent." 



" It is now known that price is a compound of wages and profit, 

 and that rent is not an element of it, but a result of it. This dis- 

 covery is the corner-stone of political economy ; but it is established 

 by an argument so long and so refined, that most minds are unable 

 to pursue it without stumbling, and the majority of those who 

 acquiesce in it are influenced by the great writers to whom they pay 

 deference, and whose judgment they follow." 



It is a noble humility to defer to those greater than 

 ourselves ; but where it is a point of judgment that is 

 concerned, it is clearly the duty of the very humblest of 

 us to verify it to our own selves before we commit our- 

 selves to its tenor. It is to be feared that Mr. Buckle 

 in effect admits here that, in regard of rent, he spared 

 for the nonce his own great faculty and took on trust 

 the conclusions of those great writers to whom he paid 

 deference and whose judgment he followed. 



No matter the business here is rent. Now, when a 

 man pays for piecework, he only, so to speak, pays for 

 piecework for the work, that is, in itself alone, and 

 without relation to the various workmen who were 

 employed upon it, and who, in proportion of their 

 various abilities, produced it. Now, that is the theory 

 of rent the proportion of their abilities. With a full 

 population, the cultivation of the poorest land will pay. 

 That is, it will pay the cultivator, but nobody else. 

 But a land richer, or a land letter placed for the market, 

 w ill a t the same time that the cultivation of said 

 poor land yields a profit pay this much, and more. 

 The more is rent. For if the poor land will pay the 

 cultivator a profit, competition will easily supply any 

 number of cultivators who, for the same profit, will part 

 with the excess over it yielded by the more advantageous 

 land. This excess, then, is rent. So long as lands vary 



