INTEREST AS THE DESIRED PRODUCT 321 



when these exertions were suspended, than they Book iv 

 are by the desire of wealth that shall come to them 

 indirectly, not as the product of their exceptional 

 exertions in the present, but as the product of the 

 accumulated product of their exceptional exertions 

 in the past the product of those stored -up forces 

 with which they have enriched the world, and which, 

 whilst rendering help to thousands of men besides, Hence the 

 will continue to render a tribute to their creators * ' 



and their creators' children. 



Thus, to express the matter in brief and familiar nl y of ^ 



he produces 



language, the sustained development and exercise directly, but of 



, , ... . . . .. what he pro- 



OI exceptional ability m wealth -production implies duces indirectly 



the possession by those who monopolise this ability, 



not merely of that portion of those products which 



are called the wages of superintendence, but also 



to that portion which is called interest on capital. 



For just as the control of capital affords the only 



means by which, under free institutions, the great 



man can apply his faculties so as to increase the 



production of wealth, so does the right to interest, 



or to the products of the capital accumulated by 



him, constitute the chief reward by the desire of 



which the exercise of his faculties is stimulated. 



There is a further point, however, which now 

 remains to be noticed. When it is said that the 

 great wealth - producer is motived mainly by the 

 desire to enjoy an amount of wealth proportionate 

 to what is produced by him, it is not asserted that 

 in order to gratify this desire it is necessary that 

 he should be able to appropriate the whole of what 



