ALTERNATIVES SEEN AS BASIC ECONOMIC FACTS 197 
despised and shunned. He may be locked up or otherwise segre- 
gated. Economic values arise early, but social values arise as 
early and possibly are antecedent. 
These first two alternatives constrain us to abide in society 
and to lead an economic life. Their relation to economic theory 
strictly defined, however, is relatively remote. Closer to it is a 
third alternative, namely: Think creatiwely or accept the 
economics of exploitation. 
For two thousand years after Plato and Aristotle had found 
slavery necessary to civilization slavery and the near slavery of 
serfdom persisted in Christendom. To this present hour strong 
nations continue to subjugate and to exploit weaker ones, 
Economically powerful groups (financial, commercial and indus- 
trial) continue to exploit the so-called masses. Humanitarians 
revolted against serfdom and against slavery but their efforts 
availed little until invention came to their aid. It was neither 
preaching nor agitation but the-steam engine and power-driven 
machinery that abolished slavery. It is highly probable that 
electro-physics, chemistry, and biology will one day be more 
effective than pacifist ethics in preventing war, and more effective 
than strikes and boycotts in further ameliorating the wages 
system. 
When Professor Clark and I were actively exchanging ideas 
he was formulating his discrimination of pure from concrete 
capital.” He went on to work out the implications of his idea 
for the theory of values. I became interested in the economic 
possibilities of a progressive production of concrete goods, 
material wealth. I wanted to discover whether we may hope to 
carry further indefinitely nature's processes of assembling, cor- 
relating and coérdinating elements into compouds, and com- 
pounds into bigger and more complex compounds under conditions 
of varying cost. Specifically I was interested in the possibility 
(which I could not believe unlimited) of increasing that supply 
of unconsumed wealth which Adam Smith had called “stock,” 
which the Austrians were calling “present goods,” which Pro- 
fessor Clark identified with “concrete capital,” and which I 
presently called “capital goods.” * Yet more specifically I sought 
an answer to a question which I think had not before been raised, 
Association, Vol 11, Nar 38547, Publications of the American. Economic 
* Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 1V, January, 1890, D. 178.