OF LABOUR. 
AT 
case in the preceding extract. He says, that if 
by improvements in machinery and agriculture, 
the whole produce of a country were doubled, 
while the quantity of labour employed con- 
tinued the same, and if before this increase of 
produce, of every hundred hats, coats, and 
quarters of corn, the labourer received 25, and 
after the increase only 22, then wages would 
have fallen, although the labourer actually re- 
ceived 44, where he before received only 25. 
But if by a fall of wages is meant a fall in the 
value of labour; if, further, by value we mean 
the power of commanding other things in ex- 
change, and if the degrees of that power are in 
proportion to the quantity commanded, then it 
is evident, that so far from wages falling they 
would have risen, inasmuch as a definite por- 
tion of labour would command in exchange an 
increased quantity of hats, coats, and corn. 
I have said, that an alteration in the propor- 
tion of the product assigned to the labourer is 
one cause of variation in the value of labour: 
for it is manifest, that if out of a fixed quantity 
of hats, coats, and corn, the labourer receives