OF VALUE.

207

these passions should leave no regular traces of
their operation in the daily business of production
 and exchange.

I have hitherto been contending, that even if
capital could be resolved into previous labour,
it would still be a correct statement of facts to
say, that the value of commodities is chiefly
determined by the capital expended upon them.
[t is an interesting inquiry, however, how far
this doctrine, which we have taken for granted,
is true, and I shall therefore proceed to examine
 its claims to be received in that character.


It is manifest that if the unqualified doctrine,
as laid down by some writers, were correct, the
value of any commodity would be strictly representative
 of the quantity of labour expended
on its production from first to last. “If,” as
Mr. Mill expresses it, ‘quantity of labour in
the last resort, determines the proportion in
which commodities exchange for one another *:”

* Elements of Political Economy, p. 94, 2d edition.