Aví/?Z  MARX.  27
then,  that  all  wages  are  in  exact  proportion  to  the  value  of  the
work  done.  But  this  is  precisely  what  Marx  disputes.
From  these  premises,  our  author  concludes  that  labour
becomes  more  productive  and  creates  more  utilities  all  to  no
purpose,  it  does  not  produce  more  values.  In  fact,  if  labour
measured  by  time  is  the  sole  source  of  value,  articles  manufactured ­
  in  greater  quantity  in  the  same  lapse  of  time,  all  put
together,  represent  no  more  value,  because  each  individual
article  is  worth  less.  By  the  strictly  logical  chain  of  these
abstractions  we  arrive  at  this  singular  result,  that  all  the  inventions ­
  of  science,  all  the  improvements  of  manufacture,  produce
more  utilities,  without  increasing  the  sum  total  of  values.
Bastiat  had  expressed  a  similar  idea.
Let  us  now  see  how  capital  arises.  According  to  Marx,  it
is  by  no  means  from  thrift  or  abstinence,  as  “the  common
Political  Economy  ”  asserts.  Nor  is  it  any  more  from  exchange,
as  idle  people,  seeing  how  merchants  make  rapid  fortunes,  are
apt  to  imagine.  In  fact,  exchange  is  normally  made  on  the
footing  of  equality,  values  against  values  ;  and  if  by  artifice  or
skill  Paul  sells  to  Peter  for  a  commodity  worth  only  ^^4,
Paul,  it  is  true,  gains  but  as  Peter  loses  it,  the  community
is  none  the  richer,  no  new  value  is  created,  no  new  capital
formed.  This  opinion,  developed  with  great  precision  by  J.
B.  Say,  is  held  by  the  greater  number  of  Economists.  Nevertheless, ­
  in  my  opinion,  it  is  not  well  founded.  Condillac  was
right  when  he  asserted  that  in  every  exchange  both  parties
gain,  because  each  obtains  the  object  which  suits  him  best.*
A  lady,  he  says,  sells  some  acres  of  land  in  order  to  purchase
a  cashmere  shawl,  and  is  astonished  at  obtaining  such  a  magnificent ­
  article  in  exchange  for  such  an  ugly  piece  of  meadow.
Each  party  gets  what  he  wants,  and  is  thus  better  satisfied.
Marx  and  J.  B.  Say  look  only  at  the  value  in  exchange,
which,  perhaps,  does  not  increase  in  the  act  of  exchange,
though  an  object,  on  the  approach  of  those  who  have  need  of
*  See  “  Commerce  et  le  gouvernement^'  by  Condillac,  Guillaumin’s  edition, ­
  p.  267.  This  little  work,  like  the  majority  of  those  of  the  eighteenth
century,  contains  many  just  remarks,  expressed  with  great  clearness  and
intelligence.