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POLITICAL  ECONOMY

called  demand  price.  It  is  important  that
ethical  ideas  should  not  be  read  into  the
conceptions  of  wealth  and  value  when  they
are  being  employed  in  their  everyday  sense.
If  our  aim  is  to  indicate  what  people  ought  to
want  instead  of  what  they  do  want,  we  had
better  speak  of  ethical  wealth  and  ethical
value.
The  introduction  of  the  notion  of  wealth
conceived  from  the  ethical  point  of  view  raises
issues  which,  though  they  are  not  primarily
economic,  if  they  are  economic  at  all,  need  not,
I  think,  be  shirked,  particularly  as  their
examination  will  serve  to  clarify  ideas  vaguely
hinted  at  in  Chapter  I.  In  opposition  to  the
popular  economics  of  his  day,  Ruskin  wrote
as  follows  :—“  There  is  no  wealth  but  Life—
Life,  including  all  its  powers  of  love,  of  joy,
and  of  admiration  ”  ;  and  again,  “  To  be
valuable  is  to  avail  towards  life  ”  ;  and  again,
“  Wealth  is  the  possession  of  the  valuable  by
the  valiant  ”—and  in  the  highest  sense  he  was
right.  All  that  we  call  wealth  is  only  of
value  because  it  conduces  to  the  great  ultimate
value  which  means  conscious  living  properly
conceived—“  valiant  ”  living.  The  former  is
economic  value  and  is  relative  to  the  end  which
it  subserves  ;  the  latter  we  may  call  absolute
value.  Now  the  curious  thing  is  that  absolute