BOOK
II.

Thirdly, of the materials, whether altogether rude, or more or less manufactured, of clothes, furniture and building, which are not yet made. up into any of thofe three fhapes, but which remain in the hands of the growers, the manufacturers, the mercers, and drapers, the timbermerchants, the carpenters and joiners, the brick-makers, &c.

Fourthly, and laftly, of the work which is made up and completed, but which is ftill in the hands of the merchant or manufacturer, and ́not yet difpofed of or diftributed to the proper confumers; fuch as the finished work which we frequently find ready-made in the fhops of the fmith, the cabinet-maker, the goldsmith, the jeweller, the china-merchant, &c. The circulating capital confifts in this manner, of the provifions, materials, and finished work of all kinds that are in the hands of their refpective dealers, and of the money that is neceffary for circulating and diftributing them to those who are finally to use, or to confume them.

Of these four parts three, provifions, materials, and finished work, are, either annually, or in a longer or fhorter period, regularly withdrawn. from it, and placed either in the fixed capital or in the stock referved for immediate confump

tion.

Every fixed capital is both originally derived from, and requires to be continually supported by a circulating capital. All useful machines and inftruments of trade are originally derived from a circulating capital, which furnishes the materials

I.

materials of which they are made, and the main- c HA P. tenance of the workmen who make them. They require too a capital of the fame kind to keep them in conftant repair.

No fixed capital can yield any revenue but by means of a circulating capital. The most useful machines and inftruments of trade will produce nothing without the circulating capital which affords the materials they are employed upon, and the maintenance of the workmen who employ them. Land, however improved, will yield no revenue without a circulating capital, which maintains the labourers who cultivate and collect its produce.

To maintain and augment the ftock which may be referved for immediate confumption, is the fole end and purpose both of the fixed and circulating capitals. It is this stock which feeds, clothes, and lodges the people. Their riches or poverty depends upon the abundant or fparing supplies which those two capitals can afford to the stock referved for immediate confumption.

So great a part of the circulating capital being continually withdrawn from it, in order to be placed in the other two branches of the general stock of the fociety; it must in its turn require continual fupplies, without which it would foon cease to exift. Thefe fupplies are principally drawn from three fources, the produce of land, of mines, and of fisheries. These afford continual fupplies of provifions and materials, of which part is afterwards wrought up

EE 2

II.

BOOK up into finished work, and by which are replaced the provifions, materials, and finished work continually withdrawn from the circulating capital. From mines too is drawn what is neceffary for maintaining and augmenting that part of it which confifts in money. For though, in the ordinary course of business, this part is not, like the other three, neceffarily withdrawn from it, in order to be placed in the other two branches of the general flock of the fociety, it must, however, like all other things, be wasted and worn out at laft, and fometimes too be either loft or fent abroad, and muft, therefore, require continual, though, no doubt, much fmaller fupplies.

Land, mines, and fisheries, require all both a fixed and a circulating capital to cultivate them: and their produce replaces with a profit, not only thofe capitals, but all the others in the fociety. Thus the farmer annually replaces to the manufacturer the provifions which he had confumed and the materials which he had wrought up the year before; and the manufacturer replaces to the farmer the finished work which he had wafted and worn out in the fame time. This is the real exchange that is annually made between thofe two orders of people, though it feldom happens that the rude produce of the one and the manufactured produce of the other, are directly bartered for one another; because it feldom happens that the farmer fells his corn and his cattle, his flax and his wool, to the very fame perfon of whom he chufes to purchase the

clothes,

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clothes, furniture, and inftruments of trade which CHA P. he wants. He fells, therefore, his rude produce for money, with which he can purchase, whereever it is to be had, the manufactured produce he has occafion for. Land even replaces, in part at least, the capitals with which fisheries and mines are cultivated. It is the produce of land which draws the fish from the waters; and it is the produce of the furface of the earth which extracts the minerals from its bowels.

The produce of land, mines, and fisheries, when their natural fertility is equal, is in proportion to the extent and proper application of the capitals employed about them. When the capitals are equal and equally well' applied, it is in proportion to their natural fertility.

In all countries where there is tolerable fecurity, every man of common understanding will endeavour to employ whatever ftock he can com mand, in procuring either prefent enjoyment or future profit. If it is employed in procuring prefent enjoyment, it is a flock referved for immediate confumption. If it is employed in procuring future profit, it muft procure this profit either by ftaying with him, or by going from him. In the one cafe it is a fixed, in the other it is a circulating capital. A man must be perfectly crazy who, where there is tolerable fecurity, does not employ all the ftock which he commands, whether it be his own or borrowed of other people, in fome one or other of those three ways.

BOOK
II.

In thofe unfortunate countries, indeed, where men are continually afraid of the violence of their fuperiors, they frequently bury and conceal a great part of their stock, in order to have it always at hand to carry with them to fome place of fafety, in cafe of their being threatened with any of thofe difafters to which they confider themselves as at all times expofed. This is faid to be a common practice in Turkey, in Indoftan, and, I believe, in moft other governments of Afia. It feems to have been a common practice among our ancestors during the violence of the feudal government. Treafure-trove was in thofe times confidered as no contemptible part of the revenue of the greateft fovereigns in Europe. It confifted in fuch treasure as was found concealed in the earth, and to which no particular perfon could prove any right. This was regarded in thofe times as fo important an object, that it was always confidered as belonging to the fovereign, and neither to the finder nor to the proprietor of the land, unless the right to it had been conveyed to the latter by an exprefs clause in his charter. It was put upon the fame footing with gold and filver mines, which, without a special claufe in the charter, were never fuppofed to be comprehended in the general grant of the lands, though mines of lead, copper, tin, and coal were, as things of fimaller confequence.

CHAP.