ion with the land, the houses, and other immoveable structures built or formed upon it for the use of man, whether they be calculated for accommodation and enjoyment merely, or for business and production; as roads, canals, harbours, docks, water-works, or arcs for water-wheels, dam-heads, &c.; all houses of every description, as dwelling-houses, public buildings for national or for local purposes, churches, chapels, theatres, arsenals, and all works and buildings necessary for manufactories, as founderies, potteries, glass-works, salt-works, coal-works or mines, corn-mills, cotton-mills, &c.; or for mercantile purposes, as warehouses, granaries, &c.; or for agricultural purposes, as barns, storehouses, &c. These, it may be observed, and the two foregoing classes of wealth, except the natural productions of the land and waters, are all fixed property, stock or capital immoveable and inseparable from the land or territory.

Fourthly, I shall state, as a distinct portion of wealth, all useful machines and engines, or instruments of trade, together with all implements and utensils of every description, and for whatever purpose wanted or used, as water-wheels, steam-engines, cranes, wind-mills, thrashing-mills, ploughs, weaving-looms, washing-mills, beetling-engines, fulling-mills, paper-mills, printing-presses, types, anvils, hammers, planes, saws, augers, axes, tools; as also tables, chairs, beds, pokers, tongs, fire-irons, pots and pans. These, again, we observe, are all moveable property, except, perhaps, waterwheels, which cannot, in general, be taken down and removed without almost their entire destruction, or at least without such expense, injury, and diminution of value, as would amount to the resolution of them into the original materials; that is, into the value of the wood and iron whereof they were made, or of such parts of those materials as should remain applicable to any new purpose.

A singular exception perhaps it may be thought.

Fifthly and lastly, I state generally, that wealth consists of the productions of agriculture, manufactures, and commerce, that is, of rude produce and wrought goods, whether adapted for the purposes of trade or for immediate use or enjoyment; as corn, cattle, sugar, wine, tobacco, coffee, tea, beef, bread, meal, flour, wool, cotton, silk, leather, cloth, household furniture, musical instruments, paintings, maps, books, wood, iron, silver, gold, pots and pans; money, goods, wares, and merchandises of all sorts; ships, carriages, waggons, carts, and coaches. These also, it is evident, are all moveable property.

The foregoing and all other material objects, the produce of every art and occupation, which require labour or industry to collect, arrange, fashion, and form, or to fit and prepare them for the use, accommodation, or enjoyment of man, compose the wealth and capital or stock of a country. These are all vendible property; and they are all of that limited quality that law and force are necessarily required to secure them to the possessors or proprietors. And if we scrutinize the whole, and try every article, we shall find that all wealth comes either immediately from the land, or from the hands of productive labour; and that capital (together with all the benefits which it will be shown in the sequel to confer upon mankind) owes its existence entirely to human providence, foresight, and parsimony. All wealth therefore is wholly derived from the united powers of nature and human industry assisted by capital, shortly expressed by the terms land and labour. The elements and matter of wealth exist in the earth and in the heavens; human labour is necessary to collect, fashion, and dispose them for the use of

man.

CHAPTER III.

ANALYSIS AND CLASSIFICATION OF WEALTH IN REFERENCE TO ITS DIFFERENT USES AND EMPLOYMENTS.

ALTHOUGH all wealth is employed either productively or unproductively; that is, either, first, in supplying and gratifying the wants and desires of mankind, without any other return than the support of their bodies and enjoyment of their lives; or, secondly, in supplying and gratifying the same wants and desires, accompanied with the production, or return of a quantity of new wealth, greater or less, or equal to that which is consumed; yet a small examination will be sufficient to convince us that it cannot be divided into two simple sorts, or be classed entirely and distinctly under the two different heads of productive and unproductive.

It is true, there are a great many items of wealth which can only be employed productively, as a plough, a weavingloom, &c.; and others which can only be employed unproductively, as a piano-forte, a sideboard, &c. ; but there is a third sort, and great amount of wealth, which can be employed either the one way or the other, as corn, cloth, &c. according to the employment of the persons whom it maintains.

All wealth consists of objects either immediately applicable to the satisfaction of the wants and desires of mankind, as bread, wine, cloth, houses, household furniture, musical instruments, paintings, maps, books, &c., or of such as assist in producing them, as a plough, a wine-press, a weavingloom, a printing-press, axes, planes, saws, and other tools, &c. The first sort may be distinguished when occasion requires, as wealth immediately consumable; the second as wealth not immediately consumable. The latter sort, or

wealth not immediately consumable, can be employed only in one way, and that is productively. Of the former sort, or wealth immediately consumable, a part can be employed only in one way, and that is unproductively, as instruments of music,* paintings, maps, books, &c. ; but another, and by far the greatest part, may be employed either productively or unproductively, as bread, cloth, &c. according to the employment of the persons who consume it. For as wealth immediately consumable, or food, clothing, and shelter of some sort or other, is necessary to the support of our bodies and to our very existence, and as human labour is absolutely necessary, in a greater or less degree, to the production of every article of wealth, that which is employed in maintaining productive labourers is alone productive of new wealth; while that which is employed in maintaining every other description of persons is not followed by any such result. This part of wealth, therefore, is productive or unproductive according to the way in which it is employed, or to the description of persons whom it maintains.

"There is one sort of labour," says Dr Smith, "which adds to the value of the subject upon which it is bestowed; there is another which has no such effect. The former, as it produces a value, may be called productive; the latter, unproductive labour. Thus the labour of a manufacturer adds generally to the value of the materials which he works upon, that of his own maintenance and of his master's profit. The labour of a menial servant, on the contrary, adds to the value

• It may perhaps be thought that musical instruments and even household furniture, when they are employed by teachers or boardinghouse-keepers for hire, and the gaining of a livelihood, are employed productively; but it is to be recollected that no new wealth is ever produced in this way, and that that which supports both the teachers and taught must be drawn ultimately from some productive source. Vide Dr Smith on this subject, W. of N. b. ii. c. 1. vol. i. p. 441, Buchanan's edition.

of nothing. Though the manufacturer has his wages advanced to him by his master, he in reality costs him no expense, the value of those wages being generally restored, together with a profit, in the improved value of the subject upon which his labour is bestowed. But the maintenance of a menial servant never is restored. A man grows rich by employing a multitude of manufacturers; he grows poor by maintaining a multitude of menial servants. The labour of the latter, however, has its value, and deserves its reward as well as that of the former. But the labour of the manufacturer fixes and realizes itself in some particular subject or vendible commodity, which lasts for some time at least after that labour is past. It is, as it were, a certain quantity of labour stocked and stored up, to be employed, if necessary, upon some other occasion. That subject, or, what is the same thing, the price of that subject, can afterwards, if necessary, put into motion a quantity of labour equal to that which had originally produced it. The labour of the menial servant, on the contrary, does not fix or realize itself in any particular subject or vendible commodity. His services generally perish in the very instant of their performance, and seldom leave any trace of value behind them, for which an equal quantity of service could afterwards be procured."*

To return to our analysis and classification, and to be as distinct as possible upon this subject, wealth, with regard to its uses and employments, must be classed under three different heads; namely, first, that which is necessarily productive; second, that which is necessarily unproductive; and, third, that which may be either the one or the other, according to the way in which it is employed.

I. If we cast our eyes backwards upon the various items or sorts of wealth described and enumerated in the statement or summary contained in the preceding chapter, it

• Wealth of Nations, book ii. chap. 3. See the subject of productive and unproductive labour treated more fully in the next chapter.