nomists estimate
the utility of agriculture, plainly arises from the high price of its
produce, which, however advantageous to the landlord who receives it,
is surely no advantage to the consumer who pays it. Were the produce of
agriculture to be sold for a lower price, the same net surplus would
not remain, after defraying the expenses of cultivation; but agriculture
would be still equally productive to the general stock; and the only
difference would be, that as the landlord was formerly enriched by the
high price, at the expense of the community, the community would now
profit by the low price at the expense of the landlord. The high price
in which the rent or net surplus originates, while it enriches the
landlord who has the produce of agriculture to sell, diminishes in the
same proportion the wealth of those who are its purchasers; and on this
account it is quite inaccurate to consider the landlord's rent as a
clear addition to the national wealth.' In other parts of his work he
uses the same, or even stronger language, and in a note on the subject
of taxes, he speaks of the high price of the produce of land as
advantageous to those who receive it, it but proportionably injurious
to those who pay it. 'In this view,' he adds, 'it can form no general
addition to the stock of the community, as the net surplus in question
is nothing more than a revenue transferred from one class to another,
and from the mere circumstance of its thus changing hands, it is clear
that no fund can arise out of which to pay taxes. The revenue which
pays for the produce of land exists already in the hands of those who
purchase that produce; and, if the price of subsistence were lower, it
would still remain in their hands, where it would be just as available
for taxation, as when by a higher price it is transferred to the landed
proprietor.' [5]

That there are some circumstances connected with rent, which have an
affinity to a natural monopoly, will be readily allowed. The extent of
the earth itself is limited, and cannot be enlarged by human demand. And
the inequality of soils occasions, even at an early period of society a
comparative scarcity of the best lands; and so far is undoubtedly one
of the causes of rent properly so called. On this account, perhaps, the
term partial monopoly might be fairly applicable. But the scarcity
of land, thus implied, is by no means alone sufficient to produce the
effects observed. And a more accurate inves