say to what point this value
will descend; but we can affirm, that it will never reach zero, unless
the stockings finish by producing themselves spontaneously. Why? Because
the principle of remuneration is in labor; because he who works for
another renders a service, and ought to receive a service. If no one
paid for stockings, they would cease to be made; and, with the scarcity,
the price would not fail to reappear.

The sophism which I am now combating has its root in the infinite
divisibility which belongs to _value_, as it does to matter.

It appears, at first, paradoxical, but it is well known to all
mathematicians, that, through all eternity, fractions may be taken from
a weight without the weight ever being annihilated. It is sufficient
that each successive fraction be less than the preceding one, in a
determined and regular proportion.

There are countries where people apply themselves to increasing the size
of horses, or diminishing in sheep the size of the head. It is
impossible to say precisely to what point they will arrive in this. No
one can say that he has seen the largest horse or the smallest sheep's
head that will ever appear in the world. But he may safely say that the
size of horses will never attain to infinity, nor the heads of sheep to
nothing.

In the same way, no one can say to what point the price of stockings nor
the interest of capitals will come down; but we may safely affirm, when
we know the nature of things, that neither the one nor the other will
ever arrive at zero, for labor and capital can no more live without
recompense than a sheep without a head.

The arguments of M. Proudhon reduce themselves, then, to this: since the
most skillful agriculturists are those who have reduced the heads of
sheep to the smallest size, we shall have arrived at the highest
agricultural perfection when sheep have no longer any heads. Therefore,
in order to realize the perfection, let us behead them.

I have now done with this wearisome discussion. Why is it that the
breath of false doctrine has made it needful to examine into the
intimate nature of interest? I must not leave off without remarking upon
a beautiful moral which may be drawn from this law: "The depression of
interest is proportioned to the abundance of capitals." This law being
granted, if there is a class of men to whom it is more important than to
any other that capitals be formed, accumulate, multiply, abound, and
superabound, it i