it in a wider sense. The generalities, therefore, about supply
and demand, take us little further.

From these difficulties Ricardo escapes by another method. Malthus's
theory of population gives him what he requires. The 'natural price of
labour' (as distinguished from its 'market price') is, as he asserts,
'that price which is necessary to enable the labourers, one with
another, to subsist and perpetuate their race without either increase
or diminution.'[312] This is the true 'natural price,' about which the
'market price' oscillates. An increase of capital may raise wages for
a time above the natural price, but an increase of population will
bring back the previous rate. Ricardo warns us, indeed, that this
natural price of labour is not to be regarded as something 'absolutely
fixed and constant.'[313] It varies in different times and countries,
and even in the same country at different times. An English cottager
now possesses what would once have been luxuries. Ricardo admits
again[314] that the wages of different classes of labourers may be
different, although he does not consider that this fact affects his
argument. We may allow for it by considering the skilled labourer as 2
or 1-1/2 labourers rolled into one. The assumption enables him to get
out of a vicious circle. He is seeking to discover the proportions in
which produce will be divided between the two classes, and which
co-operate in the production. The 'demand and supply' principle may
show that an increase of capital will tend to increase wages, but even
that tendency, as he carefully points out, can only be admitted
subject to certain important reservations. In any case, if it explains
temporary fluctuations, it will not ascertain the point round which
the fluctuations take place. But the two variables, wages and profit,
are clearly connected, and if we can once assume that one of these
variables is fixed by an independent law, we may explain in what way
the other will be fixed. Having got rid of 'rent,' the remaining
produce has to be divided between wages and profit. If the produce be
fixed, the greater the share of the labourer the less will be the
share of the capitalist, and _vice versa_. But the labourer's share
again is determined by the consideration that it must be such as to
enable him to keep up the population. The capitalist will get the
surplus produce after allowing to the labourer the share so
determined. Everything turns ultimately upon th