these individual
interests, and say: Wants are riches: Labor is riches: The obstacle to
well-being is well-being: To multiply obstacles is to give food to
industry.

Then comes the statesman; and as the developing and propagating of
obstacles is the developing and propagating of riches, what more
natural than that he should bend his efforts to that point? He says,
for instance: If we prevent a large importation of iron, we create a
difficulty in procuring it. This obstacle severely felt, obliges
individuals to pay, in order to relieve themselves from it. A certain
number of our citizens, giving themselves up to the combating of this
obstacle, will thereby make their fortunes. In proportion, too, as the
obstacle is great, and the mineral scarce, inaccessible, and of
difficult and distant transportation, in the same proportion will be
the number of laborers maintained by the various branches of this
industry.

The same reasoning will lead to the proscription of machinery.

Here are men who are at a loss how to dispose of their petroleum. This
is an obstacle which other men set about removing for them by the
manufacture of casks. It is fortunate, say our statesmen, that this
obstacle exists, since it occupies a portion of the labor of the
nation, and enriches a certain number of our citizens. But here is
presented to us an ingenious machine, which cuts down the oak, squares
it, makes it into staves, and, gathering these together, forms them
into casks. The obstacle is thus diminished, and with it the fortunes
of the coopers. We must prevent this. Let us proscribe the machine!

To sift thoroughly this sophism, it is sufficient to remember that
human labor is not an _end_ but a _means_.

_Labor is never without employment._ If one obstacle is removed, it
seizes another, and mankind is delivered from two obstacles by the
same effort which was at first necessary for one. If the labor of
coopers could become useless, it must take another direction. To
maintain that human labor can end by wanting employment, it would be
necessary to prove that mankind will cease to encounter obstacles.

CHAPTER III.

EFFORT--RESULT.

We have seen that between our wants and their gratification many
obstacles are interposed. We conquer or weaken these by the employment
of our faculties. It may be said, in general terms, that industry is
an effort followed by a result.

But by what do we measure our well-being? By our riches? By