ould operate in an inverse ratio
from those of Providence.

Yet we have heard members of Congress exclaim, "I do not understand
this theory of cheapness; I would rather see bread dear, and work more
abundant." And consequently these gentlemen vote in favor of
legislative measures whose effect is to shackle and impede commerce,
precisely because by so doing we are prevented from procuring
indirectly, and at low price, what direct production can only furnish
more expensively.

Now it is very evident that the system of Mr. So-and-so, the
Congressman, is directly opposed to that of Mr. So-and-so, the
agriculturist. Were he consistent with himself, he would as legislator
vote against all restriction; or else as farmer, he would practise in
his fields the same principle which he proclaims in the public
councils. We would then see him sowing his grain in his most sterile
fields, because he would thus succeed in _laboring much_, to _obtain
little_. We would see him forbidding the use of the plough, because he
could, by scratching up the soil with his nails, fully gratify his
double wish of "_dear bread_ and _abundant labor_."

Restriction has for its avowed object and acknowledged effect, the
augmentation of labor. And again, equally avowed and acknowledged, its
object and effect are, the increase of prices--a synonymous term for
scarcity of produce. Pushed then to its greatest extreme, it is pure
Sisyphism as we have defined it; _labor infinite; result nothing_.

There have been men who accused railways of _injuring shipping_; and
it is certainly true that the most perfect means of attaining an
object must always limit the use of a less perfect means. But railways
can only injure shipping by drawing from it articles of
transportation; this they can only do by transporting more cheaply;
and they can only transport more cheaply, by _diminishing the
proportion of the effort employed to the result obtained_--for it is
in this that cheapness consists. When, therefore, these men lament the
suppression of labor in attaining a given result, they maintain the
doctrine of Sisyphism. Logically, if they prefer the vessel to the
railway, they should also prefer the wagon to the vessel, the
pack-saddle to the wagon, and the sack to the pack-saddle: for this
is, of all known means of transportation, the one which requires the
greatest amount of labor, in proportion to the result obtained.

"Labor constitutes the riches of the people,"