welfare, but the man who has contrived to make it
print pictures for him has made sunlight into wealth in the picture.
Equally so the farmer's energy and contrivance use the properties of soil
and climate and the vital energies of seeds to make wealth in a crop.

_Control for welfare._--As each individual worker gains control over any of
these properties or forces he advances in wealth and welfare. It becomes
his own means of meeting wants. If all individuals in a community share in
such control, they think of the good things as part of the general
welfare, and do not enumerate them in anybody's wealth except when
comparing their own condition with that of another community. Advantages
of this kind constantly tend to become more universal, and so to count
very little in individual wealth. Many advantages of civilization today
belong to all the world alike, so that nature seems to meet our wants
gratuitously; but the story of progress shows that these are gifts
inherited from the wealth of past ages. The human exertion which they once
cost is overlooked in the ease of the present. Mere fire was once a
treasure to be cherished and kept at much expenditure of strength and
foresight. Now we kindle a fire so easily that nobody thinks of it as a
part of the world's wealth.

_Land as a force._--Land represents a combination of natural energies and
properties so important as to be named sometimes as a distinct force in
production. It implies, first, needed space for various kinds of exertion
in both country and town. Second, it includes all mineral, vegetable and
animal bodies that are found above, on or under the surface. Third, it is
soil, an essential part of a farmer's equipment in using nature's
processes of growth.

As most of these properties of land can be put to use only by repeated and
continued exertion in the same place, a large portion of the earth is
necessarily apportioned to individual control, i. e., to the ownership of
those who can direct its uses, and so it becomes wealth. The sea in most
of its uses to men requires no such local control, and so is not owned by
a nation even; but the harbors, ships and wharves, the oyster-beds and
fishing banks, soon become the property of some body of men that will make
and keep them useful. Even a pathway over the high seas may yet be
controlled for the safety of the huge steamers that dash across.

Land, except when used for absolutely universal welfare, must be under