satisfy it. The mind never attains to a
firm conviction which is not wrought out by its own labor. I will,
however, make an effort to put it upon the right track.

The adversaries of importations and of machinery are misled by allowing
themselves to form too hasty a judgment from immediate and transitory
effects, instead of following these up to their general and final
consequences.

The immediate effect of an ingenious piece of machinery, is, that it
renders superfluous, in the production of any given result, a certain
quantity of manual labor. But its action does not stop here. This result
being obtained at less labor, is given to the public at a less price.
The amount thus saved to the buyers, enables them to procure other
comforts, and thus to encourage general labor, precisely in proportion
to the saving they have made upon the one article which the machine has
given to them at an easier price. Thus the standard of labor is not
lowered, though that of comfort is raised.

Let me endeavor to render this double fact more striking by an example.

I suppose that ten million of hats, at fifteen francs each, are yearly
consumed in France. This would give to those employed in this
manufacture one hundred and fifty millions. A machine is invented which
enables the manufacturer to furnish hats at ten francs. The sum given to
the maintenance of this branch of industry, is thus reduced (if we
suppose the consumption not to be increased) to one hundred millions.
But the other fifty millions are not, therefore, withdrawn from the
maintenance of _human labor_. The buyers of hats are, from the surplus
saved upon the price of that article, enabled to satisfy other wants,
and thus, in the same proportion, to encourage general industry. John
buys a pair of shoes; James, a book; Jerome, an article of furniture,
etc. Human labor, as a whole, still receives the encouragement of the
whole one hundred and fifty millions, while the consumers, with the same
supply of hats as before, receive also the increased number of comforts
accruing from the fifty millions, which the use of the machine has been
the means of saving to them. These comforts are the net gain which
France has received from the invention. It is a gratuitous gift; a
tribute exacted from nature by the genius of man. We grant that, during
this process, a certain sum of labor will have been _displaced_, forced
to change its direction; but we cannot allow that it has been dest