ion, renders the production in
so far _gratuitous_. There only remains the actual labor of man to be
paid for; and the remainder, which is the result of the invention, is
subtracted; at least after the invention has run through the cycle which
I have just described as its destined course. I send for a workman; he
brings a saw with him; I pay him two francs for his day's labor, and he
saws me twenty-five boards. If the saw had not been invented, he would
perhaps not have been able to make one board, and I would have paid him
the same for his day's labor. The _usefulness_ then of the saw, is for
me a gratuitous gift of nature, or rather it is a portion of the
inheritance which, _in common_ with my brother men, I have received from
the genius of my ancestors. I have two workmen in my field; the one
directs the handle of a plough, the other that of a spade. The result of
their day's labor is very different, but the price is the same, because
the remuneration is proportioned, not to the usefulness of the result,
but to the effort, the labor given to attain it.

I invoke the patience of the reader, and beg him to believe, that I have
not lost sight of free trade: I entreat him only to remember the
conclusion at which I have arrived: _Remuneration is not proportioned to
the usefulness of the articles brought by the producer into the market,
but to the labor_.[11]

[Footnote 11: It is true that labor does not receive a uniform
remuneration; because labor is more or less intense, dangerous,
skillful, etc. Competition establishes for each category a price
current; and it is of this variable price that I speak.]

I have so far taken my examples from human inventions, but will now go
on to speak of natural advantages.

In every article of production, nature and man must concur. But the
portion of nature is always gratuitous. Only so much of the usefulness
of an article as is the result of human labor becomes the object of
mutual exchange, and consequently of remuneration. The remuneration
varies much, no doubt, in proportion to the intensity of the labor, of
the skill which it requires, of its being _a propos_ to the demand of
the day, of the need which exists for it, of the momentary absence of
competition, etc. But it is not the less true in principle, that the
assistance received from natural laws, which belongs to all, counts for
nothing in the price.

We do not pay for the air we breathe, although so useful to us, that we