ty with which it can be reduced in quantity.
If the quantity of the commodity taxed could not be diminished, if the
capital of the farmer or of the hatter for instance, could not be
withdrawn to other employments, it would be of no consequence that their
profits were reduced below the general level by means of a tax; unless
the demand for their commodities should increase, they would never be
able to elevate the market price of corn and hats up to the increased
natural price. Their threats to leave their employments, and remove
their capitals to more favoured trades, would be treated as an idle
menace which could not be carried into effect; and consequently the
price would not be raised by diminished production. Commodities however
of all descriptions can be reduced in quantity, and capital can be
removed from trades which are less profitable to those which are more
so, but with different degrees of rapidity. In proportion as the supply
of a particular commodity can be more easily reduced, the price of it
will more quickly rise after the difficulty of its production has been
increased by taxation, or by any other means. Corn being a commodity
indispensably necessary to every one, little effect will be produced on
the demand for it in consequence of a tax, and therefore the supply
could not be long excessive, even if the producers had great difficulty
in removing their capitals from the land; the price of corn therefore,
will speedily be raised by taxation, and the farmer will be enabled to
transfer the tax from himself to the consumer.

If the mines which supply us with gold were in this country, and if
gold were taxed, it could not rise in relative value to other things
till its quantity were reduced. This would be more particularly the
case, if gold were exclusively used for money. It is true that the least
productive mines, those which paid no rent, could no longer be worked,
as they could not afford the general rate of profits till the relative
value of gold rose, by a sum equal to the tax. The quantity of gold, and
therefore the quantity of money would be slowly reduced; it would be a
little diminished in one year, a little more in another, and finally its
value would be raised in proportion to the tax; but in the interval, the
proprietors or holders, as they would pay the tax, would be the
sufferers, and not those who used money. If out of every 1000 quarters
of wheat in the country, and every 1000 produced in futu