of the
greatest importance and its variety almost as great as in the Byzantine
and Gothic styles. The pilaster, which was employed so extensively in
the Revival, called for new combinations in the designs for its
capitals. Most of the ornament can be traced to Roman sources, and
although less vigorous, shows much more delicacy and refinement in its
carving. (R. P. S.)

CAPITAL (i.e. capital stock or fund), in economics, generally, the
accumulated wealth either of a man or a community, that is available for
earning interest and producing fresh wealth. In social discussion it is
sometimes treated as antithetical to labour, but it is in reality the
accumulated savings of labour and of the profits accruing from the
savings of labour. It is that portion of the annual produce reserved
from consumption to supply future wants, to extend the sphere of
production, to improve industrial instruments and processes, to carry
out works of public utility, and, in short, to secure and enlarge the
various means of progress necessary to an increasing community. It is
the increment of wealth or means of subsistence analogous to the
increment of population and of the wants of civilized man. Hence J.S.
Mill and other economists, when seeking a graphic expression of the
service of capital, have called it "abstinence." The labourer serves by
giving physical and mental effort in order to supply his means of
consumption. The capitalist, or labourer-capitalist, serves by
abstaining from consumption, by denying himself the present enjoyment of
more or less of his means of consumption, in the prospect of a future
profit. This quality, apparent enough in the beginnings of capital,
applies equally to all its forms and stages; because whether a
capitalist stocks his warehouse with goods and produce, improves land,
lends on mortgage or other security, builds a factory, opens a mine, or
orders the construction of machines or ships, there is the element of
self-deprival for the present, with the risk of ultimate loss of what is
his own, and what, instead of saving and embodying income productive
form, he might choose to consume. On this ground rests the justification
of the claims of capital to its industrial rewards, whether in the form
of rent, interest or profits of trade and investment.

To any advance in the arts of industry or the comforts of life, a rate
of production exceeding the rate of consumption, with consequent
accumulation of r