s, such as these
you have around you now. But by those same laws of Nature and
Providence, if the labour of the nation or of the individual be
misapplied, and much more if it be insufficient,--if the nation or man
be indolent and unwise,--suffering and want result, exactly in
proportion to the indolence and improvidence--to the refusal of labour,
or to the misapplication of it. Wherever you see want, or misery, or
degradation, in this world about you, there, be sure, either industry
has been wanting, or industry has been in error. It is not accident, it
is not Heaven-commanded calamity, it is not the original and inevitable
evil of man's nature, which fill your streets with lamentation, and your
graves with prey. It is only that, when there should have been
providence, there has been waste; when there should have been labour,
there has been lasciviousness; and wilfulness, when there should have
been subordination.[1]

[Note 1: Proverbs xiii. 23: "Much food is in the tillage of the
poor, but there is that is destroyed for want of judgment."]

8. Now, we have warped the word "economy" in our English language into a
meaning which it has no business whatever to bear. In our use of it, it
constantly signifies merely sparing or saving; economy of money means
saving money--economy of time, sparing time, and so on. But that is a
wholly barbarous use of the word--barbarous in a double sense, for it is
not English, and it is bad Greek; barbarous in a treble sense, for it is
not English, it is bad Greek, and it is worse sense. Economy no more
means saving money than it means spending money. It means, the
administration of a house; its stewardship; spending or saving, that is,
whether money or time, or anything else, to the best possible advantage.
In the simplest and clearest definition of it, economy, whether public
or private, means the wise management of labour; and it means this
mainly in three senses: namely, first, _applying_ your labour
rationally; secondly, _preserving_ its produce carefully; lastly,
_distributing_ its produce seasonably.

9. I say first, applying your labour rationally; that is, so as to
obtain the most precious things you can, and the most lasting things, by
it: not growing oats in land where you can grow wheat, nor putting fine
embroidery on a stuff that will not wear. Secondly, preserving its
produce carefully; that is to say, laying up your wheat wisely in
storehouses for the time of famine, and