CHAPTER I

HOW TO DISCRIMINATE BETWEEN THE PARTS CONTRIBUTED TO A JOINT PRODUCT BY THE FEW AND BY THE MANY

Mill declares that when two agencies are essential to producing an effect, their respective contributions to it cannot be discriminated • 197

Mill argues thus with special reference to land and labour; • 198

but he overlooks what in actual life is the main feature of the case • 198

The labour remaining the same, the product varies with the quality of the land • 198

The extra product resulting from labour on superior land is due to land, not labour • 199

This is easily proved by a number of analogous illustrations • 199

Mill errs by ignoring the changing character of the effect • 201

The case of labour directed by different great men is the same as the case of labour applied to different qualities of land. The great men produce the increment • 202

Labour, however, must be held to produce that minimum necessary to support the labourer, • 203

both in agriculture • 203

and in all kinds of production • 204

The great man produces the increment that would not be produced if his influence ceased • 204

Labour, it is true, is essential to the production of the increment also; • 205

but we cannot draw any conclusions from the hypothesis of labour ceasing; • 205

for the labourer would have to labour whether the great men were there or no • 206

The cessation of the great man’s influence is a practical alternative; the cessation of labour is not, • 206

as we see by frequent examples • 206

Thus the great man, in the most practical sense, produces what labour would not produce in his absence • 208

An analysis of practical reasoning as to causes generally will show us the truth of this • 208

For practical purposes _the_ cause of an effect is that cause only which may or may not be present; • 209

as we see when men discuss the cause of a fire, • 210

or of the accuracy of a chronometer, • 210

or the causes of danger to a man hanging on to a rope • 211

But there is another means of discriminating between the products of exceptional men and ordinary men • 212

This is by an analysis of the faculties necessary to produce the product • 213

Are these faculties possessed by all, or by a few only? • 213