Instead of reckoning the interest due him on his labor, he reckons it on his capital; and, by this substitution, the same property, which in the hands of its owner is capable of yielding only one, is worth to him ten, a hundred, a thousand, a million.

Consequently, he has only to hold himself in readiness to register the names of the laborers who apply to him--his task consists in drafting leases and receipts.
Not satisfied with the lightness of his duties, the proprietor does not intend to bear even the deficit resulting from his idleness; he throws it upon the shoulders of the producer, of whom he always demands the same reward.

When the farm-rent of a piece of land is once raised to its highest point, the proprietor never lowers it; high prices, the scarcity of labor, the disadvantages of the season, even pestilence itself, have no effect upon him--why should he suffer from hard times when he does not labor?
Here commences a new series of phenomena.
Say--who reasons with marvellous clearness whenever he assails taxation, but who is blind to the fact that the proprietor, as well as the tax-gatherer, steals from the tenant, and in the same manner--says in his second letter to Malthus:-- "If the collector of taxes and those who employ him consume one-sixth of the products, they thereby compel the producers to feed, clothe, and support themselves on five-sixths of what they produce.

They admit this, but say at the same time that it is possible for each one to live on five-sixths of what he produces.
"I admit that, if they insist upon it; but I ask if they believe that the producer would live as well, in case they demanded of him, instead of one-sixth, two-sixths, or one-third, of their products?
No; but he would still live.

Then I ask whether he would still live, in case they should rob him of two-thirds,...