When the idea of permanence is introduced into the notion of wealth it at once becomes altogether vague and uncertain. Things are of all degrees of permanence, from the land which lasts for ever to things of a constantly-diminishing degree of permanence, such as money, jewelry, houses, clothes, food, till we come to labour. At what degree of permanence is the line to be drawn between things that are wealth and those that are not wealth?

The law of continuity says, "That which is true up to the limit, is true at the limit;" which shows that labour, which has the least degree of permanence, must be included under the term wealth equally with laud, which has the greatest degree of permanence.

We have now to examine more particularly Mill's doctrines upon credit.

He says that anything which has purchasing power is wealth.

He then says, "The amount of purchasing power which a man can exercise is composed of all the money in his possession or due to him (i.e., any bills or notes he may have), and of all his credit.

uCredit, in short, has exactly the same purchasing power with money."

And many other passages to the same effect.

Now, if it be said that "everything which has purchasing power is wealth," and if it be said "credit is purchasing power," then the necessary inference is that "credit is wealth." That is a syllogism in which Mill is safely padlocked, and from which there is no escape.

Thus, by the clear admission of Mill, credit is wealth; and how is credit material, or extracted from the materials of the globe?

Now, there are numerous other self-contradictions in Mill as to the nature of wealth, but those which I have given are quite sufficient to show you that Mill himself had no clear ideas as to what wealth is.

I have now taken only one of the definitions of economics, but that the fundamental one, and shown you the self-contradictions of economists from Smith to Mill. And how can you expect a solid system of science to be founded on such self-contradictions? But there, in fact, 27 definitions in economics, and with respect to each one of them there is exactly the same self-contradiction and diversity of opinion.

No doubt the disciples of Smith have achieved a series of great successes, but these have been chiefly destructive, to sweep away what they considered mischievous laws; and everyone can agree upon that, but when it comes to a positive definite science the case is wholly different.

The fundamental defect of economists, from Smith to Mill, is that they profess to discuss wealth and the science of wealth. They consider the production, distribution, and so on of wealth, but they are unable to form a distinct and clear idea of what wealth is. Is it not surprising that writers who perfectly admit that personal credit, bills, and notes are wealth and capital in some places, in others allege that all wealth is the produce of land and labour, and extracted from the materials of the globe?

Some of the manuals in popular use begin by admitting that wealth is anything that is exchangeable, and then in a few sentences after they say that all wealth is the produce of land, labour, and capital. They themselves admit that labour itself is an exchangeable commodity. They admit that personal credit is wealth; and how is labour itself and how is personal credit the produce of land, labour, and capital?

There was a time when the physical sciences were exactly in the same state as economics is at present. They were simply a mass of confusion and contradictions. The wisest moral philosopher of antiquity, seeing that all the professors of the physical sciences were at utter discord with themselves, called off his disciples in blank despair from the study of physical science, and bade them restrict themselves to moral science.

But if Socrates were to revisit the earth now, would he be of the same opinion, and how has physical science been brought to its present state of perfection? Simply by a careful settlement of its definitions, a diligent observation of facts, and a sedulous attention to bring language into harmony with nature, and economics can only be delivered from the present disrepute into which it has notoriously fallen, by strictly following the same methods by which the modern physical sciences have been created.

And I will cite the authority of Mill himself for this view. He says, very justly, "In the case of so complex an aggregation of particulars as are comprehended in anything which can be called a science, the definition we set out with is seldom that which a more extensive knowledge of the subject shows to be most appropriate. Until we know the particulars themselves, we cannot fix upon the most correct and compact mode of circumscribing them with a general definition.

"Scientific definitions, whether they are definitions of scientific terms or of common terms used in a scientific sense, are almost always of the kind last spoken of; their main purpose is to serve as the landmark of scientific classification. And since the classifications of any science are continually modified as scientific knowledge advances, the definitions of the sciences are constantly varying. . . What is true of the definition of any term of science, is of course true of the definition of the science itself; and accordingly the definition of a science must necessarily be progressive and provisional."

Is it possible to have anything more exactly appropriate to the present case. Those who still adhere to the definition of economics as the production, distribution, and consumption of wealth, entirely forget that that definition was expressly restricted by its originators to the commerce of the material products of the earth and to those only. They expressly excluded labour and rights from the term wealth. They, therefore, only considered one class of economic quantities and only one kind of exchange.

But all modern economists now admit labour and rights to be wealth, in accordance with the unanimous doctrine of ancient writers, and the complete science treats of three orders of exchangable quantities and six species of exchange.

The fact is that economics has burst the bonds of the physiocrate nomenclature - a definition which suits the exchange of material products only becomes unintelligble when it is stretched to include labour and rights. The attempt of economists to discuss these subjects while retaining the old definition was hopeless, and only led to confusion. It was like putting new wine into old bottles. The fundamental concepts of the physiocrates will no more fit economics in its present enlarged state than the clothes of an infant will fit a full-grown man. As economics now embraces all commerce, we must, in strict accordance with the above extract from Mill, entirely reject the narrow and restricted definition and adopt the enlarged one of commerce, which includes all exchanges. And when we do that it is like the transformation scene in a pantomime. Harmony, order, and science are evolved out of incomprehensible chaos as from the stroke of the enchanter's wand.