Page:Karl Marx - The Poverty of Philosophy - (tr. Harry Quelch) - 1913.djvu/222

 APPENDIX 215

upon public meetings. It was at one of these meetings that a workingman exclaimed boldly,—

“If the landlords were to sell our bones, you manu- facturers would be the first to buy them, and to put them through the mill and make flour of them.”

The English workingmen have appreciated to the fullest extent the significance of the struggle between the lords of the land and of capital. They know very well that the price of bread was to be reduced in order to reduce wages, and that the profit of capital would rise in proportion as rent fell.

Ricardo, the apostle of the English Free Traders, the leading economist of our century, entirely agrees with the workers upon this point.

In his celebrated work upon Political Economy he says: “If instead of growing our own corn..... we dis- cover a new market from which we can supply our- selves .... at a cheaper price, wages will fall and profits rise. The fall in the price of agricultural produce re- duces the wages, not only of the laborer employed in cultivating the soil, but also of all those employed in commerce or manufacture.”

And do not believe, gentlemen, that it is a matter of indifference to the workingman whether he receives only four francs on account of corn being cheaper, when he had been receiving five francs before.

Have not his wages always fallen in comparison with profit? And is it not clear that his social position has grown worse as compared with that of the capitalist ? Beside which he loses actually. So long as the price of corn was higher and wages were also higher, a smail saving in the consumption of bread sufficed to procure him other enjoyments. But as soon as bread is cheap,