Page:Karl Marx - Wage Labor and Capital - tr. J. L. Joynes (1900).pdf/21

 his life? On the contrary. Life begins for him exactly where this activity of his ceases—at his meals, on the public-house bench, in his bed. His twelve hours’ work has no meaning for him as weaving, spinning, boring etc., but only as earnings whereby he may obtain his meals, his seat in the public-house, his bed. If the silkworm’s object in spinning were to prolong its existence as a caterpillar, it would be a perfect example of a wage worker.

Labor-power was not always a commodity. Labor was not always wage labor that is free labor The slave does not sell his labor to the slave-owner. The, slave, along with his labor, is sold once for all to his owner. He is a commodity which can pass from the hand of one owner to that of another. He himself is a commodity, but his labor is not his commodity. The serf sells only a portion of his labor. He does not receive his wages from the owner of the soil; rather the owner of the soil receives a tribute from him. The serf belongs to the soil, and to the lord of the soil he brings its fruits. The free laborer on the other hand, sells himself, and that by fractions. From day to day he sells by auction, eight, ten, twelve, fifteen hours of his life to the highest bidder—to the owner of the raw material, the instruments of work and the means of life; that is, to the employer. The laborer himself belongs neither to an owner nor to the soil; but eight, ten, twelve, fifteen hours of his daily life belong to the man who buys them. The laborer leaves the employer to whom he has hired himself when ever he pleases; and the employer discharges him