Page:Malthus 1823 The Measure of Value.djvu/13

 We may also consider as a postulate which will be readily granted, that any given quantity of labour must be of the same value as the wages which command it, or for which it actually exchanges.

Of the two main elements of value, labour and profits, the former, particularly if w^e include, as we ought to do, accumulated as well as immediate labour, is much the largest and most powerful.

The great instrument of production is labour. There is no commodity nor implement used to assist manual exertions in which it does not enter as a condition of supply, and very few in which it does not enter very largely. If in the production of commodities and of the implements which assist in this production, no other ingredient were required than labour, and the interval between the exertion of the labour and its remuneration in the completed commodity were so inconsiderable that it might be entirely disregarded, it is certain that, as the same quantity of labour would have a constant tendency to produce commodities in the same relative proportion to each other, and to the demand for them, they would be found on an average to exchange with each other according to the