Page:Malthus 1823 The Measure of Value.djvu/56

 A sixth result illustrated in the Table is the important distinction between cost and value. The two last columns show the value of a givenquantity of corn, and the value of the product of a given quantity of labour, under all the variations which may be supposed of fertility and corn wages. The difference between the numbers in the last column, and the uniform num ber expressing the value of labour, shows exactly the difference between the value of the labour which has been employed upon a production, or its cost, and the labour which that, production will command, or its natural, and exchangeable value; which, where profits and wages are alone concerned, must be exactly equal to the additional value occasioned by the amount of profits.

The reader will be aware that neither the preceding Table, nor any thing which has been said, tends in any degree to contradict the acknowledged truth that different kinds of labour are of very different natural and exchangeable value. It will be further allowed, that even the same kind of labour, and the kind which has been especially referred to, namely common agricultural labour, may, under partiqular circumstances, and in particular places, vary in value from a partial or temporary state