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SEC. I.] eminent. They have confined wealth or riches to the neat produce derived from the land, and in so doing they have greatly diminished the value of their inquiries in reference to the most familiar and accustomed sense in which the term wealth is understood.

Among the definitions which have extended the meaning of the term wealth too far, Lord Lauderdale's may be taken as an example. He defines wealth to be, "All that man desires as useful and delightful to him."

This definition obviously includes every thing whether material or intellectual, whether tangible or otherwise, which contributes to the advantage or pleasure of mankind, and of course includes the benefits and gratifications derived from religion, from morals, from political and civil liberty, from oratory, from instructive and agreeable conversation, from music, dancing, acting, and all personal qualities and services. It is certain, however, that an inquiry into the nature and causes of all these kinds of wealth, would not only extend beyond the bounds of any single science, but would occasion so great a change in the use of common terms as to introduce the utmost confusion into the language of political economists. It would be impossible to form any judgment of the state of a country from the use of the terms rich or richer. A nation might be said to be increasing in wealth, when to all common eyes, and in all common language, it might be growing poorer. This would be the case, according to the definition, if a diminution of the manufacturing and mercantile products had been balanced in the opinions of some persons by the gratifications derived from the intellectual attainments, and the various personal qualities and services of the inhabitants. But how is this balance to be ascertained? how is it possible to estimate the degree of wealth derived from these sources? Yet it is quite obvious that we cannot practically apply any discussions respecting the relative increase in the wealth of different nations, without having some