Page:Reflections on the Formation and the Distribution of Riches by Anne Turgot.djvu/83

56 price of the products of the earth; the surplus serves the Cultivator for paying the Proprietor for the permission he has given him to make use of his field for setting his enterprise on foot. This is the price of the lease, the revenue of the Proprietor, the net produce; for all the land produces, up to the exact amount of the advances of every kind and of the profits of every kind due to him who has made the advances, cannot be regarded as a revenue, but only as the return of the expenses of cultivation; when one considers that, if the Cultivator did not get them back, he would take care not to employ his riches and his toil in cultivating the field of another.

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The competition of Capitalist Undertakers in agriculture establishes the current price of leases, & farming on a large scale. The competition of rich Undertakers in agriculture fixes the current price of leases in proportion to the fertility of the land and the price at which its products are sold, always according to the calculation the Farmers make, both of their expenses and of the profits they ought to draw from their advances: they cannot give the Proprietor more than the surplus. But, when the competition among them is very keen, they give him all this surplus, the Proprietor only letting his land to him who offers the highest rent.