272 THE NATURE AND CAUSES Of

a third the day thereafter, the amount of the metal pieceswhich annually circulate in any country, must always be ofmuch less value than the whole money pensions annuallypaid with them. But the power of purchasing, or the goodswhich can successively be bought with the whole of thosemoney pensions as they are successively paid, must alwaysbe precisely of the same value with those pensions; as mustlikewise be the revenue of the different persons to whom theyare paid. That revenue, therefore, cannot consist in thosemetal pieces, of which the amount is so much inferior to itsvalue, but in the power of purchasing, in the goods whichcan successively be bought with them as they circulate fromhand to hand.

Money, therefore, the great wheel of circulation, the greatinstrument of commerce, like all other instruments of trade,though it wakes a part, and a very valuable part, of the ca-pital, makes no part of the revenue of the society to which itbelongs; and though the metal pieces of which it is com-posed, in the course of their annual circulation, distribute toevery man the revenue which properly belongs to him, theymake themselves no part of that revenue.

Thirdly, and lastly, the machines and instruments of trade,&c. which compose the fixed capital, bear this further resem-blance to that part of the circulating capital which consists inmoney; that as every saving in the expense of erecting andsupporting those machines which does not diminish the pro-ductive powers of labour, is an improvement of the neat re-venue of the society ; so every saving in the expense of col-lecting and supporting that part of the circulating capitalwhich consists in money, is an improvement of exactly thesame kind.

It is sufficiently obvious, and it has partly too been ex-plained already, in what manner every saving in the expenseof supporting the fixed capital is an improvement ot the neatrevenue of the society. The whole capital of the undertakerof every work is necessarily divided between his fixed andhis circulating capital. While his own capital remains thesame, the smaller the one part, the greater must necessarilybe the other. It is the circulating capital which furnishesthe materials and wages of labour, and puts industry into mo-tion. Every saving, therefore, in the expense of maintainingthe fixed capital, which does not diminish the productivepowers of labour, must increase the fund which puts industry