Dissertation on Value, c. vii. p. 140. Footnote 79: Dissertation on Value, c. vi. p. 145. Footnote 80: It has always been a matter of great surprise to me that I should have been accused of _arbitrarily_ adopting labour as the measure of value. If there be not a most marked and characteristic distinction between labour and any _product_ of labour, I do not know where a characteristic distinction between two objects is to be found; and surely I have stated this distinction often enough, and brought forward the peculiar qualities of labour as my reasons for thinking that it may be taken as a measure of value. Opinions may differ as to the sufficiency of these reasons, or as to the degree of accuracy with which it will serve the purpose of a measure. But how it can be said that I have adopted it arbitrarily, is quite unintelligible to me. If I had merely stated, that I had adopted it because it was the main element in the natural costs of production, there could have been no ground for such a charge. Footnote 81: Dissertation on Value, c. vii. p. 148. Footnote 82: Dissertation on Value, c. vii. p. 150. Footnote 83: On the Production of Wealth, c. i. p. 56. Footnote 84: I am very ready to include myself among those political economists who have not been sufficiently attentive to this subject. Footnote 85: If in a foreign country, in which the relation of money to men and labour was unknown to us, we were told that a quarter of corn was selling for four ounces of silver, we should not know whether there was a famine, and corn was held in the highest estimation, or whether there was a glut of corn, and it was held in the lowest estimation. The very term estimation, as applied to commodities, must of necessity refer to man and labour. Footnote 86: It is a truth fruitful in important consequences, that the labour which commodities will command when in their natural state, by representing accurately the quantity of labour and profits necessary to produce them, must represent accurately the effectual demand for them. And this holds good at different places and times, referring of course to the labour of the same description at each place and time. Footnote 87: What could give us any information respecting the scarcity of a commodity in China, or the state of its supply as compared with the demand, but a reference to Chinese labour? Footnote 88: Principles of Polit. Econ., c. i. s. i. p. 5. 3d edit. Footnote 89: M. Say’s comprehensive expression, “_Services productifs_,” includes profits and rents as well as labour; but it is certain that labour will measure accurately the value of the whole amount of these services. Footnote 90: If this concession be once made, the whole question respecting labour as a measure of value is at once decided. Footnote 91: C. xi. p. 232. Footnote 92: