They are the two following—namely, that the increase of value which a cask of wine acquires, by being kept a certain number of years untouched in a cellar, is occasioned by the increased quantity of labour employed upon it; and that an oak tree of a hundred years’ growth, worth 25_l._, which may not have been touched by man, beast, or machine for a century, derives its whole value from labour. Mr. Macculloch acknowledges that Mr. Ricardo was inclined to modify his grand principle, that the exchangeable value of commodities depended on the quantity of labour required for their production, so far as to allow that the additional exchangeable value that is sometimes given to commodities, by keeping them after they have been purchased or produced until they become fit to be used, was not to be considered as an effect of labour, but as an equivalent for the profits which the capital laid out on the commodities would have yielded had it been actually employed.[41] This was looking at the subject in the true point of view, and showing that he would not get out of the difficulty by changing the meaning of the term labour; but Mr. Macculloch says— “I confess, however, notwithstanding the hesitation I cannot but feel in differing from so great an authority, that I see no good reason for making this exception. Suppose, to illustrate the principle, that a cask of new wine, which cost 50_l._, is put into a cellar, and that at the end of twelve months it is worth 55_l._, the question is, whether ought the 5_l._ of additional value given to the wine to be considered as a compensation for the time the 50_l._ worth of capital has been locked up, or ought it to be considered as the value of additional labour actually laid out on the wine. I think that it ought to be considered in the latter point of view, and for this, as it appears to me a most satisfactory and conclusive reason, that if we keep a commodity, as a cask of wine which has not arrived at maturity, and on which therefore _a change or effect is to be produced_, it will be possessed of additional value at the year’s end; whereas, had we kept a cask of wine which had _already arrived at maturity_, and on which no beneficial or desirable effect could be produced for a hundred or a thousand years, it would not have been worth a single additional farthing. This seems to prove incontrovertibly that the additional value acquired by the wine during the period it has been kept in the cellar is not a compensation or return for time, but for the effect or change that has been produced on it. Time cannot of itself produce any effect, it merely affords space for really efficient causes to operate; and it is therefore clear, that it can have nothing to do with the value.”[42]