◆¹ But interest depends also on a reason that is yet stronger and more simple than these. The owner of Capital receives interest for the use of it, because it is, in the very nature of things, impossible to prevent its being offered him, and impossible to prevent his taking it. If a man who possesses _one hundred thousand pounds_, by using it as Capital makes _ten thousand pounds_ a year, and could, if he had the use of another _one hundred thousand pounds_, add another _ten thousand pounds_ to his income, no Government could prevent his making a bargain with a man who happened to possess the sum required, by which the latter, in return for lending him that sum, would obtain a part of the income which the use of it would enable him to produce. The most practical aspect of the matter, however, yet remains to be considered. I have spoken of interest as of a thing with whose nature we are all familiar. But let us pause and ask, What is it? It is merely a part of the product which active Ability is enabled to produce by means of its tool, Capital. It is the part given by the man who uses the tool to the man who owns it. But the tool, or Capital, is, as we have seen already, itself the product of the Ability of some man in the past; so that the payment of interest, whether theoretically just or no, is a question which concerns theoretically two parties only: the possessor of living Ability, and the possessor of the results of past Ability. Thus, whatever view we may happen to take about it, Labour, in so far as theoretical justice goes, has no concern in the matter, one way or the other. For if interest is robbery, it is Ability that is robbed, not Labour. [Sidenote ◆1 And whether interest be just or no, it at all events represents no injustice to Labour.] [Sidenote ◆2 For it will modify, though not extinguish, their desire to appropriate a part of what is paid as interest.]