But if, instead of taking this course, the Lancashire capitalists and operatives want not to consume either cotton or anything else, but simply to _save_ and put up more mills and prepare more yarn and cloth, they will soon find they are attempting the impossible. Their new capital, and the fresh labour conjoined with it, can only be employed on condition that they or others shall increase their consumption of cotton goods. They themselves _ex hypothesi_ will not do so, and if the capitalists and operatives engaged in setting up the new cotton-mills, etc., will consent to do so, this only postpones the difficulty, unless we suppose a continuous erection of new mills, and a continuous application on the part of those who construct these mills of the whole of their profits and wages in demanding more cotton goods--a _reductio ad absurdum_. In short, cotton capitalists and operatives can only effect this saving and provide this increased employment of capital and labour on condition that either those engaged in erecting and working the new mills shall spend all their income in demanding cotton goods, or that other persons shall diminish the proportion of their incomes which hitherto they have saved, and shall apply this income in increased demand for cotton goods. Now if the same motives which induce Lancashire capitalists and workers to refuse to increase their present consumption _pari passu_ with the rate of production are generally operative, it will appear that capital and labour lie idle because those who are able to consume what they could produce are not willing to consume, but desire to postpone consumption--_i.e._, to save.