Essays on Political Economy | Page 6

"Give me
ten sixpences, I will give you a crown," adds, "You shall give me the
ten sixpences now, and I will give you the crown-piece _in a year_;" it
is very evident that this new proposition alters the claims and
advantages of the bargain; that it alters the proportion of the two
services. Does it not appear plainly enough, in fact, that Peter asks of
Paul a new and an additional service; one of a different kind? Is it not
as if he had said, "Render me the service of allowing me to use for my
profit, for a year, five shillings which belong to you, and which you
might have used for yourself?" And what good reason have you to
maintain that Paul is bound to render this especial service gratuitously;
that he has no right to demand anything more in consequence of this
requisition; that the State ought to interfere to force him to submit? Is it
not incomprehensible that the economist, who preaches such a doctrine
to the people, can reconcile it with his principle of _the reciprocity of
services_? Here I have introduced cash; I have been led to do so by a
desire to place, side by side, two objects of exchange, of a perfect and
indisputable equality of value. I was anxious to be prepared for
objections; but, on the other hand, my demonstration would have been
more striking still, if I had illustrated my principle by an agreement for
exchanging the services or the productions themselves.
Suppose, for example, a house and a vessel of a value so perfectly
equal that their proprietors are disposed to exchange them even-handed,
without excess or abatement. In fact let the bargain be settled by a
lawyer. At the moment of each taking possession, the shipowner says
to the citizen, "Very well; the transaction is completed, and nothing can
prove its perfect equity better than our free and voluntary consent. Our
conditions thus fixed, I shall propose to you a little practical
modification. You shall let me have your house to-day, but I shall not
put you in possession of my ship for a year; and the reason I make this
demand of you is, that, during this year of delay, I wish to use the
vessel." That we may not be embarrassed by considerations relative to
the deterioration of the thing lent, I will suppose the shipowner to add,
"I will engage, at the end of the year, to hand over to you the vessel in
the state in which it is to-day." I ask of every candid man, I ask of M.
Proudhon himself, if the citizen has not a right to answer, "The new
clause which you propose entirely alters the proportion or the equal

value of the exchanged services. By it, I shall be deprived, for the space
of a year, both at once of my house and of your vessel. By it, you will
make use of both. If, in the absence of this clause, the bargain was just,
for the same reason the clause is injurious to me. It stipulates for a loss
to me, and a gain to you. You are requiring of me a new service; I have
a right to refuse, or to require of you, as a compensation, an equivalent
service." If the parties are agreed upon this compensation, the principle
of which is incontestable, we can easily distinguish two transactions in
one, two exchanges of service in one. First, there is the exchange of the
house for the vessel; after this, there is the delay granted by one of the
parties, and the compensation correspondent to this delay yielded by
the other. These two new services take the generic and abstract names
of credit and interest. But names do not change the nature of things;
and I defy any one to dare to maintain that there exists here, when all is
done, a service for a service, or a reciprocity of services. To say that
one of these services does not challenge the other, to say that the first
ought to be rendered gratuitously, without injustice, is to say that
injustice consists in the reciprocity of services,--that justice consists in
one of the parties giving and not receiving, which is a contradiction in
terms.
To give an idea of interest and its mechanism, allow me to make use of
two or three anecdotes. But, first, I must say a few words upon capital.
There are some persons who imagine that capital is money, and this is
precisely the reason why they deny its productiveness; for, as M. Thoré
says, crowns are not endowed with the power of reproducing
themselves. But it is not true that capital and money are the same thing.
Before the discovery of