he confidently drew from it the consequence, that in no case could taxation fall on the laborer, since—­living, as a normal state of things, on the lowest possible stipend adequate to maintain him and his family—­he would inevitably, he argued, transfer the burden to his employer; and a tax nominally on wages would in the result become invariably a tax upon profits.  On this point Mill’s doctrine leads to conclusions directly opposed to Ricardo’s, and to those of most preceding economists.  And it will illustrate his position as a thinker, in relation to them, if we note how this result was obtained.  Mill neither denied the premises nor disputed the logic of Ricardo’s argument:  he accepted both; and in particular he recognized fully the force of the principle of population; but he took account of a further premise which Ricardo had overlooked, and which, duly weighed, led to a reversal of Ricardo’s conclusion.  The minimum of wages, even such as it exists in the case of the worst-paid laborer, is not the very least sum that human nature can subsist upon:  it is something more than this; in the case of all above the worst-paid class it is decidedly more.  The minimum is, in truth, not a physical but a moral minimum, and as such, is capable of being altered with the changes in the moral character of those whom it affects.  In a word, each class has a certain standard of comfort below which it will not consent to live, or at least to multiply,—­a standard, however, not fixed, but liable to modification with the changing circumstances of society, and which, in the case of a progressive community, is, in point of fact, constantly rising, as moral and intellectual influences are brought more and more effectually to bear on the masses of the people.  This was the new premise brought by Mill to the elucidation of the wages question; and it sufficed to change the entire aspect of human life regarded from the point of view of political economy.  The practical deductions made from it were set forth in the celebrated chapter on “The Future of the Industrial Classes,”—­a chapter which it is no exaggeration to say places a gulf between Mill and all who preceded him, and opens an entirely new vista to economic speculation.

The doctrine of the science with which Mill’s name has been most prominently associated within the last few years is that which relates to the economic nature of land, and the consequences to which this should lead in practical legislation.  It is very commonly believed, that on this point Mill has started aside from the beaten highway of economic thought, and propounded views wholly at variance with those generally entertained by orthodox economists.  No economist need be told that this is an entire mistake.  In truth, there is no portion of the economic field in which Mill’s originality is less conspicuous than in that which deals with the land.  His assertion of the peculiar nature of landed property, and again