he expresses great surprise that "so acute and sagacious a reasoner
should have maintained a doctrine so manifestly erroneous." "So far
indeed," says that gentleman--

"Is it from being true that nature does much for man in agriculture,
and nothing for manufactures, that the fact is more nearly the
reverse. There are no limits to the bounty of nature in manufactures;
but there are limits, and those not very remote, to her bounty in
agriculture. The greatest possible amount of capital might be
expended in the construction of steam-engines, or of any other sort
of machinery, and, after they had been multiplied indefinitely, the
last would be as prompt and efficient in producing commodities and
saving labour as the first. Such, however, is not the case with the
soil. Lands of the first quality are speedily exhausted; and it is
impossible to apply capital indefinitely even to the best soils,
without obtaining from it a constantly diminishing rate of
profit."--_Principles of Political Economy_.

The error here results from the general error of Mr. Ricardo's system,
which places the poor cultivator among the rich soils of the swamps
and river-bottoms, and sends his rich successors to the poor soils of
the hills,--being directly the reverse of what has happened in every
country of the world, in every county in England, and on every farm in
each and all of those counties.[138] Had he not been misled by the
idea of "the constantly increasing sterility of the soil," Mr.
McCulloch could not have failed to see that the only advantage
resulting from the use of the steam-engine, or the loom, or any other
machine in use for the conversion of the products of the earth, was,
that it diminished the quantity of labour required to be so applied,
and increased the quantity that might be given to the work of