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IV.—COMMERCE.

113

in any form: namely, that the farther your

neighbour lives from you, and the less he understands you, the more you are bound to be true in your dealings with him; because your power over him is greater in proportion to his ignorance, and his remedy more difficult in proportion to his distance.[1]

98. I have just said the breadth of sea increases the cost of exchange. Now note that exchange, or commerce, in itself, is always costly; the sum of the value of the goods being diminished by the cost of their conveyance, and by the maintenance of the persons employed in it; so that it is only when there is advantage to both producers (in getting the one thing for the other) greater than the loss in conveyance, that the exchange is expedient. And it can only be justly conducted when the porters kept by the producers (commonly called merchants) expect mere pay, and not profit.[2] For in just commerce there are but three parties—the two persons or

  1. ↑ [I wish some one would examine and publish accurately the late dealings of the Governors of the Cape with the Caffirs.]
  2. ↑ [By "pay," I mean wages for labour or skill; by "profit," gain dependent on the state of the market.]
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