Jean-Baptiste Say Quotes
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What would people think of a tradesman, that was to give a ball in his shop, hire performers, and hand refreshments about, with a view to benefit his business?
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To have never done anything but make the eighteenth part of a pin, is a sorry account for a human being to give of his existence.
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The entrepreneur shifts economic resources out of an area of lower and into an area of higher productivity and greater yield.
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The property a man has in his own industry, is violated, whenever he is forbidden the free exercise of his faculties or talents, except insomuch as they would interfere with the rights of third parties.
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Freedoms and apprenticeships are likewise expedients of police,not of that wholesome branch of police, whose object is the maintenance of the public and private security, and which is neither costly nor vexatious; but of that sort of police which bad governments employ to preserve or extend their personal authority at any expense.
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The command of a large sum is a dangerous temptation to a national administration. Though accumulated at their expense, the people rarely, if ever profit by it: yet in point of fact, all value, and consequently, all wealth, originates with the people.
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Capital can seldom be made productive, without undergoing several changes both of form and of place, the risk of which is always more or less alarming to persons unaccustomed to the operations of industry; whereas, on the contrary, landed property produces without any change of either quality or position.
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And let no government imagine, that, to strip them of the power of defrauding their subjects, is to deprive them of a valuable privilege. A system of swindling can never be long lived, and must infallibly in the end produce much more loss than profit.
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I'il n'est pas en notre pouvoir de changer la nature des choses. Il faut les йtudier telles qu'elles sont.
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What is the motive which operates in every man's breast to counteract the impulse towards the gratification of his wants and appetites?
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The haggardness of poverty is everywhere seen contrasted with the sleekness of wealth, the exhorted labour of some compensating for the idleness of others, wretched hovels by the side of stately colonnades, the rags of indigence blended with the ensigns of opulence; in a word, the most useless profusion in the midst of the most urgent wants.
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The United States will have the honour of proving experimentally, that true policy goes hand in hand with moderation and humanity.
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The love of domination never attains more than a factitious elevation, that is sure to make enemies of all its neighbours.
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The government has, in all countries, a vast influence, in determining the character of the national consumption; not only because it absolutely directs the consumption of the state itself, but because a great proportion of the consumption of individuals is gained by its will and example.
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The manner in which things exist and take place, constitutes what is called the nature of things; and a careful observation of the nature of things is the sole foundation of all truth.
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Nothing can be more idle than the opposition of theory to practice!
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capital cannot be more beneficially employed, then in strengthening and aiding the productive powers of nature.
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The sea and wind can at the same time convey my neighbour's vessel and my own.
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The day will come, sooner or later, when people will wonder at the necessity of taking all this trouble to expose the folly of a system, so childish and absurd, and yet so often enforced at the point of a bayonet.
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When war becomes a trade, it benefits, like all other trades, from the division of labour.
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Still how unenlightened and ignorant are the very nations we term civilized!
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No human being has the faculty of originally creating matter, which is more than nature itself can do. But any one may avail himself of the agents offered him by nature, to invest matter with utility.
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The best scheme of finance is, to spend as little as possible; and the best tax is always the lightest.
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A science only advances with certainty, when the plan of inquiry and the object of our researches have been clearly defined; otherwise a small number of truths are loosely laid hold of, without their connexion being perceived, and numerous errors, without being enabled to detect their fallacy.
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A treasure does not always contribute to the political security of its possessors. It rather invites attack, and very seldom is faithfully applied to the purpose for which it was destined.
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Opulent, civilized, and industrious nations, are greater consumers than poor ones, because they are infinitely greater producers.
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The quantity of money, which is readily parted with to obtain a thing is called its price.
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Alas, how many have been persecuted for the wrong of having been right?
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It is doubtless very desirable, that private persons should have a correct knowledge of their personal interests; but it must be infinitely more so, that governments should possess that knowledge.
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To the labor of man alone Smith ascribes the power of producing values. This is an error. A more exact analysis demonstrates... that all the values are derived from the operation of labor, or rather from the industry of man, combined with the operation of those agents which nature and capital furnish him.
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