[Footnote 220-3: If the hoarding takes place in a time of superfluity, and the restitution of the stores in a time of want, there is of course no detrimental disturbance, but on the contrary the consequence is a beneficent equilibrium of prices. This is the fundamental idea in the storage of wheat.]
[Footnote 220-4: In the construction of national buildings, etc., we have the following course of things: compulsory contributions made by taxpayers, or an invitation to the national creditors to desist somewhat from their usual amount of consumption, and to employ what is saved in the building of canals, roads etc. In France, for instance, after 1835, 100,000,000 francs per annum. (_M. Chevalier_, Cours, I, 109.) The higher and middle classes of England saved, not without much trouble, however, between 1844 and 1858, £134,500,000 in behalf of railway construction. _Tooke-Newmarch_.]
[Footnote 220-5: Such savings have sometimes been prescribed by the state. In ancient Athens many prohibitions of consumption in order to allow the productive capital to first attain a certain height. Thus it was forbidden to slaughter sheep until they had lambed, or before they were shorn. (_Athen._, IX, 375, I. 9.) Similarly the old prohibition of the exportation of figs. (Ibid., III, 74.) Compare Petit. Leges. Atticae, V, 3. _Boeckh_, Staatshaushaltung, I, 62 seq.]
[Footnote 220-6: The process of the transformation of savings from a money-income, in a money-economy (_Geldwirthschaft_), into other products, more closely analyzed in _v. Mangoldt_, V. W. L., 152 ff.]
It may be seen from the foregoing, that the mere saving of capital, if the nation is to be really enriched thereby, has its limits. Every consumer likes to extend his consumption-supply and his capital in use (_Gebrauchskapitalien_); but not beyond a certain point.[221-1] Besides, as trade becomes more flourishing, smaller stores answer the same purpose. And no intelligent man can desire his productive capital increased except up to the limit that he expects a larger market for his enlarged production. What merchant or manufacturer is there who would rejoice or consider himself enriched, if the number of his customers and their desire to purchase remaining the same, he saw his stores of unsaleable articles increase every year by several thousands?