Frédéric Bastiat：Economic Sophisms, Excerpt 55

I. To level and equalize the conditions of labour is not simply to cramp exchanges in certain branches of trade, it is to attack exchange in its principle, for its principle rests upon that very diversity, upon those very inequalities of fertility, aptitude, climate, and temperature, which you desire to efface. If Guienne sends wine to Brittany, and if Brittany sends corn to Guienne, it arises from their being placed under different conditions of production. Is there a different law for international exchanges? To urge against international exchanges that inequality of conditions which gives rise to them, and explains them, is to argue against their very existence. If protectionists had on their side sufficient logic and power, they would reduce men, like snails, to a state of absolute isolation. Moreover, there is not one of their sophisms which, when submitted to the test of rigorous deductions, does not obviously tend to destruction and annihilation.

Source： https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44145
Locator：Excerpt 55 · Verified：2026-10-19 · Verification：Short excerpt

公版作品；原文逐字取自 Project Gutenberg，仅摘录段落并附全书链接。

This text is in the public domain. The edition and source link are above. Copyright

← Back to the library