66. Fourth employment of capitals, in advances for
enterprises of commerce. Necessity of the interposition of
merchants, properly so called, between the producers of the
commodities and the consumers.
The undertakers either in cultivation or manufacture, draw
their advances and profits only from the sale of the fruits of
the earth, or the commodities fabricated. It is always the wants
and the ability of the consumer that sets the price on the sale;
but the consumer does not want the produce prepared or fitted up
at the moment of the crop, or the perfection of the work.
However, the undertakers want their stocks immediately and
regularly reimbursed, to embark in fresh enterprises: the
manuring and the seed ought to succeed the crops without
interruption. The workmen of a manufacture are unceasingly to be
employed in beginning other works, in proportion as the first are
distributed, and to replace the materials in proportion as they
are consumed. It would not be advisable to stop short in an
enterprize once put in execution, nor is it to be presumed that
it can be begun again at any time. It is then the strictest
interest of the undertaker, to have his capital quickly
reimbursed by the sale of his crop or commodities. On the other
hand, it is the consumers interest to find, when and where he
wishes it, the things he stands in need of it would be extremely
inconvenient for him to be necessitated to make, at the time of
the crop, his provision for the whole course of a year. Among the
objects of usual consumption, there are many that require long
and expensive labours, labours that cannot be undertaken with
profit, except on a large quantity of materials, and on such as
the consumption of a small number of inhabitants of a limited
district, may not be sufficient for even the sale of the work of
a single manufactory. Undertakings of this kind must then
necessarily be in a reduced number, at a considerable distance
from each other, and consequently very distant from the
habitations of the greater number of consumers. There is no man,
not oppressed under the extremest misery, that is not in a
situation to consume several things, which are neither gathered
nor fabricated, except in places considerably distant from him,
and not less distant from each other. A person that could not
procure himself the objects of his consumption but in buying it
directly from, the hand of him that gathers or works it, would be
either unprovided with many commodities, or pass his life in
wandering after them.
This double interest which the person producing and the
consumer have, the former to find a purchaser, the other to find
where to purchase, and yet not to waste useful time in expecting
a purchaser, or in finding a seller, has given the idea to a
third person to stand between the one and the other. And it is
the object of the mercantile profession, who purchase goods from
the hands of the person who produces them, to store them in
warehouses, whither the consumer comes to make his purchase. By
these means the undertaker, assured of the sale and the
re-acquisition of his funds, looks undisturbed and indefatigably
out for new productions, and the consumer finds within his reach
and at once, the objects of which he is in want.
