words by which they are habitually designated. Further, so long as the
pedantic objection to the introduction of new technical terms continues,
accurate thinkers on moral and political subjects are limited to a very
scanty vocabulary for the expression of their ideas. It therefore is of
great importance that the words with which mankind are familiar, should
be turned to the greatest possible advantage as instruments of thought;
that one word should not be used as the sign of an idea which is already
sufficiently expressed by another word; and that words which are
required to denote ideas of great importance, should not be usurped for
the expression of such as are comparatively insignificant.

The phrases _productive labour_, and _productive consumption_, have been
employed by some writers on political economy with very great latitude.
They have considered, and classed, as productive labour and productive
consumption, all labour which serves any _useful_ purpose--all
consumption which is not _waste_. Mr. M'Culloch has asserted, _totidem
verbis_, that the labour of Madame Pasta was as well entitled to be
called productive labour as that of a cotton spinner.

Employed in this sense, the words _productive_ and _unproductive_ are
superfluous, since the words _useful_ and _agreeable_ on the one hand,
_useless_ and _worthless_ on the other, are quite sufficient to express
all the ideas to which the words _productive_ and _unproductive_ are
here applied.

This use of the terms, therefore, is subversive of the ends of language.

Those writers who have employed the words in a more limited sense, have
usually understood by productive or unproductive labour, labour which is
productive of wealth, or unproductive of wealth. But what is wealth? And