When a tree, a natural product, is felled, is society put into possession of no greater produce than that of the mere labour of the woodman? - Jean-Baptiste Say

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.

The best scheme of finance is, to spend as little as possible; and the best tax is always the lightest.

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.