But here is presented to us an ingenious machine, which cuts down the oak, squares it, makes it into staves, and, gathering these together, forms them into casks.

The obstacle is thus diminished, and with it the profits of the coopers.

We must prevent this.

Let us proscribe the machine! To sift thoroughly this sophism, it is sufficient to remember that human labor is not an _end_, but a _means_.

_It is never without employment._ If one obstacle is removed, it seizes another, and mankind is delivered from two obstacles by the same effort which was at first necessary for one.