On Wealth The land is the source or matter from whence all wealth is produced. The labour of man is the form which produces it: and wealth in itself is nothing but the maintenance, conveniencies, and superfluities of life.
Land produces herbage, roots, corn, flax, cotton, hemp, shrubs and timber of several kinds, with divers sorts of fruits, bark, and foliage like that of the mulberry-tree for silkworms; it supplies mines and minerals. To all this the labour of man gives the form of wealth.
Rivers and seas supply fish for the food of man, and many other things for his enjoyment. But these seas and rivers belong to the adjacent lands or are common to all, and the labour of man extracts from them the fish and other advantages.
