VOLUME III, SEMESTER 2, CHAPTER 25, SECTION 3
Sole Sale, One Decree, Only I May Sell
The third move comes. This move is the most labor-sparing. It needs no buying, no contending, no enduring, and it need not even issue a written paper to anyone, it wants only a decree. And this one decree bares, of these three moves, that root underneath cleanest. This section digs it out. Dug out, the meaning this whole chapter sets stands up too.
One. The shape of this move
The third move, one line: a decree comes down, this thing, only I may sell. See clear its difference from the first two moves. The first, monopoly, must gather five houses into one, must spend money, must spend time, must contend. The second, patent and franchise, must have a written paper, and the paper must have a reason: he thought it up, or he was chosen. The third, nothing at all is needed.
A decree, posted up, from now on, this thing, another may not sell. Then, why will anyone submit? Because the one who issues this decree has other things in hand. This layer, remember it to the death, this is the door of this whole chapter.
Two. Why, of all things, salt
Dynasty after dynasty, the thing this move was used on most is salt. Think a moment: why salt? Not silk, not tea, not jade. Because salt has three tempers other things do not have. The first, everyone wants it. The emperor must eat salt, the beggar must eat salt too, three days without salt and a person cannot walk the road. The second, the amount is very small. The salt one person eats in a year is not much. The third, the sources are very few. Salt comes out only in a few places: the seaside, the salt well, the salt lake. Set these three together and look: everyone wants it, so no one can dodge it, the amount small, so raise the price a little and no one will cry out, the sources few, so guard those few mouths and you guard all under heaven. This is a thing born fit to be rung in.
Three. That debate quarreled to this day
Last semester, chapter six, spoke of that one in 81 BC, when a quarrel broke out in the court. One side said: this move cannot be abolished, the treasury needs money, the border needs troops, troops need grain and armor, where do these monies come from? Salt and iron to the official, and the money comes, and the people need not pay one cent more in tax.
The other side said: it will not do, the official doing trade makes a thing dear and bad both, and the salt the people must eat is several times the former price, and besides, the official once come down onto the field is no longer that one governing the rule, it has become the one come down to do trade. See clear these two sides, neither is a bad person: one guards the life of the state, one guards the pot of the people. That quarrel done, at the last a usable arrangement was pieced together: iron loosed in part, salt still governed. Two thousand years passed, this quarrel is, in truth, still being quarreled.
Four. This move’s deepest layer: it is itself a kind of sealing
Now dig out the root of this move, sit up straight. Ask one line: a decree, by what can it make all submit? You build a wall at the village mouth, you can push it down at night, you issue a paper saying only you may do it, another can ignore you and do his own in copy. Yet a decree comes down, and you say, I ignore it, will that do? It will not.
Why? Because behind that decree stands not a merchant, but a position that can fine you, can seize you, can shut your shop. See clear: this move leans, at root, not on the economy, it leans on another thing, and that thing is the character volume four of this book will speak of: sealing. This move is not made scarcity by money, this move is: by power, a line is drawn, and the ones on that side of the line may not come in. It is, itself, a kind of sealing.
Five. Three moves gathered, the root bared
Three moves gathered, look at them side by side once. The first, monopoly: gather what many houses could do into one house. The second, patent and franchise: a written paper, ring in what all may use. The third, sole sale: a decree, only I may sell. Look at these three moves, each more labor-sparing than the last: the first must contend, the second must have a reason, the third needs nothing.
Look again: each move, nearer to what? Nearer to power. The first could still be done leaning on money, the second must have someone to approve, the third is straightaway a decree. This is the deepest stroke of this whole chapter, copy it down: the road of making scarcity, walked to the innermost, the root is not in the economy. Monopoly must have power backing it, patent and franchise must have someone approve, sole sale is itself a decree. This semester has spoken all along of the economy, yet this chapter dug to the bottom, and what was dug out is not the economy.
Six. The meaning this chapter sets, crossing to the next
This whole chapter is walked through. Three moves set out: monopoly, gathering what many houses could do into one house, patent and franchise, a written paper ringing in a notion, a trade, sole sale, a decree, only I may sell. The merit of the three moves, wiped one by one: some matters only one house can afford, guard not those ten years and no one will go make a new medicine, the treasury needs money and the border needs troops. The cost of the three moves, wiped one by one too: the price is his to say, he need no longer grow better, that door is locked from the inside, the one who cannot afford the medicine kept outside. And the root, one line only: making scarcity walked to the innermost leans not on money, but on power.
Speaking to here, that breath of anger in the heart has been gathering two chapters: the wall of the last chapter, these three moves of this one, likely it would say, those people who build walls, are they bad people? The first section of the next chapter handles this breath to its face. A word of warning: this volume from beginning to end does one thing only, set out positions, hand down no verdict, and to today, having set out to here, it has not judged one person, and the next chapter will not either.
Credit to the ancestors; the mistakes are mine: Tiger Lyon.
Chapter 26: Living Capital, Living Economy, and That Boundary