[4] Along with A System of Logic, Principles of Political Economy established Mill's reputation as a leading public intellectual.

Devoid of the mathematical graphs and formulae that were only developed after his death, principally by Alfred Marshall, Mill wrote with the rich tone of grandeur that is found in all his books.

His book continued to be used well into the twentieth century as the foundational textbook, for instance in Oxford University until 1919.

Man has found a way to harness nature, so that "the muscular action necessary for this is not constantly renewed, but performed once for all, and there is on the whole a great economy of labour."

"He refers to former French Economists and Adam Smith, who thought land rents were higher because there was more nature being provided.

In order that the whole remuneration of the labourers should be advanced to them in daily or weekly payments, there must exist in advance, and be appropriated to productive use, a greater stock, or capital, than would suffice to carry on the existing extent of production: greater, by whatever amount of remuneration the labourers receive, beyond what the self-interest of a prudent slave-master would assign to his slaves.

"In his third book, Mill addressed one of the issues left unresolved by David Ricardo's theory of comparative advantage, namely to whom the gains of trade were distributed.

"I confess I am not charmed with the ideal of life held out by those who think that the normal state of human beings is that of struggling to get on; that the trampling, crushing, elbowing, and treading on each other's heels, which form the existing type of social life, are the most desirable lot of human kind, or anything but the disagreeable symptoms of one of the phases of industrial progress.

The necessary tasks mentioned include the protection of citizens from invasion, the safety of domestic life, and regulations on private property and the resources it produces.

[7] He states that the government must be cautious when intervening in economic issues to avoid disrupting the natural demand for freedom between consumers and producers to trade, he mentions this again when referring to the long-run negative impact of protectionism.

However, he also notes the potential benefits of government intervention, including the expansion and maintenance of markets through subsidized exploration and the construction of lighthouses.