PRINCIPLES OF TAXATION. 319 



to explain the guinea-pig's molars; and a microscope and a frog's 

 leg made real to them the circulation of the blood. 



In spite of the time required for the physiology, the fifth-year 

 children have about thirty lessons on minerals; the sixth-year, the 

 same number on plants; and the seventh-year, on animals; and it 

 would be difficult to decide which of these subjects rouses their great- 

 est enthusiasm. 



PKINCIPLES OF TAXATION.* 



By the Late Hon. DAVID A. WELLS. 



XX. THE LAW OF THE DIFFUSION OF TAXES. 



PART I. 



NO attempt ought to be made to construct or formulate an 

 economically correct, equitable, and efficient system of taxa- 

 tion which does not give full consideration to the method or extent to 

 which taxes diffuse themselves after their first incidence. On this 

 subject there is a great difference of opinion, which has occasioned, 

 for more than a century, a vast and never-ending discussion on the 

 part of economic writers. All of this, however, has resulted in no 

 generally accepted practical conclusions; has been truthfully charac- 

 terized by a leading French economist (M. Parieu) as marked in no 

 small part by the " simplicity of ignorance," and from a somewhat 

 complete review (recently published f) of the conflicting theories 

 advanced by participants one rises with a feeling of weariness and 

 disgust. 



The majority of economists, legislators, and the public generally 

 incline to the opinion that taxes mainly rest where they are laid, and 

 are not shifted or diffused to an extent that requires any recognition 



* It is fortunate that Mr. Wells had practically completed his essays on taxation 

 before death put an end to his activity. The manuscript of two chapters was found among 

 his papers — one on the Best Methods of Taxation, and the other on the Law of the Diffu- 

 sion of Taxes, begun in this number. The first manuscript has some pages missing, and 

 it has been thought best to postpone its publication, in the hope that the missing pages 

 may be found. It is evident that the last touches were yet to be put upon the chapter on 

 the diffusion of taxes — a chapter that was to sum up the theory of taxation developed by 

 the writer. So much of that summary is contained in it as to make the meaning of Mr. 

 Wells unmistakable, and its publication is further amply justified by the number of practical 

 illustrations and happy application of theory to fact, in the selection and explanation of 

 which the author excelled. The entire series, which has been running in the Popular Sci- 

 ence Monthly for more than three years, will now be collected in a volume — a worthy 

 memorial to one whose powers of popular exposition of abstract problems placed him 

 among the first of economists in the United States. 



f On the Shifting and Incidence of Taxation, by Prof. Edwin R. Seligman, 1892. 



