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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



to take in the future. He has no spe- 

 cial theory to advocate, and he prom- 

 ises no speedy renovation of society if 

 only his advice be taken. He knows 

 too much to be a visionary ; he has too 

 firm a hold on the actual to be carried 

 away by the merely ideal or fanciful. 

 He finds no fatal flaw in the present so- 

 cial system ; he does not see, in fact, how, 

 given human nature as it is, things could 

 be very different from what they are. 

 At the same time he is an earnest be- 

 liever in progress ; but he thinks that 

 progress depends more npon individual 

 adaptation to necessary conditions of 

 existence than upon any cunningly con- 

 trived devices for an improved distri- 

 bution of the products of industry. In 

 a word, he is a man whom the devour- 

 er of contemporary socialistic romances 

 would tind a little dull, but whom the 

 practical man of business would find 

 both interesting and instructive in the 

 highest degree. As a large part of Mr. 

 "Wells's book appeared originally in the 

 pages of this magazine, we may pre- 

 sume that many of our readers have a 

 more or less vivid recollection of the 

 course of his argument. What Mr. "Wells 

 set himself chiefly to do was to trace to 

 its cause or causes the present disturbed 

 condition of the world from an eco- 

 nomic point of view. Given such a 

 problem, a writer who wished to create 

 an immediate sensation would bring 

 forward some theory about the land, or 

 about the currency, or about monopo- 

 lies, or about the waste involved in com- 

 petition, and would declare with much 

 emphasis and vainglory that he alone 

 had the true key to the whole situation. 

 Mr. Wells is more modest. All he pro- 

 fesses to see is that the rapid pace of 

 invention and discovery in the modern 

 world is sufficient to account for enor- 

 mous vicissitudes both in the money 

 market and in the labor market. Capi- 

 tal has been destroyed in huge blocks 

 and recreated by new methods; labor 

 has been forced to quit one employ- 

 ment after another and find new open- 



ings for itself. The course of business 

 has become more and more difficult to 

 calculate, and only the stronger heads 

 and more resolute wills have been able 

 to hold their own amid the changes and 

 chances of the hour. 



Mr. Wells does not deal in mere gener- 

 alities. He treats separately each aspect 

 of his subject, and under every head gives 

 facts in abundance — "modern instances," 

 as Shakespeare expresses it. He shows 

 what has been done in the way of open- 

 ing new routes ; and, in the case of the 

 Suez Canal, he traces to that one cause 

 the most momentous results as regards 

 the course of trade. He discusses very 

 fully the effects of the cheapening of 

 transportation by land and by sea, show- 

 ing how, to this cause, must be attrib- 

 uted much of the agricultural depression 

 existing in different parts of the world. 

 He dwells on the inventions and dis- 

 coveries by which manufactures have 

 been cheapened, and labor constantly 

 displaced and again provided for. He 

 shows how improved methods of farm- 

 ing render less efficient ones unprofit- 

 able, and how little good has been done 

 to the farming population by the home- 

 stead and other exceptional laws passed 

 for their benefit— nay, how they have 

 been injured by the overzeal of their 

 friends in the Legislature. He discusses 

 the effect of restrictions on trade, and 

 shows in what idle fashion the govern- 

 ments of the world, with one or two ex- 

 ceptions, handicap their own commerce 

 in the effort to injure that of their neigh- 

 bors, and how the effect of the whole 

 protectionist madness is simply to place 

 a heavy drag upon the industrial energy, 

 not to say upon the conscience, of man- 

 kind. We can not pretend, however, in 

 this place to give even the most rapid 

 summary of the contents of Mr. Wells's 

 volume. Suffice it at present to say that 

 he has described with great fullness and, 

 so far as we can judge, with great accu- 

 racy, the conditions under which the 

 business of the world is now being car- 

 ried on, and the circumstances that have 



