458 LABOUR, WAGES, AND TRADES* UNIONS. 



nature so simple, they first deemed as unworthy, and soon found an 

 impossible task ; but that which they could not simplify they have suc- 

 ceeded in elevating into some degree of doubt arid mystery. By 

 their theories not only have they rendered the subject itself one of 

 some difficulty and complexness, but have so hemmed round the very 

 portals to their speculative labyrinth with the niceties of definition., 

 and distinctions, certainly " more nice than wise," that few thinking 

 minds can pursue the inquiries they offer without doubting at the 

 very outset upon matters which are wholly unimportant if not irre- 

 levant to the subject. If our readers will take the trouble of open- 

 ing any one of the treatises hitherto published upon this subject, they 

 will find that the best half of the book is occupied by discussions of 

 the above description, which have no concern with the facts or prin- 

 ciples of the study itself, but only with the import of a few words, 

 simple in themselves, which are attempted thus to be elevated into a 

 technical preciseness. It is worthy also of remark that no two writers 

 are found to agree upon the meaning of any one of these terms, and 

 the consequence is that their several disciples are not only distracted 

 by the verbal obscurity of their respective teachers at the very outset, 

 but can have no community of sentiment between themselves, being 

 deprived of a community of expression. A recent writer upon the 

 subject,* who pretends to treat it in an especially popular manner, 

 has not only encumbered his pages with a conflicting statement of all 

 the definitions under which the study has been obscured by every 

 writer from the time of Adam Smith to M'Culloch ; but, as if that 

 were not enough to impress his readers with the difficulties of the 

 inquiry, has added, of his own free will, a series of what he is 

 pleased to call " axiomatic principles/' by which all the homely 

 operations and the homely resources of mankind are pretended to be 

 regulated. Suffice it to say of this attempt first, that the " axiomatic 

 principles" in question are not <e axiomatic" at all, inasmuch as 

 many of them, so far from being self-evident, are easily controverti- 

 ble ; secondly, that many of them are not at all applicable to the 

 nature of the subject; and, lastly, that none of them are attempted 

 to be used as principles of argument in the few really " economical" 

 discussions which follow. The failure of this work, we believe, has 

 fully shown the absurdity of attempting to elevate into a science, in 

 the usual acceptation of the term, a study so simple in its truths, yet 

 heterogeneous in its materials, and so irresponsible in its various 

 agents as that of political economy. 



We are aware that it has been attempted by another writer t to re- 

 present the truths of political economy in their truly homely and 

 simple vigour, by means of illustrative fiction. These publications 

 have fallen into a vast number of hands, and have undoubtedly done 

 much towards familiarizing the subject : how far they are free from 

 error in their doctrine, we will not now inquire. It has been thought, 

 however, that the field is yet open to another class of labourers, who, 

 without the adornments of fiction or romance, should endeavour to 

 present the grand truths of the subject before the eyes of those who 



* Mr. Poulett Scrope. f Miss Maitineau. 



