6o2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



us the vistas of Nature — which read for us the story of the deep past, 

 or search out the laws of our physical or mental organization — what is 

 their practical importance as compared with the science which deals 

 with the conditions that alone make the cultivation of the others pos- 

 sible? Compare on this ground of practical utility the science of 

 political economy with all others, and its preeminence almost suggests 

 the reply of the Greek : " No, I can not play the fiddle ; but I can 

 tell you how to make of a little village a great and glorious city ! " 



How is it, then, it will naturally be asked, that a science so impor- 

 tant is so little regarded ? Our laws persistently violate its first and 

 plainest principles, and that the ignorance thus exemplified is not con- 

 fined to what are called the uneducated classes is shown by the debates 

 in our legislative bodies, the decisions of our courts, the speeches of our 

 party leaders, and the editorials of our newspapers. A century has 

 elapsed since Adam Smith published his " Wealth of Nations," and 

 sixty years since Ricardo enunciated his theory of rent. Yet not 

 only has political economy received no substantial improvement since 

 Ricardo, but, while thousands of new discoveries in other branches of 

 human knowledge have been eagerly sized and generally utilized, and 

 the most revolutionary conclusions of other sciences become part of 

 the accepted data of thought, the truths taught by political economy 

 seem to have made little real impression, and it is even now a matter 

 of debate whether there is, or can be, such a science at all. 



This can not be on account of the paucity of politico-economic 

 literature. Enough books have been wi'itten on the subject within 

 the last hundi'ed years to fill a large library, while all of our great 

 institutions of learning have some sort of a chair of political economy, 

 and matters of intense public interest in which the principles of the 

 science are directly involved are constantly being discussed. 



It seems to me that the reasons why political economy is so little 

 regarded are referable partly to the nature of the science itself and 

 partly to the manner in which it has been cultivated. 



In the first place, the very importance of the subjects with which 

 political economy deals raises obstacles in its way. The discoveries of 

 other sciences may challenge pernicious ideas, but the conclusions of 

 political economy involve pecuniary interests, and thus thrill directly 

 the sensitive pocket-nerve. For, as no social adjustment can exist 

 without interesting a larger or smaller class in its maintenance, politi- 

 cal economy at every point is apt to come in contact with some interest 

 or other which regards it as the silversmiths of Ephesus did those who 

 taught the uselessness of presenting shrines to Diana. Macaulay has 

 well said that, if any large pecuniary interest were concerned in deny- 

 ing the attraction of gravitation, that most obvious of physical facts 

 would not lack disputers. This is just the difiiculty that has beset and 

 still besets the progress of political economy. The man who is, or 

 who imagines that he is, interested in the maintenance of a protective 



