496 TRANSACTIONS OP SECTION F. 



richer by increasing its taxes. A public debt as the Midas of the eighteenth 

 century is as much a fairy tale as the modern conception of taxation as a 

 species of 'manna falling on the country in a fertilising shower.' Naturally 

 there ivas a reaction from the magic claimed for a state debt, and the opposed 

 type of thought urged that supplies, even fur war, should be raised during the 

 period in which the expense is incurred. The citation by John Stuart Mill of 

 a passage from Chalmers, in which the latter view is expressed, is almost the 

 only echo of this controversy in more recent times. During the last fifty years, 

 if a few occasional writings, such as those of the late Sir R. Giffen ' On Consols 

 in a Great War,' ' be excepted, our standard economic works have scarcely 

 anything to say on war, and there is nothing which can be construed into a pre- 

 paration for hostilities. 



But the cultivation of peace by British economists in avoiding the study of the 

 mobilisation of national resources for war has not merely been negative ; it was 

 also positive in proving the advantages of peace and the tendency of enlightened 

 economic views to promote it. More than two hundred years ago Sir Dudley 

 North wrote that ' the whole world as to trade is but as one nation or people, 

 and therein nations are as persons. The loss of trade with one nation is not 

 that only, separately considered, but so much of the trade of the world 

 rescinded and lost, for all is combined together.' ^ In the same spirit David 

 Hume urged that ' our domestic industry cannot be hurt by the greatest 

 prosperity of our neighbours.' * Before the end of the eighteenth century men 

 of open mind not only recognised that war was a great evil, but also that there 

 was nothing in international commercial relations to cause it or justify it. 

 And so Burke spoke of the condemnation of war as a commonplace and ' the 

 easiest of all topics.' Even victory accompanied by substantial material gains 

 is described by Hamilton as but 'a temporary and illusive benefit.' In one 

 passage he writes : 'The emphatic epithet of "the Scourge of God" has been 

 aptly bestowed upon the extensive warrior. . . . Riches, thus collected, no more 

 resemble riches acquired by industry in advancing the happiness of the nation 

 than the mirth of intoxication is worthy of being compared to the permanent 

 flow of spirits which health and activity confer.'* The undercurrent of the 

 work of all the great British economists has been ever on the side of peace. 

 Adam Smith suggested measures to prevent wars being undertaken wantonly.* 

 Ricardo shows how free commerce ' diffuses general benefit and binds together 

 by one common tie of interest and intercourse the universal society of nations 

 throughout the civilised world.' ' It would be wearisome to multiply quotations 

 from the long line of great writers, for already enough has been said to prove 

 that the encom-agement of the best possible relations with other countries has 

 always been a prominent feature of their teaching. 



Tliis conclusion leads on to the discussion of a new problem. May it not 

 be urged that British economists have been either too selfish or too idealistic — 

 too selfish in inculcating material welfare as an end to the neglect of those 

 national interests which are now seen to be vital, or too idealistic in seeking a 

 cosmopolitan golden age which has proved to be but a dream? That is in fact, 

 have not our economists in their devotion to peace neglected the economic pre- 

 paration for war? While it is true that the essential teaching of the master 

 minds has been thoroughly pacific, at the same time they recognised that, 

 while war was an evil, both to the world and to us, it was one that might be 

 forced upon the nation. But it would be a dangerous error to conclude froni the 

 rare mention of warfare in our economic literature that economists had no idea.s 

 upon the subject. Adam Smith has shown with considerable detail that the 



> Woil.". ii., pp. 189-203. The calculation wa.s that Consols would fall 

 To per cent, at the opening of hostilities. The fixing of a minimum price 

 during the first months of the war has made it impossible to confirm or refute 

 Giffen's forecast. 



^ Discourses upon Trade (1691), p. viii. 



^ Essays, i., p. 347. 



* Progress of Society (1830), p. 411. 



° Wealth of Nations (ed. Cannan), ii., p. 411. 

 Works, pp. 76, 160. 



