wisdom, are the concerns of God's highest work alone left to the blindest chance? Is there any principle, broad, simple, comprehensive, which can account for all this confusion, and reconcile these contradictions? If so, where is it to be found, to whom has it been revealed? While Physical Science has had its Newton, Physiology its Harvey, Philosophical Anatomy its Geoffroy Saint Hilaire, Paleontology its Cuvier, Chemistry its Lavoisier has the Newton of Social Science not yet appeared ?* An answer to this question will be vainly sought in European literature. The greatest of English economists, Adam Smith, while setting forth much of valuable truth, failed to reach the fundamental principle, and erred on many important points. England, however, has since his day far retrograded both in theory and practice; and in the monstrous doctrines of the Ricardo-Malthusian school, which attribute human suffering to error of an all-wise Creator, has initiated that which she herself so fitly terms "the dismal science," the "philosophy of despair;" while her literature for well nigh half a century bears constant witness to the existence of a need which it cannot supply, each writer testifying of evils the cause and remedy of which none appear to see. Nor have the writers of the continent been more successful, none of them having attained to any really fundamental truth. The editor of the following volume having, like so many others, long vainly sought light on this most interesting subject, first found it in the "Past, Present, and Future" of H. C. Carey. The principles there contained are enlarged, expanded, and corrected by the test of subsequent events in his "Principles of Social Science;" a work which, it is believed, no one capable of understanding it can carefully study without feeling that the Newton of Social Science has indeed appeared. It may, however, be asked :-If this be so, if the truth on this highest of sciences has indeed been discovered, how is See Histoire Naturelle Générale, by ISIDORE GEOFFROY SAINT HILAIRE, vol. i. p. 234. " it that mankind have not hailed it with a burst of enthusiastic welcome? that when it has been now for seven years before the world, it is as yet so little known? What, however, is the reception ever accorded to a great and fundamental truth? Is it not, that it is at first simply neglected because unrecognized? A few earnest minds, indeed, perceive and embrace it heartily; but the majority brush past it, so to speak, unconscious of its presence. When by degrees it makes way and gains for itself a hearing, it is met by a storm of opposition. Some minds simply dislike what is new; others hate to be disturbed in their ordinary modes of thought; the self-love of some is wounded by finding that they know nearly nothing of what has been their life-long study, and they are unwilling to submit to become learners where they have so long been teachers; while others again find their interests or their influence imperilled by the new idea. In the darker ages of the world's history, persecution, imprisonment, or death, was commonly the reward of the discoverer; now it is simply opposition or misrepresentation, when not even calumny. When at length its opposers are unable to resist the evidence presented of its truth, they next turn round and say :- Well, granted that it is so, this is not new; it is to be found in the pages of such or such an author, ancient or modern. And true it is, that those who now in the full light of a truth look back to earlier ages to search for it, will often detect its first faint glimmerings in the works of those who were themselves utterly unconscious of the scope of the idea that had for a moment flashed across their minds, as quickly disappearing, and leaving the darkness as complete as it had been before.* At length, however, the time arrives when the new truth finds its place in the intelligence of the age: it is discussed in philosophical works, set forth in elementary treatises, and finally is adopted as the basis of public instruction. Does its discoverer at length meet with the honor due? Rarely even then. Few know the source whence the idea had been derived. Ask them and they will answer: "I never thought otherwise; I * See Life, Labors, and Scientific Doctrines of Etienne Geoffroy Saint Hilai e, p. 260. learned the theory at college; or I derived it from such or such a work." It is under the impression that the most certain mode of spreading a knowledge of truths which lie at the root of all national progress, is by making them a part of the instruction of the young, that the editor has ventured, encouraged by the approbation of the author, to undertake a work more suited to a masculine than to a feminine intellect. This Manual of Social Science, it will be perceived, is little more than a selection from the great work above referred to the words of which have been as far as possible preserved, although the vast variety of facts and illustrations which give to it such a living interest have necessarily been sacrificed to brevity. The object in view will account for the free use of italics, which, though perhaps an offence against taste, every experienced teacher knows to be useful in awakening the attention and understanding of the youthful student. In the years that have now elapsed since Mr. Carey's work was written, and since his first volume was given to the world, there have been many changes, and most especially in the facts presented by these United States, but the editor has deemed it best to give them here as they had been there presented, believing that the careful student may find in them the causes of those greater changes which are now in course of progress. That this volume may be of some use in impressing upon the rising generation that the true principles of Social Science are in perfect accordance with the great precepts of Christianity, and may thus help to hasten the reign of universal peace and justice upon earth, is the earnest wish and prayer of the Editor, CUMBERLAND, MD., KATE MCKEAN. NOTE. Believing that many of her readers might be pleased to study the gradual development of the many new ideas presented in this work, the editor gives the following extract from Mr. Carey's preface: "Of the principles here enunciated, some now [1857] make their appearance for the first time; whereas, others were first published twenty years ago.* Since then, the latter have reappeared in another work, by a distinguished French economist, which its circulation having been extensive-has been read by thousands who have never seen the volumes in which the same ideas had previously been published. Finding here a repetition of what they had read elsewhere, and given without acknowledgment, those persons would, most naturally, be disposed to suspect the present author of having wrongfully appropriated the property of another; when, in point of fact, he was himself the real owner. This would be an unpleasant state of things; and, as the only mode by which it can be avoided, he deems it well to make, on this occasion, a brief statement of the order of discovery of the various new ideas contained in the following pages. The theory of value, as now given, was årst published in 1837. Being very simple, it was very comprehensive, embracing every commodity, or thing, in reference to which the idea of value could exist-whether land, labor, or their products. This was one step towards establishing the universality of natural laws, the value of land having been ascribed by all previous economists to causes widely different from those which gave value to its products. Paris, 1850. * CAREY: Principles of Political Economy. Phila., 1837-1840. BASTIAT: Harmonies Economiques. "Carey, and after him Bastiat, have introduced a formula à posteriori, that I believe destined to be universally adopted; and it is greatly to be regretted that the latter should have limited himself to occasional indications of it, instead of giving to it the importance so justly given by the former. In estimating the equilibrium between the cost to one's self and the utility to others, a thousand circumstances may intervene; and it is desirable to know if there be not among men a law, a principle of universal application. Supply and demand, rarity, abundance, etc., are all insufficient, and liable to perpetual exceptions. Carey has remarked, and with great sagacity, that this law is the labor saved, the cost of reproduction-an idea that is, as I think, most felicitous. It appears to me that there cannot arise a case in which a man shall deter Consequent upon this was the discovery of a general law of distribution, embracing all the products of labor, whether that applied to cultivation or conversion-to change of place or form, According to the theories then most generally received, the profit of one was always attended with loss to another, rents rising as labor became less productive, and profits advancing as wages retrograded-a doctrine that, if true, tended to the production of universal discord; and that, too, as the natural consequence of a great law instituted by the Deity for man's government. Directly the reverse of this, however, was the law that was then published, and now is reproduced, proving, as it did, that both capitalist and laborer profited by every measure tending to render labor more, while losing by every one that tended to render it less, productive-and thus establishing a perfect harmony of interests. Thoroughly persuaded of the truth of the laws then presented for consideration, the author felt not less certain that the really fundamental law remained yet to be discovered; and that, until it could be brought to light, many of the phenomena of society must continue unexplained. In what direction, however, to seek it, he could not tell. He had already satisfied himself that the theory presented for consideration by Mr. Ricardo-not being universally true-had no claim to be so considered; but it was not until ten years later that he was led to remark the fact, that it was universally false. The real law, as he then saw, was directly the reverse of that propounded by that gentleman, the work of ⚫ cultivation having, and that invariably, been commenced on the poorer soils, and having passed to the richer ones as wealth had grown and population had increased. Here was the great fundamental truth, of which he before had thought, and the one, too, that was needed for the perfect demonstra mine to make an exchange, in which this law will not be found to apply. I will not give a quantity of labor or pains, unless offered in exchange an utility equivalent; and I will not regard it as equivalent, unless I see that it will come to me at less cost of labor than would be necessary for its reproduction. I regard this formula as most felicitous; because, while on one side it retains the idea of cost, which is constantly referred to in the mind, on the other it avoids the absurdity to which we are led by the theory, which pretends to see everywhere a value equivalent to the cost of production; and, finally, it shows more perfectly the essential justice that governs us in our exchanges."-FERRARA: Biblioteca dell' Economista, vol. xii. p. 117. |