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The importance of cultivating any branch of knowledge is, in a great degree, proportioned to the positive mass of ignorance and error which it has become necessary to displace. I wish for my own part,' says Dr. Whately, that there were no such thing as Political Economy,'-he means, no occasion for such a thing, no necessity for directing our attention to the study itself. And he thus explains himself.

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'If men had always been secured in person and property, and left at full liberty to employ both as they saw fit; and had merely been precluded from unjust interference with each other;-had the most perfect freedom of intercourse between all mankind been always allowed; had there never been any wars, nor (which in that case would easily have been avoided) any taxation;-then, though every exchange that took place would have been one of the phenomena of which Political Economy takes cognizance, all would have proceeded so smoothly, that probably no attention would ever have been called to the subject. The transactions of society would have been like the play of the lungs, the contraction of the muscles, and the circulation of blood in a healthy person, who scarcely knows that these functions exist.' pp. 92, 93.

This is very much like saying, that, if man had not fallen, had there existed in his bosom no bad passions to generate wars, injustice, fraud, and violence, there would have been required no legislation, no government. Lawyers and kings, as well as political economists and divines, might then have been dispensed with. So says Thomas Paine. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness: the former promotes our hap'piness positively, by uniting our affections; the latter negatively, by restraining our vices. Society in every state is a blessing; but government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil. Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence the palaces of kings are built on the ruins of the 'bowers of paradise. For, were the impulses of conscience clear, ' uniform, and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other law'giver; but, that not being the case, he finds it necessary to sur' render up a part of his property, to furnish means for the pro'tection of the rest.' The purpose which dictated these similar representations, was as opposite as the characters of the writers. Dr. Whately means to make a concession to those who depreciate Political Economy, for the purpose of combating with the greater advantage their unreasonable prejudices, by shewing that they might as well quarrel with anatomical science and the medical art, which would have had no existence but for disease. The Author of Common Sense' is endeavouring to draw his reader into a concession that may render him the more easily beguiled and entangled by the sophisms it is designed to introduce. But, although thus opposite in their spirit, both statements imply neither more nor less than this; that, in a condition of society al

together different from what has ever existed in this world, there would be no necessity for the restraints of Law or for the science of Government. In such a state of things, possibly, there might be no such thing as property, no such transaction as an exchange of the products of labour. Otherwise, the subject matter of political economy, which is simply the knowledge of the laws of the social phenomena, would still have existed and have deserved attention; just as the structure and functions of the human system would have claimed admiration, had there been no disease. This, the learned Prelate would readily admit; for, in a subsequent passage, he expresses his opinion, that, if the time should ever arrive, when the structure of human society, and all the phenomena 'connected with it, shall be as well understood as Anatomy and Physiology, it will be regarded as exhibiting even more striking 'marks of Divine Wisdom.'

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To wish, then, that there were no such thing as Political Economy, would be to wish that the most entire ignorance prevailed with regard to the true principles by which the interchanges of commerce, the combinations of industry, the division of labour, should be regulated, so as to promote individual or national welfare; or else, to wish that all these were known intuitively, instinctively, and that human society exhibited the unerring operation of such laws as govern the republic of the ants or the monarchy of the bees. But the wish is vain. We have only to choose between political economy and political disorder-between knowledge and ignorance. We are at present in the uncomfortable position of being about half way between both; and from this half-knowledge, leading to erroneous views and erroneous treatment, has accrued the aggravation of many evils which it was sought to cure. But to impute to Science, the evils occasioned by the want of it, is a very absurd, though a very common mistake.

Bonaparte was a great enemy to Political Economy: "he detested the name,' says Dr. Whately; and his hatred cost him dear.

When he endeavoured by all possible means to destroy the commerce of the Continent with this country,-means which brought on ultimately the war which ended in his overthrow,-there is no doubt he believed himself to be not only injuring us, but consulting the best interests of his own dominions. Indeed, the two ideas were with him inseparable; for, all that he had himself acquired having been at the expense of others, he could not understand how we could gain except by their loss. Yet, all the while, he was in the habit of saying that Political Economy, if an empire were of granite, would crumble it to pieces. That erroneous Political Economy may do so, he evinced by the experiment he himself tried: but to the last, he was not aware that he had been in fact practising such a system-had been prac

tising political economy, in the same sense in which a man is said to be practising medicine, unskilfully, who through ignorance prescribes to his patient a poisonous dose.' pp. 96, 97.

The most difficult questions in Political Economy, the learned Prelate remarks, are every day discussed among us, with unhesitating confidence, not merely by empty pretenders to Science, but by persons avowedly ignorant of the subject, and boasting of their contempt for knowledge; persons neither having, nor pretending to have, nor wishing for, any fixed principles by which to regulate their judgement on each point.

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Questions concerning taxation, tithes, the national debt, the poorlaws-the wages which labourers earn, or ought to earn,-the comparative advantages of different modes of charity, and numberless others belonging to Political Economy,-and many of them among the most difficult, and in which there is the greatest diversity of opinion,--are debated perpetually, not merely at public meetings, but in the course of conversation, and decisions of them boldly pronounced, by many who utterly disclaim having turned their attention to Political Economy. The right management of public affairs in respect of these and such like points, is commonly acknowledged to call for men of both powerful and well cultivated mind; and yet, if every man of common sense is competent to form an opinion, at the first glance, on such points, without either having made them the subject of regular study, or conceiving that any such is requisite, it would follow that the art of government (as far at least as regards that extensive and multifarious department of it, pertaining to National Wealth) must be the easiest of all arts ;-easier than even the common handicraft trades, in which no one will knowingly employ a man who has not been regularly taught. And the remark of the Chancellor Oxenstiern to his son, "Quàm parvâ sapientiâ regitur mundus," must be understood to apply not only to what is, but to what ought to be, the state of things.

Many of you probably have met with the story of some gentleman, (I suppose it is usually fathered on a native of a neighbouring island,) who, on being asked whether he could play on the violin, made answer, that he really did not know whether he could or not, because he had never tried. There is at least more modesty in this expression of doubt, than those shew, who, having never tried to learn the very rudiments of Political Economy, are yet quite sure of their competence to discuss its most difficult questions.

You may perhaps wonder how it is, that men should conceal from themselves and from each other so glaring an absurdity. I believe it is generally in this way: they profess and intend to keep clear of all questions of Political Economy; and imagine themselves to have done so, by having kept clear of the names. The subjects which constitute the proper and sole province of the science, they do not scruple to submit to extemporaneous discussion, provided they but avoid the title by which that science is commonly designated.' pp. 84–86.

How much the nation has suffered from this presumptuous, unteachable ignorance in those depositaries of the collective wisdom who glory in being of the old school, it would be easy to prove, but difficult to calculate. These old-school politicians have never discovered, however, any disposition to quarrel with the theories of the new school economists, when they fell in with their own interests. When Mr. Ricardo demonstrated, that rent is no component part of price, because the market-price of grain produced from high-rented, good land, and from low-rented, inferior Îand, is the same, the precious fallacy was welcomed as the decision of an oracle. Yet, by the same reasoning it might be proved, that profits are not a component part of price; since the price of corn is the same in the market, whether produced from land that yields a profit to the farmer, or from land on which all the profits of cultivation are absorbed by the expenses. And if neither rent nor profits determine price, neither, according to Mr. M'Culloch, do wages; for, in his examination before a Committee of the House of Commons, being asked whether he considered that, when wages rise, the price of commodities will increase, he replied: 'I do not think that a real rise of wages has any effect whatever, or but a very imperceptible one, on the price of com'modities.' What is it then, the learned Philosopher was asked, that does affect prices? Answer: An increase or diminution of the quantity of labour necessary to the production of the commodity.' How admirably this explains the fact, that the immense saving of agricultural labour by means of machinery, and the improved husbandry of large farms, of which we heard so much thirty years ago, was coeval with the reign of high prices and high profits too!

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It is far from our intention, in the present article, to attempt an enumeration, much less any discussion of the various questions which divide the old and modern schools. Our object is, to illustrate the sovereign and urgent necessity of acquiring right views and clear opinions upon matters of universal and every day interest. We wish that the compliment paid to us by the American Professor were better founded. In England and Scotland', says Dr. Cooper, no well informed gentleman is per'mitted to be ignorant of the labours of Adam Smith, Malthus, and Ricardo, any more than of Shakspeare, Milton, or Pope." In his profound admiration of the discoveries of Ricardo and Malthus, we must profess that we do not sympathize. Their writings have tended to lead the public far away from the true path of inquiry, and to convert a science resting on observation, historic fact, and practical evidence, into a scholastic debate respecting the mere technicalities of expression, or a hideous chain of paradoxes at apparent war with religion and humanity.

Hitherto, indeed, little ground has been afforded for the ex

pectation, that the science of political economy will be greatly advanced by University professorships. Much good may accrue from them, however, indirectly, by their having the effect of dispelling the prejudices against the study prevailing among those who are destined to become the territorial proprietors and legislators of the country; prejudices partly arising from the notion that its conclusions are hostile to the truths of religion, partly from the dry, repulsively abstruse, and apparently uncertain character of the study. It was with a view to combat these prejudices, and to remove the erroneous impressions in which they have their origin, that Dr. Whately was induced to offer himself as a candidate for the Oxford Professorship, recently founded by the munificence of Mr. Henry Drummond, who has by this enlightened application of his wealth, entitled himself to the gratitude of his country. By accepting the endowment of a Pro'fessorship of Political Economy, the University,' Dr. Whately remarks, may be regarded as having borne her public testimony against the existing prejudice; and as having thus rendered an important service to the public, independently of the direct be'nefits resulting from the cultivation of the science.'

I trust,' adds the learned Prelate, that before many years shall have elapsed, the views of the University in accepting, and of her public-spirited Benefactor in founding, the Professorship, will be to a considerable extent realized;-that idle prejudices against the science will be done away by a distinct view of its real character;-and that there will be no one who will not be ashamed of employing, much more of deliberately recommending, (as some have ventured to do,) undefined language, and a loose style of reasoning, in a subject in which the most careful accuracy of expression is most especially called for. The time is not, I trust, far distant, when it will be regarded as discreditable, not to have regularly studied those subjects, respecting which, even now, every one is expected to feel an interest-most are ready to adopt opinions-and many are called on to form practical decisions.' pp. ix-xi.

By undertaking the novel duties of this not very inviting ap pointment, Dr. Whately, and his predecessor, Mr. Senior, (the first professor on Mr. Drummond's foundation, and now Professor of Political Economy in the King's College,) have honourably evinced their public spirit and their ardent desire to promote the advancement of liberal knowledge. Mr. Senior commenced his labours with two lectures (delivered in Easter Term, 1828) on the subject of Population; in which it appears to have been his object, to vindicate the political mathematics of Malthus from the practical conclusions to which his principles lead, by means of some ingenious distinctions, which he afterwards admits, in correspondence with Mr. Malthus himself, to be in great measure verbal. After having shewn a disposition to enter the lists with the