view of the great case. They who undertook to conduct the attack against those courses of regulation, restriction, and prohibition that were involved in the ancient mercantile system, succeeded in showing that the evidence which was adduced, and the arguments which were constructed, in support of the regulating system, were, for the greater part, ill-founded and false, and that the principle and system were wrongly, oppressively, and most injuriously applied and worked. Having thus obtained a judgment against the ancient and prevailing system of regulation, they then claimed and assumed a judgment in favour of the free commerce and intercourse of the people of all the nations of the world. Now the evidence adduced and the arguments supplied do not warrant this. The natural law is yet to be discovered. Although writers and statesmen have been successful in showing that governments cannot prescribe and dictate to people courses of trade and commerce; yet a far greater and more important work than this work of negation still remains to be performed. This work is that of discovering and establishing the Social Law of commerce. Trade being allowed to be free-to show the manner in which this freedom must be used in order to realise that natural social law of commerce, by which the interests of the general body of the people of all nations shall be comprehended, promoted, and conserved.

Now, for the purpose of accomplishing a due treatment of the subject, it is necessary that three distinct courses of inquiry and of reasoning should be pursued, and the results clearly and firmly established.

Firstly. It has to be shown that the writers on Political Economy have failed in their adducement of evidence and in their reasoning, and so have presented to the world false principles and a wrong system.

Secondly. It is required to show the true principle — the law of social action and progress; and then the issue of this principle, namely, the sound and right system.

Thirdly. It is required to show the manner in which the true principle, involving the law of progress, is to be adapted to an existing state of national circumstances.

Such being the scope and the character of the work that is required to be accomplished, in order that the science of Social and Political Economy may be placed in its right position, or be made to rest on its true foundations, the reader will discern that a careful and thorough examination of the writings of the leading Political Economists, and also of the arguments of the leading statesmen who have based their policy on the principles of these writers, is indispensable. The author of the following work would gladly have avoided this particular field of labour, could such an avoidance have been made, and at the same time justice have been rendered to the subject; for the strict process of analysation, leading to a discovery of main error, and t'en of a series of errors, in a system, although containing scattered truths, yet composed mainly or almost wholly of false reasoning, is neither pleasing to him who has to conduct the process, nor pleasing to those who have to read and examine carefully the false inductive steps and the wrong conclusions that are shown by this course.

But, however preferable it would have been to have been spared the unpleasant labour that is involved in the exploration, discovery, and exposure of error, yet it is not possible to raise this important science from the abased state in which it is now placed, and place it in its right position, if a discovery and eradication of the main errors that have been introduced into it be not carefully conducted and accomplished.

The courses which are thus declared necessary and indispensable for a due and just treatment of the subject-matter

involved, are adopted in the following work. The main feature of the work is that of attaching to the free communication and inter-communication of nations, or free trade, its social law. The commerce of the world being declared to be free, it is shown how this freedom is to be controlled, guided, governed, and qualified, so that, freedom being enjoyed, there may, nevertheless, be fulfilled under it that natural law by which the fruits or productions of labour, or that which we agree to call by the name of capital, is to be so used as to realise the widest or most general diffusion, maintenance, and enjoyment.

As connected with the new principle and system now referred to, the reader will find, that although the LAW of united labour, together with the duty connected both with the acquisition and expenditure of property, are explained, yet no attempt is made to have the great social course enforced by means of positive or statutory laws of the realm. A correct definition being worked, the course demonstrated is left to be fulfilled by the free will and action of each individual member of the community. The duty of the scientific or philosophical inquirer is that of discovering, explaining, and in all instances faithfully upholding, the truth of the subject. It is for the statesman, in his character of general practitioner, to find out, to determine, and to declare, in what manner, and in what degree, if either in the one or the other, the truth is to be dealt with by means of positive or enforcing laws of the realm.

No careful and competent reader of the writings in which the science of Political Economy is treated can fail to have had his mind impressed by the absence from these writings, of one great and most essential element. It is the absence of all real or true attempt to show the course by which diffusion or distribution of wealth is to be brought about.

The lamentable absence from the writings of those to whom the title of Political Economists has been accorded of this first and noblest feature of their subject, is often made a matter of comment, disappointment, and deep regret, being felt on account of it by every truly enlightened and honourable reader. Thus it is made to appear, and this is really the fact, that this school of writers have lent themselves to the unwort y and ignoble course of showing how wealth may be accumulated, how individual men may get together, for their own special enjoyment, the largest amount of money or property. To get this unsound, ungenerous, and lamentable doctrine received, they have attempted, and hitherto have succeeded in their attempt, to make the world believe that the course of individual self-interest, of individual aggrandisement by an accumulation of wealth, is that which conduces most largely to the general or aggregate acquisition, possession, and enjoyment of it.

To such a system as that now alluded to, and which prevails, it was not possible that either its inventors, constructors, or supporters, could apply a moral law of action; and so the world has this notable thing before it, namely,- Principles of Political Economy A System of Social and Political Economy The Wealth of Nations The Social and Political Creed of the school of Modern Statesmen offered, commended, and recommended to it, and maintained with the utmost assurance, into which the authors and supporters, one and all, have been unable to introduce a moral law of action. Mercantile ambition and avarice, the desire of accumulating, supported under the pretext of political expediency, have constituted the leaven by which alone the system of the modern Political Economists is attempted to be bound together. To an examination, exposure, and demolition of this system, so laboriously raised within the field of

literature by the united efforts of Adam Smith, Dugald Stewart, Malthus, Ricardo, Macculloch, Bentham, the Mills, Chalmers, Whateley, Senior, and many other writers both English and foreign, assented to and supported by Paley, and also by a large and influential school to whom the high title “Utilitarian,” being falsely claimed, has been inconsiderately assigned; received with intense glorification by almost all modern statesmen, and, without any knowledge whatever of its real character, enthroned in the estimation and hearts of people in general; and to the construction of another system of a different character, the following work is devoted.

If any reader, before he commences an examination of this work, should be sceptical upon the point now asserted and assumed by the writer, which is, the defective and erroneous manner in which the science of Political Economy has been treated up to the present moment, he has only to read with due attention-for then his scepticism will be dispelled-the evidence of several of our scientific men, as well as of several of our most practical and most honourable merchants and bankers, that has lately been given before a Committee of the House of Commons appointed for the purpose of collecting well-founded, sound, or reliable evidence that might serve to throw light on the general principle of commerce and banking, so that, by this evidence, guidance might be afforded to the legislature on the point of making up its judgment on the important subject of a reconstruction of the Charter of the Bank of England. Here there is offered a very large volume indeed of opiniative matter; but the reader will find it impossible to trace any defined or clear courses of truth; such courses as that a sound general conclusion shall be established by them.

An intelligent reader who is conversant with those processes, or courses of reasoning, by which a development of science