INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. Ir is a common complaint against political economy, in the form in which it is usually embodied, that though dealing with man, his passions and wants, and with the elements of his happiness and his misery, it is as hard and cold as if it gave expression to the laws of inanimate nature. From every truth in political economy, the acting and thinking man should be able to derive a rule of life, with reference to evils that may be practically avoided, and good that may be rationally anticipated; but he complains that even in matters like surplus population, commercial revulsions, gluts, and panics, and labour and its rewards, in which his temporal prospects, and those of the whole race, are so deeply involved, he finds only cold formulas or abstract laws, derived from what men usually do, not indicating what they might accomplish; and thus he fails to acquire from these abstractions the light, and assistance which he seeks, to cheer, encourage, and fortify him in his path through life. It may be mainly attributed to the want of living systems founded on the true principles of political economy, that of late, projects founded on a contradiction of the whole science, and resting on the most dangerous and disorganising fallacies, have been so extensively adopted as to lead to the direst calamities. The false opinions presented themselves in that living, breathing form which the true science would not condescend to adopt; and the multitude, demanding a guide that pointed to practical conduct instead of merely developing rigid formulas, followed the first that offered itself. The following pages, containing an attempt to apply to action and progress the truths which political economy has developed, embody opinions which their author has long entertained. He has frequently indulged in the hope of being able to present them in the form of an elaborate analysis, tracing them back to their ultimate principles, according to the rigid laws of scientific inquiry. In the meantime, the enterprising Publishers of the series in which the volume appears, did him the honour to believe that a rapid sketch, in a popular form, of the general results of his inquiries, might, at a juncture like the present, serve those ends of progress and improvement to which so large a portion of their publications is directed. EDINBURGH, January 1849. CONTENTS. Labour a Condition of Progress in Civilisation-The Communities farthest advanced exact the Greatest Quantity-The Human Constitution has Resources to meet the Demand-Futility of the Views that Energy and Progress will cause an increase of Popu- lation beyond the means of Supply-Position of those who do not fulfil the Conditions of Advanced Civilisation-The Hand- The History of the Handloom Weavers Examined, and Inquiry into their Peculiar Condition-Their Fate a Beacon to the Working-Classes-How Avoided-Skilled Labour-The Rewards of Labour Measured by its Intensity-Unhappy Position of those who give Time instead of Labour-Are Slaves while the Real Workers are Free-Risks Peculiar to Manufacturing Workmen— Importance of those who have the Training of Children Resisting Fallacy that the Field of Production is Limited-Enlarges before Well-Directed Enterprise-General Increase Distinguished from Partial Gluts-How the Supply may Create the Demand-The Value of Personal Enterprise to the Community--False Ideas that there can be Wages and Salaries without Production- Machinery-A Fallacy that in Increasing Production it Decreases Page |
