\r^ <<> --> ■■•T' _ ^-* - - 'ii- v'*N, t /" ,^ 16 Cornell University Law Library. THE GIFT OF LILLIAN HUFFCUT BINGHAMTON, N. Y. November 27, 1915- 9181 HB 75 C67™*" ""'"""l' '■""^'y 3 1924 024 833 448 Cornell University Library The original of tiiis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924024833448 ^'-.S ;^ r-.> supplembnt to the Annaw of thb Ambrican Academy of Powticai, and Sociai, Scibncb. March, 1894. A HISTORY OF POLITICAL ECONOMY, BY Dr. Gustav Cohn, Professor in the University of Gfittingen. Translated by DR. JOSEPH Adna Hill. ■With an Introddctory Note by Edmdnd J. Jamks. PHILADELPHIA : American academy of political and Social Science. 1894. ,^6~l>i-^ CONTENTS. CHAPTBR, ' PAGB. I. Economic History and the Htstdry of Economic Science 7 II. The Preparatory Period of Scientific Political Economy . ii III. The French Economists or Physiocrats 21 IV. Adam Smith . 30 V. The Followers of Adam Smith, down to the time of John Stuart Mill 41 VI. German Political Economy in the first half of the Nine- teenth Century 52 VII. The Socialistic el Literature of France and Germany . . 67 VIII. The New German Political Economy 100 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. There is a singular dearth of histories of political economy in the English language. The older works on the subject — McCuUoch and Twiss — are valuable and suggestive; but strike the student of to-day rather by what they have not than by what they have. Blanqui's book is rather a history of industrial systems than a treatise on the history of economic science. Dr. Ingram's work is a very useful book, with a special value owing to its emphasis of the sociological point of view; while the new edition of Cossa, invaluable as it is, must be considered rather as a guide to the bibliography of Political Economy than a treatise on its history. All taken together leave the field still fairly open to the scholar who will undertake to give us a comprehensive treatise on the subject, and English literature is still far behind the German, for example, in this respect. In this branch of science, as in some others, moreover, the tone and method of a work are determined very largely by national peculiarities, and whenever a nation has made serious contributions to the literature of any subject falling within the scope of the moral or social sciences, its historians are nearly certain to represent a new point of view, to have a new and fruitful perspective. In no country for the last twenty years has more active and thorough intellectual work been done in the depart- ment of political and social science than in Germany, and German scholars have turned out in rapid succession valuable treatises in nearly every department of econo- mics and finance. As the intellectual work of every (5) 6 Annai 1803-4 i 49 volumes. 1 8 Annai^r isolirte Staat"* an examination of the influ- ence exerted upon agriculture by the price of grain, the fertility of the soil, and taxes, or in other words, an • Der isolirte Staat in Beziehung auf Land-unrthschaft undNalionalokonomie. (The Isolated State in its Relations to Agriculture and Political Economy), 1826. GERMAN POMTICAI, ECONOMY. 55 examination of the reasons which determine the inten- sity of the several branches of forestry and agriculture. This work was an application of that method of isolating abstract ideas which others, notably Ricardo, had before made use of ; but von Thiinen in his com- pletion of the Ricardian theory of rent, applied the method with greater care and precision. A second enlarged and improved edition of his work appeared in 1843, as the first volume of a larger work. The second and third came out between 1850 and 1863. The former year was the date of the author's death (September 22). The second volume deals with what von Thiinen calls the "natural wages of labor;" that is, the search after a standard or just measure of wages in that portion of the total product which is the outcome of labor. The indignation which he manifests toward the English economists, for meaning something quite dijBFerent from this standard of justice in their use of the term " natural " wages, does honor to his heart. Never- theless, Smith and his followers could no more be for- bidden to use that ambiguous term, ' ' natural, ' ' in the sense they were so fond of (meaning cost price in distinc- tion from market price), than they could be reproached, because they did not, like von Thiinen, broaden the meaning of the word to include a problem, which from its very nature is insolvable. All the more grateful should be the recognition of the debt which the history of the science owes to this strong desire to break through the barriers of the old school — a desire which is revealed in the above problem, but which certainly could not be satisfied so long as the spell, the methods, or the standpoint of the old school still prevailed. On the contrary, if the problem was to be solved, the fact of the totality of the product which PS6 Annai Befugniss G:BRMAN Political Economy. 57 2um Gewerbebetriebe, siir Berichtigung der Urtheile uber Gewerbefreiheit und Gewerbezwang, mit besonderer Rucksicht auf den preussischen Staaf'' (Rights of Indus- try, contribution to the question of industrial freedom or regulation, with special reference to Prussia), 1841; '■'■ Sammlung kleiner Schriften staatswirthschaftlichen Inhalts''^ (Collection of minor economic writings), 1843; " Nachlass kleiner Schriften staatswirthschaftlichen Inhalts'''' (Collection of posthumous minor economic writings), 1847. Although the last publication was called a posthumous, Hoffman himself was the editor (having finished the book on his eighty-second birthday, July 20, 1846). All these works are an important source of historical information in regard to the views and convictions which dominated the best minds of the Prussian bureaucracy during the first third of this century. They are, moreover, of lasting value for the study of the Prussian financial and economic policy and ■of its relation to economic theory. It is perhaps, a matter of surprise that the impor- tant influence which we are accustomed to call the " historical school " took root so late comparatively in our science. It was doubtless due to the lofty self-sufficiency of the science and its contentment with doctrines which were asserted to be independent of historical facts. While language, law, and the state were coming to a true consciousness of their own nature under the guidance of historical investigation, political economy steadfastly adhered to those eighteenth century illusions which had transformed the historical into the natural. This coagulated mass of "natural" matter concealed from the eye both the actual course of the stream of development and the component parts of its content. Individual, thinkers, indeed, who were dissatisfied with this condition of things were not lacking. Such 58 AnnaIvS of thb Ambrican Academy. was Sismondi, to whom we have already been introduced;: and we shall presently encounter a great literary move- ment which, in the main, signified nothing more or less- than a vigorous protest against the prevailing political, economy. Moreover there was no lack whatever of dis- contents outside the circle of professional economists. Side by side with the protest of socialism and com- munism but springing, to be sure, from a different root, was the dissatisfaction of the better educated and more thoughtful classes. We still have in the England of to-day living examples of this spirit of dissatisfaction in the philosophers, historians, and humanists who cherish an inextinguishable hatred of political economy. But clearly no reasonable man can be angry with a science,, but only with those who are at the time its representa- tives, and with them only because of what they pro- claim in the name of their science. A prominent opponent of the Knglish political econ- omy at the beginning of this century was Adam Miiller (1779-1839). He occupied a position half-way between, the adherents of the science and the outsiders. His- standpoint, indeed, was that which characterized the beginnings of the historical school. But his was really a case of a man in the wrong time and place — an isolated case, not followed by any further developments in the direction of the clearness and serious scientific methods which we admire in that school. His main work, '■'■Die Elemente der Staatskunst" (The- Elements of Statesmanship), was the outcome of a series of lectures delivered to princes and statesmen in 1808- 1809. It was followed by ''Theorie des Geldes^^ (The- ory of Money), 1816, and his work, '■^Von der Nothwen- digkeit einer theologischen Grundlage der gesammten StacUsmissenschaften und der Staatswirthschafi ins- German Politicai, Economy. 59 besondere'''* (On tlie necessity of a Theological Founda- tion for all Political Sciences and for Political Economy in particular) 181 9. Mtiller regards Adam Smith as the most learned economist of all times, but he sees in him (as did Franz I/ist a generation later) the one- sided representative of English economic conditions and interests. In contrast to Smith and most of his contem- poraries, Miiller insists that man cannot be conceived outside of the State. He attacked certain features of the prevailing theories in many brilliant sallies. That these attacks, however, were rendered ineffective through their vagaries was only to be expected since they eman- ated from a mind which denominated definitions the poison of science. But if clear conceptions are poison so must clear thinking be as well. Conseqtiently it is very instructive to note that that mystical play upon words revealed in such expressions as ' ' immaterial capital, ' ' or in the demand that the statesman himself should be "living money," may already be found in Miiller' s writings; and that in his references to the "slavery which the great mass of the people suffers at the hands of the money monopolists, ' ' we meet with those catch- words of Romanticism which meet half-way the opposi- tion of the radicals. In Adam Miiller we have an illustration of the ineffectiveness of a highly gifted mind without the discipline of methodical thinking. No traces of his influence are to be met with in German political economy until his writings were brought to light by men who supplied this lack of clear thinking and had learned to appreciate the worth of these earlier germs of thought. *W. Roscher, "Die Romantisihe Schule der Nationalokonomie in Deutschland." Zeitschrifi fur dieges. Siaaiswissenschafien, 1870, vol, xxvi. 6o Annals of thb Ambrican Academy. Miiller's friend, Friedrich Gentz, who belonged to the Romantic school by personal attachments and political development, did not produce any writings like Muller's. Still less can this be said of the English statesman, Edmund Burke, who was, on the contrary, a pronounced follower of Adam Smith, and can be counted among the Romanticists only on some such remote grounds as those on which they claim Goethe. Burke's renunciation of the French Revolution * was, to be sure, thoroughly in keeping with the tone of the romantic and historical schools, and certainly contained the germs of an histori- cal view of state and society such as was destined later to overcome the doctrine of natural rights even in the science of political economy. But, considering how intellectual life develops, this by no means precludes his being, in the main, unconscious of what his views involved. We have repeated instances of this same thing: as when F. J. Stahl incorporates the economic doctrines of Adam Smith in his "Philosophy of Law," or Ihering in his '■'■Geist des romischen Rechts^^ (Spirit of Roman Law), seeks support in the ideas of Rau. There are other Romanticists to be mentioned whose attitude toward the political economy of Adam Smith is similar to Miiller's. In the first place there was the patrician of Berne, Karl Ludwig von Haller, whose main work was iipon the '■'• Restauration der Staatswissen- schaft oder Theorie des naturlich-geselligen Zustandes der Chimare des kunstlich-burgerlichen entgegengesetst." (The restoration of political science or the theory of the natural and social condition of society as opposed to that chimera the artificial and civic society.) As a result of his mediaeval view of the State he develops a theory of • " Reflections on the Revolution in France," 1789, German translation by F. Gentz. German Political Economy. 6i public finance and taxation whicli accords with his con- ception of the state drawn from private right, and which might contribute to the more recent controversies about the bases of taxation some remarkable points of view calculated to throw light upon the question e contrario. Then there was the younger member of the aesthetic romantic circle in Berlin, Alexander von der Marwitz. Traces of his literary talent are to be found in his corre- spondence with Rahel Varnhagen to which I^ist in the preface to '■'■Das nationale System der po.litischen Oeko- nomie'''' (1841), refers in emphatic terms of praise. In one of these letters (18 10), von der Marwitz writes of Smith and his German followers: " All their wisdom is derived from Adam Smith — a narrow man, although acute within the range of his narrowness, — whose theories they expound on every occasion, with tedious diffuseness, repeating his precepts like schoolboys recit- ing their lessons. His wisdom is of a very convenient sort, for independent of all ideas and untrammeled by all other tendencies in human existence, he constructs a commercial State equally suitable for all nations and all conditions. The only statesmanship required con- sists in letting people do what they like. His point of view is that of private interests; that there must be any higher one for the state he never once imagines; . . and when towards the end of his work he comes to speak of important state affairs, of carrying- on war, administering justice, and of education, he be- comes absolutely foolish." The young man who wrote these words I^ist called the greatest economist of Germany. ' ' And he must needs die before he had recognized his great mission." This is the appropriate place to speak of List himself. He was anything but a Romanticist, although, by his 62 Annals of thb American Academy. own statement, personally acquainted with Ad. Miiller and Gentz. His relation to Romanticism was similar to tiie relation of the national uprising in the War of Liberation to this great intellectual movement. Just as that uprising, after its ideal elements had gathered strength in the twilight of the previous age, brought that product of modern times,. the national state, to the light of living reality, so List's agitation in the service of German political economy, thoroughly realistic as it was, consisted of practical deductions drawn from those promptings of Romanticism which were partly literary, partly vague and confused, but, in their national signifi- cance, thoroughly wholesome and fruitful. He was so pre-eminently a practical political econo- mist that his full significance was not recognized until the present day,* after all, that for which he labored, and for which like a true apostle he sufiered, has been accomplished. Now, that this recognition has once been accorded, it has occasionally led to an over-esti- mate of the worth of his scientific services. For they do not equal the great practical importance of his work. It is the strong impression created by a belated gjratitude to the great patriot, which leads to the laudation to-day of List's scientific importance, by the very economic historians who not long ago denied his merits. The method in which he simplifies the economic development of nations by reducing it to three typical stages is not true to historical growth. This develop- ment does not follow so direct and uniform a course, nor has it always been the same in the different nations of civilization. In trade and industry Germany in the Middle Ages stood in the same relation to England as • His principal work is "Das nationale System der politischen Oekonomie," 7th ed., with a historical and critical introduction, by K. Th. Eheberg, 1S83. His ' ■ Collected Works " were published by I,. Hausser. 2 volumes, 1850. German Politicai, Economy. 63 the latter did to Germany in the time of List, and in that earlier period the struggle of the English to assert their ' ' national productive power ' ' against the foreigners presented the same spectacle as did the struggle of these foreigners against the English in the eighteenth or more -especially the nineteenth century. Again, List's '■'■Theorie der Produktivkrdfte'''' (Theory of the Productive Forces) lacks scientific soundness. The dazzling contrast between ' ' productive powers ' ' and ' ' exchange values ' ' suited the needs of agitation, in coining useful catchwords ; but it was no clear and ■definite conception. He centred his efforts upon one single aim, to the neglect of certain great problems in the new economic ■conditions, such as no true reformer of economic science at that time could have overlooked. While directing his attention to the increase of national productive power, he failed to emphasize the significance of the human element in the economic system; the problem of distri- bution did not occupy his thoughts. Such strictures as these detract nothing, however, from the great practical services which this man rendered, or from the glOry of his patriotic martyrdom. Viewed from this standpoint, his unusually active life was so completely occupied with his agitation for German eco- nomic unity, of territory, a German railroad system and German industrial prosperity, that it would be mere per- versity to censure him for a lack of other efibrts for which he had no time or opportunity. Moreover there is no doubt but that his services proved to be of benefit to German political economy, but the very fact that this benefit was first realized through the subsequent labors of investigators who were truly scientific indicates that he himself did 64 Annals of the American Academv. not suf&cieiitly appreciate the scientific bearing of his schemes. Theodor Bernhardi was a man of essentially diflFerent type, superior to List in learning and more penetrating in his criticisms of the English theory. He was the author of '■'■Versuch einer Kritik der Grilnde, die Jur grosses und kleines Grundeigenthum angefuhrt werden. " (A critical essay on the respective arguments in favor of small and of large estates in the ownership of land.) It was written in 1846, and published at St. Petersburg in 1849. Taking up this question in connection with the cur- rent German literature on the subject, he resolves it into fundamental questions of economic principles. He proves himself a bitter opponent of the English and French school, launching his destructive scorn not so much, however, against Smith and Ricardo, the masters of that school, as against their successors, such as Say and McCuUoch. At the same time he was a liberally educated politician and historian rather than a true political economist, for he does not really take up and discuss his opponents' manner of reasoning, which is what ought to be done in any effective refutation of their theories. He was one of those critics who, like Sis- mondi before him and many others after him, without having read Ricardo thoughtfully or without having understood him, proceed to bring in an indictment against the misanthrope on grounds which are not appa- rent to the careful student of Ricardo's writings. The following passage from Bernhardi's works points out the defectiveness of the traditional method he was opposing, but at the same time reveals a characteristic disin.- clination to recognize the value of this method within its proper limits: "The passionate optimists of the German Poutical Economy. 65 industrial system, represent eacli of these disturbing crises as something isolated and accidental — a phenomenon always referable to some definite specific cause, which indeed is always present, so that we find ourselves in a society which is purely exceptional, as if events did not belong to the regular course of things in this world and we could look forward to a time when nothing will occur." But to say this is, in effect, to break one's staff over every scientific abstraction and to deny the relative value of the hypotheses of our science. All the greater is the victory which Bernhardi wins over McCuUoch and Senior, when with Jiis own higher ethical-historical view of national life he disproves their theories of "immaterial capital," or when he empha- sizes the superiority of mind over economic interests in his refutation of views which would measure the worth of the state, war education, knowledge and talent,, by the standard of economic productivity — precisely the error in which I/ist sought out the theoretical weapons for his use as an agitator. We are now at the middle of the nineteenth century, the turning point at which the science of political econ- omy takes a new departure under the influence of the historical school. But before discussing this new development, to which we shall properly devote a separate chapter, we must mention a man whose influ- ence, began, beyond question, to make itself felt in the second third of the century, while his scientific position was, for a long time after that, a monumental example for those who would reform German political economy by means of historical investigation. We refer to Georg Hanssen. Subsequent leaders of the historical movement, whose acquaintance we shall presently make, were forced to apply their efforts, first and principally,. 66 Annals of the American Academy. to the discussion of method and fundamental principles in order to settle the many doubtful points which neces- sarily obstructed a clear-cut relation to the old school, but before their day, appeared this historian, who like the poet, who is unmindful of the principles of aesthe- tics, produced imperishable works. The subject of Hanssen's investigations was the system of land-hold- ing. His essays, from the first to the last, cover a period of half a century. Yet, when the collected edition of his writings appeared in 1880,* containing some of his earliest productions, one realized how few traces of age were to be found in them. The earliest seemed as fresh as the latest. Thus, while the conflict rages between the changing schools and methods, and one hypothesis after another finds favor, only to be again rejected, there are, never- theless, certain resting places, and secure positions which give us the consoling assurance that, with all the uncertainties of knowledge, some fortunate minds will be permitted to attain results which are lasting. *" Agrarhiitorische Abhandlungen," 1880. Vol. ii, 1884. CHAPTER VII. THE SOCIALISTIC LITERATURE OF FRANCE AND GERMANY. We cannot take up the consideration of the new Ger- man national economy without first examining the socialistic literature which has exerted its own remark- able influence on the German science. The term ' ' Socialist ' ' was introduced into general use by the first French historian of socialistic writings, 1/Ouis Reybaud, who borrowed the word from Pierre Leroux. The common feature of all this literature is found in its purpose: The improvement of the condition of the laboring masses. This is to be accomplished by an organization of society which shall subject personal liberty, as it now exists in the form developed by recent changes, to regulation and restraint in the interests of the whole community. What form this new organiza- tion shall assume is a question which is differently answered in a diversity of systems and projects to which various names have been given, either by the projectors themselves, or by others. Of these names communism is one which has sometimes been applied to all these systems and again only to some of them, without any- one being able — however often it has been attempted — to draw any fundamental distinction between that term and socialism. The originators themselves were to a greater or less degree conscious of the wholly impracticable character of their projects. This was still more true in preceding cen- turies, when the very title of Political Romances adopted (67) 68 AnnaivS of the Amkrican Academy. for these writings, suggested fiction and renounced all claim to the possibility of immediate realization; when indeed the earliest of these works, the forerunner of the entire literature, was given the title of " Utopia,'''' or "Nowhere," by its author, Thomas More. Similar in- stances may be found even in the literature of the nine- teenth century (for example the '■'■Voyage en Icarie'''' of Cabet, 1840); but they fall into the background, yielding place to the explicit formulation of a practical, socialistic- policy intended for the present, or for the immediate future. In conformity with this tendency the socialists have eliminated more and more the Utopian element from their writings, but not without retaining a large residu^^ um of it to the last. The nearest approach to a treat- ment of social topics which borders on the practicable has been made in what is significantly not only the latest development of socia;lism, but is also the one which is connected with the German economic science,, and has therefore received the name of scientific social- ism. For, after indulging in all sorts of unrestrained fancies as regards the ideal state of society, the socialists finally announced their serious intention of taking up the line of reasoning which had hitherto been confined to professional economists; and thus there came to be a bit of common ground to stand on within the realm of reality. It has often been supposed that socialism, if it did not found a new science, at least gave rise to one. This,, however, cannot be admitted. A new science arises when some group of phenomena, which hitherto has not been subjected to any scientific treatment, is brought, within the grasp of systematic thinking, or when, by the process of division and differentiation, some portion. SOCIAWSTIC l,IT:eRATURE. 69 of a science already developed is separated from the parent stem to enter upon a new and independent life of its own. Neither of these conditions is fulfilled in socialism. The field upon which it enters was appropriated and worked over by the political economy of the eighteenth century, and in fact by the very men who founded the science in France. We have seen that even a revolu- tionary disposition was not lacking in these first think- ers, and that, in the unhistorical nature of the demands made on the State, they came into contact with social- istic ideas. The socialists propose other and bolder innovations, but that plainly does not give them the right to call themselves the founders of a new science. Their claims, it is true, were presented at a period when the good old traditions of political economy were for- gotten, when the industrial society had settled down comfortably in the acceptance of economic doctrines which were subservient to its interests, and had long since divested it of any tendency toward social reform. But all that does not change the one decisive fact that a science intended to be the science of society had long existed, and needed only to be revived in order to fulfill its mission. At the same time it may properly be con- ceded that socialism essentially promoted the revival of the science, and the importance of this reviving influ- ence shall by no means be ignored; but even in that case socialism is at most nothing more than an element in the literature of political economy. This honor may be accorded it with as good a right as many Utopias of an opposite tendency, which in their assumption of orthodoxy never once imagine that they are almost as far removed from the principles and relations of actual social life as are their extreme opponents with whom 70 AnnaivS of the American Academy. they do battle from the standpoint of "science." This claim to a place in the literature of our science will pre- sent itself with great weight when we come to consider the more recent socialistic writings of Germany. But it is, nevertheles::, an excessive step in this direc- tion, when with an increasing comprehension of the " scientific socialism " it has lead certain German political economists to propose that the term socialism be trans- planted from the domain of Utopias to that of strict science. For as every one knows, it is not the sound or the etymological derivation of a word which determines its meaning; since every word which has been in use for so long a time, and especially so much used in a very definite sense, acquires the ineffaceable impress of its history. Confusion of thought, and even embarrassment in the practical affairs of business, would result if a word thus marked should some day be so used, that it really meant something quite different. Experience has already confirmed the above assertion; for in the first place, confusion of thought has actually been increased by such a treatment of the word, social- ism; and in the second place, those writers who formerly introduced this objectionable terminology have quite recently begun to realize that it is advisable to adopt the clear distinction they so long disregarded. It is no accident, much as the apparent contradiction surprises us, that socialistic systems have often been produced or fostered in minds which were even better qualified for the usual speculative enterprises of the business world than for social reforms. Michel Cheva- lier, Enfantin and the Pereire brothers, began in the school of French socialism, but soon transferred their talents to the realities of founding and administering business enterprises. Henri Saint-Simon, on the other SOCIAUSTIC I/ITBRATURE. 71 hand, after the wreck of his numerous industrial pro- jects, devoted himself more and more to the elabora- tion of his philanthropic schemes.* This nephew of the rich Duke of Saint-Simon was still a young man of twenty-one, and, like Lafayette, had fought under Washington, when he laid before the Viceroy of Mexico a plan for cutting a canal through the Isthmus of Panama. Afterward, in 1787, he undertook to con- struct a canal connecting the capital of Spain with the ocean. Returning to France toward the close of 1789, he engaged in financial speculations in company with Count Redern, of Prussia. He asserts that these specu- lations were profitable, but that he was duped by his partner, who thought only of the financial gains, while he himself was working for glory, f Nevertheless, in 1811, Saint-Simon again invited this same Count Redern to join him in another enterprise — and of what sort? ' ' In the organization of a good system of philosophy, that is, a good history of the past and future of the human race. "J In the mean time he had sunk to the depths of misery, suiFering from poverty and sickness. In 1805 he became a copyist in the Loan office at a salary of 1000 francs a year. From this condition he was rescued through the benevolence of an old acquaint- ance. He now began his publications on philosophy, mathematics, and the natural sciences, with which he sought to secure the favor and support of learned socie- ties. He was literally starving when, in 1813, he wrote *The collected writings of Saint-Simon [Oeuvres de Saint Simon, 7 vols., Paris, 1868-1869), were published under the direction of liis pupil Knfantin. They form part of a larger collection, the "Oeuvres de Saint-Simon et rf' Enfaniin." The edi- tion is a beautiful and attractive one. Knfantin's wealth which was greater than that of Saint-Simon defrayed the expenses of publication. \" Histoire de ma w/>" Oeuvres, vol, i, pp. 64-88. This autobiography was written in 1808. X Oeuvres, vol. i, p. 111. 72 Annai^s op the Ambrican Acadbmy. to the Emperor, " For fifteen years I have labored upon a work which would soon be completed if I had the means for existence; MM. Cuvier and Halle are ac- quainted with it and find that it contains great and new ideas."* At the time of the fall of Napoleon, he took up in his writings, the political questions of the day, and in this way he came to study the social question. It is no easy matter to read these writings ; lofty ideas and noble feelings are commingled in that confusion of subjective originality which we so often encounter in the domain of political and socialistic literature. Nor is it probable that these writings alone would have given him any such reputation and influence as he acquired through his pupils as the result of his personal influence over them. The socialistic tendency in Saint-Simon, as it seems to me, first became prominent in 1817. It is revealed in the prospectus (April, 1817), of a projected periodical, entitledrf Industrie^ ou Discussions politiques, morales et philosophiques^ dans V inter it de tons les homvtes livris a des travaux utiles et indipendants^ with the motto: " Tout par V Industrie^ tout pour elle.'''' This prospectus says: "The eighteenth century could only destroy; we intend to lay the foundations of a new structure, or, in other words, propound and discuss the question of the common welfare, which has hitherto hardly been touched upon, and in that way recall politics, ethics and philosophy from their abstract and unprofitable speculations to their proper theme of study, the social welfare. All society is based on labor; labor is the only guarantee of its existence, the only source of its wealth." The work * Osuvres, vol. i, p. 143. The letter begins: Sire, je suis le cousin du due de Saint- Simon. t Oeuvres, vol. ii, p. 12. SOCIAUSTIC L,ITERATURB. 73 lannounced in this prospectus appeared immediately (May, 1817). The '' Politique''' of Saint-Simon's adopted son, Augustin Thierry, the historian of later date, formed the second part of the first volume. Other publications soon followed (^^Le Politique " 1819; '"■ D Organisateur^'''' 1819-30; "Z>« Systhme industriel,^'' 1831; '■'• Nouveau Christianisme^ " 1825). Saint-Simon's ideas are expressed in obscure form, and must with difficulty be sepa.rated from his effusions on philosophical and constitutional questions. He speaks much about the opposition between the industrial class and the legitimists and nobles, as if within the former or economically productive class, comprising as 'it does, managers and workmen, the social interests were harmonious. The duty of interfering in behalf of 'the needy did not assume a prominent place in his ■writings until the last years of his life; his later pro- ductions bear such mottoes as "God said, lyove and help one another," or "He that loveth his brother, fulfiUeth sthe law. " His last words in his last work, the ^'■Nouveau Christianisme^'' are addressed to princes in the tone of a prophet : ' ' Hear the voice of God, speaking to you through my mouth; remember that God commands the mighty to devote all their strength to the promotion of the social prosperity of the poor. ' ' It is in this last work of his in which he speaks of '^'- Ch'nstianisme actif^'''' practical Christianity, demand- ing a new society based on brotherly love, in much the same way as the Christian socialists of England did a .•generation later. The teachings of Saint-Simon first acquired a firm ^structure after his death, through his disciples. The freer intellectual atmosphere created by the July revolution favored the spread of his doctrines. The 74 Annai^y Socialismus und Com- 'munismus des hentigen Frankreichs,^^ (Communism and Socialism in modem France), as a contribution to con- temporary history. In words which sound commonplace to us to-day, but were new and epoch-making then, he demanded, that political economy should be broadened into social science. It is a matter of secondary import- ance that, at that time and later. Stein was of the opinion that this progress would take the form of a new " science of society." We have already pointed out that political economy, if true to its best traditions, is destined of itself to comprise a science of society, or develop into such, and we believe that the facts of subsequent expe- rience confirm our opinion. In any case. Stein's merits remain the same. At that time he spoke the words which gave to Ger- man political economy its characteristic impress, distin- gUjishing it from the socialistic movement and literature, io6 Annaih als VerkehrsmitteV (The Telegraph as a Means of Commu- nication, 1857), and especially '•'• Geld und CrediV (Money and Credit, 1873-1879), show us the former philologian and historian in the midst of the mercantile and com- mercial affairs of modern life. Whoever has overcome the serious diificulties which the study of these works involves, can but admire the keenness and penetration of reasoning powers, which are far superior to the logic of Hermann and other predecessors. The influence of these writings would have been greater, had Knies not scorned to express himself in simple German instead of apparently going out of his way to avoid simplicity of style, in order to construct the most astonishing sentences and expressions. But these formal faults of style, which we find also in his earlier works, in no way detract from his permanent merits. His treatment of credit, the conclusion to which still awaits us in a volume on the public credit, gives us for the first time a standard work on this subject, and one which will probably remain such for a long time to come. ii6 Annai,s of the American Academy. The later labors of Hildebrand were closely connected witli the publication of his journal, of which we shall speak in connection with the entire periodical literature of the science. The great development of this department of our work is a most welcome indication of the progress which political economy is making in range as well aa in thoroughness. For a long time there was but a single journal of political economy. It was small in size and hardly regular in its publication. Then thi& solitary periodical was combined with a journal of general political science, so that for a decade there was no journal whatever devoted exclusively to economics. Such in brief was the career of the Archiv der politischen Oekonomie und Polizeiwissenschaft (Archive of- Political Economy and of the Science of Police). It was founded by Ran in 1835. After 1843, it was continued as a "new series," with Georg Hanssen as assistant editor. But in 1853, it was combined with the Zdtschrift fur die gesammte Staatswissenschaft (Journal of General Political Science), a publication which the Political Science Faculty of the University of Tiibingen had founded in 1844. It was not until 1863, that a second independent journal of political economy appeared; the JahrbUcher fiir Nationalokonomie und Statistik (Annals of Politi- cal Economy and Statistics). Edited by Bruno Hilde- brand. It was significant of the changes which time had wrought, even in practical political economy, that contemporaneously with this journal, the Vierteljahr- schriftfur Volkswirth^chaft (Quarterly Journal of Polit- ical Economy), was started. It was published by Julius Faucher and Otto Michaelis, as the organ of the German Free Trade Party. Hildebrand' s Jahrbucher^ on the The New German Powticaj; Economy. 117 other hand, confined itself to purely scientific ends, giving expression to this purpose partly by the purely historical character of its articles. The editor's articles on the method of political economy, stages of economic development, and similar topics were well-written, clever, but defective efforts. This want of logical clear- ness the writer sought to atone for by a few small frag- ments of economic history. As Hildebrand was always ready to sacrifice his best strength in promoting new undertakings^ he deserves the greatest credit for having founded this journal under serious difficulties, and main- tained it until he could entrust it to stronger and safer hands. In 1872, Johannes Conrad became associate editor, and in 1878 assumed full charge of the work. But this economic journal was by no means to remain the only one. In the first place at this time the ten- dency toward political economy in the Tiibingen Zdt- schrift fur die gesammte Staatswissenschaft was becom- ing more and more pronounced, under the controlling influence of Albert Schaeffle (and later, after 1878, of Adolph Wagner). Then with the founding of the Ger- man Empire t\i& Jahrbuch fnr Gesetzgebung Verwaltung und Rechtspflege des deutschen Reichs (Annals of Legis- lation, Administration and Judicature in the German Empire) came into existence edited by Fr. von Holtzen- dorffi After a short time, in 1877, the word Rechts- pflege, Judicature, in its title was replaced by Volks- wirthschafi^ Political Economy. A little later this periodical came into the hands of that competent editor, Gustav Schmoller (1881) and entered upon a remarkably prosperous career. Closely related to the original inten- tions of the Jahrbuch, with its subjects and treatment, is the Annalen des Norddeutschen Bundes und des Deutschen Zollvereins (Annals of the North German ii8 Annans op the American Academy. Federation and the German Customs-Union). It first appeared in 1868, and in 1870 was changed to Annalen des Deutschen Reichsfur Gesetzgebung^ Verwaltung und Statistik (Annals of the German Empire; a periodical devoted to Legislation, Administration and Statistics). It is edited by Georg Hirth, and contains a valuable collection of materials, as well as a series of critical, and partly also, general more academic contributions. At the same time a number of statistical journals have sprung up in connection with the more important statistical bureaus of the German States. Especially noteworthy is the one edited by that highly gifted and energetic man, Ernst Engel, the Zeitschrift des kgl. preussischen statistischen Bureaus (Journal of the Royal Statistical Bureau of Prussia), established in 1861. The same editor had previously issued the Zeitschrift des kgl. sachsischen statistischen Btireaus (Journal of the Royal Statistical Bureau of Saxony). A similar journal for the Bavarian statistical bureau is published by Georg Mayr. Let us add, and without mentioning other periodicals of less importance, that a journal has recently (1884) appeared devoted to one special branch of political economy: viz., the Finanzarchiv (Archives of Finance), edited by Georg Schanz. If, furthermore, we call to mind the periodicals which Austria and neighboring countries publish in the German language we see how marked by contrast is the lack of scientific activity in other nations, and especially in England, once the classic land of political economy, where up to the present hour no economic journal has been published.* The only •The English now publish two journals, devoted to political economy: The Economic Journal, the journal of the British Economic Association, edited by Prof. F. Y. Edgeworth iMacmillan St Co.), and The Economic Review, published for the Oxford University Branch of the Christian Social Union (Percival & Co.). Both these journals were started in 1890, five years after Cohn's work appeared. There have also been several new journals started in Germany since the above was written. — Tram. The New German Poutical Economy. 119 periodical which at all resembles Ours' is the Journal of the Statistical Society^ which hardly equals the better class of our achievements in statistical journalism, especially in its palmy days. In France, too, there is only the Journal des Economistes^ and that is the organ of a sect. The special journals mentioned above, as well as those of a more general character, like the Deutsche Viertel- jakrschrift or the Preussische Jahrbucher^ reveal the scientific growth of the last twenty or thirty years and reflect the condition of German national economy. This busy, active, many-sided participation in the great prob- lems of the science is characterized by the fact that the remoter tasks of scholarly investigation and the burning questions of the day have been co-ordinated, and, side by side, have been brought more and more distinctly within the horizon of the professional economist. We have space for a few more names only. Albert Schaeffle began by publishing a small textbook on national economy (1858), which he afterward gradu- ally extended and elaborated (second edition, 1867; third edition, 1873). A series of essays, in which with happy appreciation and lively fancy he treats of the inner con- tent of socialism, led up to his first book on that subject, '■'■Kapitalismus und Socialismus " (Capitalism and Social- ism, 1870). A development and enlarging of it is found in the author's principal work, '■'■ Bau und Leben des socialien Korpers'''' (Structure and Life of the Social Body, 1875, et seq). We have here one of the most remarkable attempts to construct from the standpoint of political economy a science of society, following as an analogy the hypotheses of the natural sciences. Besides producing these systematic works, SchaefHe has evinced his great literary fertility in relation to burning questions I20 Annals of the American Academy. of the day, havifig recently published, " Grundsatze der Steuerpotitik und die schwebenden Finanzfragen Deutsch- lands und Oesterreichs," 1880, (Principles of Taxation and the Impending Financial Questions in Germany and Austria); "Z>