dangerous or barren"? (p. 28). Here, again, it may be worth while, after the student has worked his way to some conclusions, to point out how they have been reached, and what sort of evidence exists for substantiating them. But to consider economic method in advance is futile. So it is as to the relation of economics to other sciences: until one knows something of the subject-matter of economics itself, how is it possible to form a notion of its relation to other sciences? In the section on this last topic Professor Seligman remarks, for example, that "value can have no existence apart from the mental conditions of man. The whole conception of demand is essentially psychological" (p. 29). What can this signify to the youth or maiden who has yet to learn the first elements of the meaning of value and demand in economics? I suspect that most teachers of economics have found it best to skip the whole or nearly the whole of such introductory matter as is contained in Professor Seligman's first part, and to proceed at once to something more readily grasped by their pupils.

Something of the same sort is to be said of the second part, in which are treated such subjects as population, economic history, the growth of economic thought, private property. Opinions doubtless would differ here, yet my judgment is that most can be postponed with profit. Consider such a subject as the history of economic thought,-classical antiquity, the mercantilists, the British school, modern economics. I doubt whether the elementary student can get, under any circumstances, much notion of what all this means,-hardly more than a string of names and a date or two. The situation is substantially the same as to private property and the theories thereon. Here we find Professor Seligman, for example, arguing as to the labor theory of property, the influence of labor and of demand, the relation of great fortunes and inheritance taxes to enterprise and accumulation (pp. 133, 138),-reasoning which can be intelligible only to one who has already been taught something of the relation of labor and utility to value, and of private accumulation to social capital.

The case is more doubtful as to other topics taken up in the second part, especially population and economic history. Following the example of Professor Adolf Wagner, Professor Seligman discusses the theory of population in his early foundation-laying chapters. No doubt this subject can be made interesting and in some respects comprehensible to the beginner; but can its significance be made clear? Professor Seligman discusses three conclusions that might be drawn from the Malthusian doctrine, as to socialism, wages, and economic progress (p. 61). Once again the question arises whether the student at this early stage, before a word has been said as to production, distribution, the causes of progress, and the obstacles to it, can follow the reasoning. I speak not now of the discussion itself, which seems to me open to some criticism, but only of the place which is given it in the unfolding of the subject.

As to economic history, probably there would be many to approve its presentation in the earlier chapters, like those on the economic stages, the historical forms of enterprise, the economic development of the United States. The interest and importance of these topics are not to be denied; yet to what extent can they find a place in a text-book, and what place? Take the economic stages. Is it worth while to enumerate the stages of primitive technique, and to inform the student that the archæologists are now doubtful whether the bronze age preceded the iron age, or succeeded, or was contemporaneous with it (p. 70)? In connection with the analysis of capital, historic illustration of the growth of tool-using might be helpful. But is it worth while to tell the beginner that "it is erroneous to assume that the hunter was necessarily succeeded by the herdsman," and "in the same way it is erroneous to think that the herdsman was everywhere succeeded by the farmer" (p. 72)? Or shall we bring to his attention "the original monopoly of sexual relations,' 'the ensuing promiscuous methods," "the uterine clan," "the origin of totem worship, still shrouded in mystery" (pp. 85, 86)?

No one doubts the interest and significance of economic

history. Yet any adequate treatment of economic history is extremely difficult to fit into the analysis of the industrial society in which we live and which chiefly interests our students. For this reason it is better, in my own judgment, to take it up as a separate study and with a separate book or set of books, either pari passu with the study of those doctrines which we try to develop as to contemporary society, or after such study, but hardly before it. This is not inconsistent with the use, in a text-book like this, in direct connection with the statement of principles, of specific illustrations from economic experience; tho the difficulty of finding apt illustrations and the almost inevitable resort to hypothetical cases are familiar to every teacher. Even the economic history of the United States, the most recent and the most modern body of economic experience, is not easily brought into close logical connection with our economic theory. The chapters on it in our text-books hang in the air, quite apart from the rest of the matter; and this is equally true of Professor Seligman's chapter. He tries, indeed, to connect the economic development of this country, if not with general principles, at least with his theories of the general evolution of society. "The [American] communities which had left the frontier stage behind them developed from the family system of industry, through the help, into the handicraft and domestic system" (p. 100). But this application of a doubtful generalization in economic history to the interpretation of our country's development seems to me purely fanciful: the economic history of the United States is distorted when it is forced into such a formula. So the South is said to have "heaped up its wealth in the transition forms from an isolated to a trade economy resting on slavery" (p. 102), again suggesting analogies of very doubtful accuracy. On the other hand, the charts on the production of corn, wheat, and oats, on capital invested in manufactures, average earnings of workmen, and the like, which are appended to this chapter on the economic history of the United States, seem to me to have the effect of mere pictures: they stand in no clear relation to anything said in

the text about economic development, still less in any relation to the general body of economic principles.

We come now to the third part in Professor Seligman's book, the exposition of value, exchange, distribution, money, and the like. The chapters on these subjects contain, after all, the gist of what the economist has to say in a book like this. Here the interest is not so much in arrangement or selection as in the substantive conclusions. Unfortunately, we differ very much on some of the most important of these conclusions. I say unfortunately, for the differences are highly inconvenient to those of us who have to teach; tho doubtless they are in reality healthful, and will lead in the end to a better adjustment of our foundations. Professor Seligman is, in general, eclectic. He shows the results of omnivorous reading, and tries to give due weight to the reasoning of all sorts of diverging thinkers. On the crucial questions of distribution, however, he follows the lead of his colleague, Professor J. B. Clark. To express an opinion on this part of his book is, therefore, to express it on that scholar's contributions to economic theory.

Professor Seligman is more than appreciative of the debt he owes to his colleague, to whom he gives praise such as it is hazardous to accord to one still among us. In the introductory list of treatises Professor Clark's Distribution of Wealth is described as "of fundamental and epoch-making importance" (p. 19),-a note of praise not sounded for any other living economist. I can only record regretfully my dissent from such unique praise, and my dissent from an exposition of economic principles which follows so largely Professor Clark's lead. Those who accede to the Clarkian reasoning and conclusions will, of course, welcome their incorporation into a volume for students. Those who, like myself, think much of that reasoning inconclusive and many of the theorems untenable, will be loth to teach them. I cannot, for example, find it a helpful way of explaining distribution to describe all incomes as surplus. As Professor Seligman puts the doctrine (p. 374), "The rent of a boat is a

surplus over that of a no-rent boat; the wages of a laborer is [sic] a surplus over that of the convict or no-wage laborer; the interest of capital is a surplus over the capital so invested as to earn no interest." No doubt there always is some fraction of capital which is nearly worn out, and which continues to be used, through lack of intelligence or enterprise, even tho it no longer yields a return. But I have never been able to see that it sets the pace, so to speak,that it settles the remuneration for all capital. And it has always seemed to me even less in accord with the facts to speak of "the convict or no-wage laborer" (Professor Clark mentioned lunatics: his colleague does not go so far) as setting a standard by which all other wages are measured and determined. Again, in this volume, as in Professor Clark's writings, rent and interest are treated as two phases of the same phenomenon: "interest is commuted rent" (p. 392). There are, however, remarks which indicate that Professor Seligman is not willing to go the full length on this last topic, and would admit that there is some difference of moment between rent and interest. Speaking of the single tax, he maintains that there is unearned increment not only from land, but elsewhere as well, mentioning investments "in the shares of a street railway, a newspaper, or a bank" (p. 390), whose value may be enhanced by the growth of population. (Observe, by the way, that one of these cases the street railway-is precisely such as the consistent single-taxer would select for applying his principle; while the other two-newspapers and banks-happen to illustrate conspicuously the importance of good will.) He adds: "It may, nevertheless, be conceded that there is a difference to this extent, that ultimately the ownership of the capital controls its management and conditions its most effective utilization,”—a difference which justifies "a somewhat higher rate of taxation on land." This implies that, after all, rent and interest do not represent merely two ways of looking at the same thing, but are phenomena between which there are fundamental differences.

Whatever be one's opinions on these crucial questions,