POLITICAL ECONOMY is the Science of Wealth, and professes to teach the laws by which the production and consumption of wealth are governed. The term, "political economy," is not a fortunate one, since it leads the popular mind to a misapprehension of what the science actually teaches, and confounds it with politics, or the science of government, from which it is distinct. The relations into which these sciences enter are voluntary, and for the supposed advantage of both, not from any logical necessity to complete either. A just and efficient government of the state is important to realize the largest development of wealth, but only as a condition under which the laws of wealth, already complete and harmonious, may have their own proper sway. Government cannot furnish a new power in man, or a new agency in nature. It can, to a certain extent, control the exercise of existing power, and the use of existing agencies; but it can control only by limiting them. Nothing is added through legislation. The science of wealth is complete in its own principles, though the statesman may think it policy to contravene them for a supposed good. Political economy is, then, silent before the law. The science of wealth would be no less complete and certain, should the action of government render the creation or possession of wealth impossible. The science would vindicate itself by saying, that, when wealth is created, it must be as my laws determine. The independence of these sciences does not imply that they are indifferent to each other. The statesman must consult the economist at every step, if he would use the powers of government to national advantage, and legislate in accordance with the natural laws of wealth, and to the advancement of the national industry. It is not intended here to enforce this as a duty, but to show, by these remarks, the relation of the statesman to the science we are to investigate. Political economy teaches the relation of man to those objects of his desire which he can obtain only by his efforts. He has wants: he needs food, clothing, and shelter; he wishes many things not vital to him. Together, these constitute his wants, in the view of political economy. This is the first fact of the science. It is the foundation of all. These wants can only be satisfied by efforts. This is the second fact. By it, man builds on the foundation laid in his wants. The objects or satisfactions obtained by these efforts are collectively called wealth, or those things which contribute to the welfare of man. This is the third fact to be noticed. The circle of political economy is here completed. It may hereafter appear that there is a perpetual progress, an unceasing self-multiplication; that each satisfaction creates a new want, which in turn seeks its object through an effort. Let us make a formal statement of what we have obtained: EFFORTS, SATISFACTIONS; or, WANTS, WEALTH. The wants of man, in which are all the springs of wealth, are various, and change their place and form with times and circumstances. But they arise from his nature. They are a certain and constantly operating force. They commence with man's existence, and terminate only with his life: and, when all the desires of the individual are satisfied in the grave, and his labor paralyzed, the wealth he lays down in death becomes the possession of other men, with full strength and fresh desires; and so the creation of wealth goes on in ever-increasing circles, expanded by the central force, the wants of man. While the individual awakens but slowly to the consciousness of his needs, gradually exhausts his activity in supplying them, and finally resigns all as he passes from life, we find that the sum of such wants and energies experiences no diminution by an atom, no suspension for an instant. Differing as these do in the individual, they are, in the world, as well ascertained and determinate as the facts on which any other science rests. While the one element of wants or desires is secured in the constitution of man's being, the other element — viz., the relation of effort or labor to them - is fixed in the constancy of nature, and the permanence we attribute to the created world, a foundation sure enough to build upon. If, on the one hand, man's being were so constituted that his wants should cease, or be intermitted without any reason at the time, and without any assurance of return, or prove too weak to move the activities towards their satisfaction; or, on the other, nature were so disposed that labor had no guaranty of reward, resulting indifferently in good to the laborer, or in nothingness, or in positive injury to him who performs it, we could have no science of political economy. But, as man's being and nature's laws are found in experience, political economy is to be regarded as a positive sciNothing in its fundamental principles is hypothetical or problematic. None of its methods are whimsical or acci ence. |