into this side of the genesis of economics, one cannot help being struck with the abundance of materials that had by 1770 been laid up, ready for anybody that should wish to convert economics into a science. A long period of preparation was at last to bear fruit. As the accompanying chart will show at a glance, the ultimate sources of economics are to be sought in Greek philosophy; but, more precisely taken, the antecedents lie in the two centuries following the Renaissance. Christian theology proved of no import, though it did influence modern ethics. On the other hand modern science, especially through the researches that culminated in the Newtonian system, was the direct occasion for men's asking whether physics and psychics might not be linked by a common principle in law and logic. With the aid of these data psychology opened up new vistas, and ere long provided a basis for a theory of knowledge as well as for a theory of ethics. Together these lines of investigation forced upon able thinkers the conclusion that the study of the social environment was worth while, that master principles might be unearthed, that rules might be prescribed for the furtherance of public well-being, and for the moral elevation of individuals. Description and prescription were not as yet rigidly sundered, though the possibility suggested itself. What was evident, however, was the growing desire to compete with physicists and mathematicians. Both in France and in England men arose who attacked this problem, thereby launching a new science, to be known as economics. CHAPTER THREE NATURALISM (Continued) II. PHYSIOCRATISM Underlying Ideas.-The Physiocrats, or Economists as they called themselves with a certain pride in their work, may justly be considered the founders of economics because they were the first to study social processes from the standpoint of law and causation, exactly as Newton, for example, had done in another field. They applied to the body politic what English empiricists had originally tried to discover in individual human nature, namely a principle of regularity in the occurrence of events, according to which they might be connected and perhaps predicted just as astronomers had explained the varied phenomena of the heavens. It was shown that wealth circulated and satisfied several requirements essential to national welfare, the inference being at the same time that something definite might be done to promote this tendency toward growth and progress. Not that all members of the Physiocratic group held the same opinion in details, but rather that they shared like views on fundamentals, and thus furnished a basis for literary and social activity that was the more effective since the needs of the times favored it. For France under Louis XV had gradually lost its prestige in Europe. The strength of the country had been sapped in bloody and rather useless wars and Pyrrhean victories, which pleased no one. Profligacy at court had more than offset the frugality of the peasant. Pomp and ceremony could not compensate for the growing deficits of the exchequer. The popularity of Louis XIV gave way to a bare tolerance for his great-grandson, and this to a hearty contempt for the prince who came to the throne in 1774. From then on the government was at the mercy of financiers who were expected to remedy overnight the evils that had been engendered by a century of improvidence and autocracy. Thus one might say that what the ministers of the king vainly endeavored to accomplish by near-at-hand measures, such as loans and a curtailment of feudal privileges, the Physiocrats meant to do with their study of production and circulation. To them the problem was definite, and a solution possible by mathematical demonstration. They relied upon their philosophy to show the natural order underlying what on the surface was so chaotic. They sought to vindicate the prior rights of landlord and farmer who, by virtue of their strategic position, could make or mar the country in conjunction with the Crown. In the long run, their Economic Table purported to show, public finance must vary with private cost-keeping and spending. From nature alone all surplus came, but treasuries would be empty as long as there was misappropriation at the source. In what may be called the premises of Physiocratism there is no more merit than in most of the eighteenth century Naturalism. We find the Stoical viewpoint developed in theories of a state of nature, laws of nature, and natural rights. What Hooker and Grotius, Locke and Pufendorf, Vattel and Montesquieu had said in their treatises on sovereignty or on international law, the Physiocrats repeated with little or no variation. The static rationalistic outlook which had so distinctly inspired English moralism, besides coloring psychological nomenclature, also predominated in France. Nay, French philosophy was so much beholden to the pathfinders across the Channel that, in perusing its pages, one feels brought back to the Restoration period of British speculation. It seemed quite sufficient for the Physiocrats to say: "The natural order is merely the physical constitution which God Himself has given the universe." 1 Or: "Natural law is the right a man has to things for the enjoyment thereof." 2 And for this reason, "to secure the greatest amount of pleasure with the least possible outlay should be the aim of all economic effort." 3 Mainly in succeeding in this policy the natural order would be realized among men. Nature meant prevision and precision. God had willed it so. There was no need of devising means for saving an individual or a nation, provided only nature was correctly understood, and being understood, followed implicitly in the management of one's affairs. The laws regulating the movements of the planets or the interactions of matter, were active in the organic world also, and especially in human society where complexity so obscured the fundamentals. Nature was allwise and beneficent. Its reign extended over everything. What God had planned in the creation of the universe was not to be supposed to shut out mankind. Rather, if man made laws it was only by way of reflecting the higher and more general reason in things, the legislator, in this sense, modeling his positive order on the eternal natural which pervaded the cosmos. Considered from one point, 1 See Dupont de Nemours' Physiocratie, 1767-68, Introduction to Quesnay's Works. 2 Collection des Principaux Economistes, by Daire, Eugene, 1846, vol. 1; Quesnay, Le Droit Naturel, p. 46. Ibidem, Quesnay's Dialogues. therefore, Naturalism meant the acknowledgment of continuity from physics to psychics. It was denied that two different sets of law ruled environment and society. It was taken as almost self-evident that the apparent gulf is simply an illusion due to man's unbalanced mind or faulty vision. If men would think and probe into the inner meaning of life they would soon admit their impotence in matters of morals or government. What could they think of that had not from the beginning been known and assigned its place? What were acts of parliament if not natural law applied, or in other words inferior copies of a wisdom older than man? Hence, viewed from another angle, there need be no fear of misfortune so long as the natural economy was left undisturbed. For God was benevolent and fatherly in His solicitude. Things would right themselves even if for a while they went badly. Human nature was meant to gain by the physical arrangement, not to suffer unnoticed. The very inequality among men with respect to their innate aptitudes, capacities, tastes, and passions was a means for endless progress. Division of rights and duties rested on this important fact. The convenience, nay necessity of private property, was thus logically assured. Individuality of men could not be lost without defying the same principles that differentiated life below man. It was rational that a variety of interests should exist, and that Reason itself should guide men in their everyday economic cares. For how could they win out except by continual adaptation of their faculties to the precepts ordained by God? And how could there be adaptation without poise and diligence, i. e., reason? Happiness was morality suited to nature. It was procuring the utmost pleasure through right use of energy and intelligence. In such observance of natural dif |