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 212 w. E. SCOTT : long run," Arbuckle is very far from following the mercan- tile theorists, either in advocating prohibition or bounties. Considering the date at which he wrote, he speaks with no uncertain voice in favour of Free Trade, contending that " Prohibitions, or high duties amounting to prohibitions, we daily see have no effect ", 1 They lead to extensive smuggling and " the exorbitant gains to be made in such cases work too powerfully upon weak and dishonest minds to hinder them from supplying our luxury at any hazard to themselves and to the ruin of the public ". Even bounties " have not fully answered the ends proposed ". Thus, Arbuckle, while clinging to the mercantile position regarding bullion as wealth, and the consequent fallacy of the balance of trade, is an advocate of Free Trade at least between England and Ireland. The reconciliation of these two opposing tendencies in his work comes from a combination of the opinions of Swift and Shaftesbury. From the former he learnt to advocate the home-consumption of home manufac- tures, but he advances beyond what might be called the patriotic Protection of Swift by an ethical principle borrowed from Shaftesbury's optimism. He supposes, without ex- pressly stating it, that most of the goods required in Ireland can, under natural conditions, be produced inside the country, and, even under certain circumstances, such pro- duction would leave a surplus, which could be profitably exported, and, further, most manufactures can be sold to us more cheaply by the local producer. To bring about a return to such "natural" conditions only requires a recogni- tion of " enlightened self-interest" as opposed to fashionable caprice. Such arguments are strengthened by purely ethi- cal ones, such as appeals to Benevolence and the amount of happiness which would be produced by the increased amount of labour employed. This, according to Arbuckle, is the only true charity. These views are of interest from two quite different points of view. On the one side, Arbuckle's tentative economical work constitutes a connecting link between the Mercantile School and the Physiocrats, while it is important to note that so long before the publication of the Wealth of Nations he initiates the postulate of the coincidence of the individual and general good, as a consequence of " a benefi- cent natural order" 2 a doctrine commencing in modern thought with Shaftesbury, and transmitted by Molesworth 1 Hibernicus's Letters, p. 303. 3 Cf. A History of Political Economy, by J. K. Ingram, p. 91.