Page:The Economic Journal Volume 1.djvu/630

 608 THE ECONOMIC JOURNAL the preparation of the Dictionary has involved; and the unwearying assiduity with which difficulties have been encountered and overcome, the amount of pains which has been bestowed on main points, the readiness with which suggestions have been welcomed, and criticisms received, while the editor has throughout maintained an independent iuclgment of his own, seein to us to be beyond praise. We can only say that Mr. Palgrave has made his Dictionary a labour of love in no ordinary sense of the words. L. L. PRICE A Short History of Political Economy in Endad. From Adam Smitk to Arnold Toynbee. By L. L. PICS, Author of ' Indus- trial Peace,' Methuen's ' University Extension Series,' 1891. IT is refreshing to find a short history which is not a mere abstract, and brief chronicle of names and dates. Moreover, although English economical books can be counted by the thousand, Travers Twiss and Dr. Ingram have had the history of economic theories nearly to them- selves, and Mr. Price's short history (in a well-worn phrase) supplies a real want. His plan of picking out the salient and distinctive theories of the most important writers, and giving their ways of reasoning as well as their general conclusions, is well calculated to prevent the student from trying to master the contents of his book by rote. Of course, on going over a history like this, after a few great names are passed which would occur to every one, the' professional economist' is sure to find some minor prophets wh. ose presence surprises him, and perhaps one or two whose absence gives him a pang. Perhaps, for example, the long line of dissenters froin Ricardian orthodoxy in the early half of our century deserve more notice than they get, and those of our own half get more notice than they deserve. But some little inequality was almost unavoidable, and more attention is likely to be paid by the ordinary reader to writers of whom he has some personal recollection than to those of a generation long out of mind. The accounts of Adam Smith, Malthus, Ricardo, and John Mill, are really (in addition to a graphic description of the men and their sur- roundings) a sketch of the economic cardinal doctrines of division of labour, population, rent, and value. Similarly, on passing to Cairnes and Cliffe Leslie, and then to Bagehot and Jevons, we are introduced to economic method, and then to English banking and the money market, and then to the right use of statistics. Finally, in dealing with Fawcett and Toynbee we are brought into close quarters with ' the Social Problem'and its relations to political economy. The economic theory of wages, and the theory of the functions of the state play their part in this last chapter. Mr. Price, who has shown elsewhere his power to deal with practical questions, has shown in this volume his grasp of theoretical economics, and his wisdom and breadth of view in comprehending the bearings of theory on practice. JAs BONAR