ECONOMICS (from the Gr. oiaovogLK1, sc. TEXvrn, from OtKOS, a See also:

• HOUSE
• HOUSE (O. Eng. hiss, a word common to Teutonic languages, cf. Dut. huis, Ger. Haus; in Gothic it is only found in gudhiss, a temple; it may be ultimately connected with the root of " hide," conceal)

It necessarily involves the scientific examination of the structure and organization of the community or communities in question; their See also:

• HISTORY

It is evident that no permanent See also:

• CLASSIFICATION (Lat. classis, a class, probably from the root cal-, cla-, as in Gr. icaMce, clamor)

Progress is the result of See also:

• ADAPTATION (from Lat. adaptare. to fit to)

See also:

• FOREIGN

Elaborate regulations were in force, but no one knows how elastic they were in practice. See also:

• MEDIEVAL

Those condiof tions are: (i.) the life of the state or other community economic or communities we are studying must be so differen- adence. tiated that we can isolate those functions which are wholly or predominantly economic. The " separation of employments " is not only a See also:

• CONDITION (Lat. condicio, from condicere, to agree upon, arrange; not connected with conditio, from condere, conditum, to put together)

Whatever. " method " of economic investigation we employ, we must at every See also:

• STAGE (Fr. 6/age; from Lat. stare, to stand)

This was inevitable in the See also:

• ABSENCE (Lat. absentia)

Her insular position, continuity of political development and freedom from domestic broils played an important part in bringing about a steady and continuous growth of industry and manufactures for several generations before the modern era. The great See also:

• WARS

The spread of the modern industrial system has brought with it the modern state, with its millions of consumers, its vast See also:

• AREA

The historical relations between philosophy and economics are of great importance in tracing the development of the latter, and have done much to determine its present form. But the modern conception of society or the state owes more to See also:

• BIOLOGY (Gr. Qios, life)

As a matter of fact, discussions of method and the See also:

• CRITICISM
• CRITICISM (from the Gr. KpiTrlS, a judge, Kpivew, to decide, to give an authoritative opinion)

Every See also:

• HYPOTHESIS (from Gr. inrorcOivat, to put under; cf. Lat. suppositio, from sub-ponere)

We can show, for example: (r) that the Statute of Apprenticeship did not stand alone; it was one of a long series of similar measures, beginning more than two centuries before, which in their turn join on to the municipal and gild regulations of the middle ages; one of an important group of statutes, more or less closely interwoven throughout their history, administered by local authorities whose functions had grown largely in connexion with this legislation and the See also:

• GRADUAL (Med. Lat. gradualis, of or belonging to steps or degrees; gradus, step)

It is a comparatively simple thing to state the , question to which we want an answer, but extremely difficult to define the exact nature of the evidence which will constitute a See also:

• GOOD, JOHN MASON (1764-1827)

But it would be absurd to suppose that we could reach those conclusions by simple reference to the trades themselves. We cannot assume that the fluctuations in wages were due to the action or inaction of magistrates without the most careful examination of the other influences affecting the trades. In economic affairs the See also:

• ARGUMENT

But like the early statisticians of the 17th century, economic historians are the " beginners of an art not yet polished, which time may bring to more perfection." When we come to exclusively modern questions, there is no reason or necessity for a fundamental change of method. We The haves- cannot suppose that there occurred, at or about the illation of commencement of the 19th century, a See also:

• BREACH (Mid. Eng. breche, derived from the common Teutonic root brec, which appears in " break," Ger. brechen, &c.)

Competition, in the Darwinian sense, is characteristic not only of modern industrial states, but of all living organisms; and in the narrower sense of the " higgling of the market " is found on the Stock See also:

• EXCHANGE

If we study the economy of a See also:

• VILLAGE

Definite economic problems can very rarely be dealt with by merely quantitative methods. In the tabulation and interpretation of statistical evidence, as in its collection, it is scarcely possible to overrate the importance of wide knowledge and experience. There is another very important instrument of investigation which can be used in our own time, but cannot be employed in historical research. Historical documents, however detailed, rarely show all the factors we have to deal with or fully explain a given situation. No sane See also:

• PERSON, OFFENCES AGAINST THE

If by the " old Political Economy " we mean the methods and conclusions of certain great writers, who stood See also:

• HEAD (in 0. Eng. heafad; the word is common to Teutonic languages; cf. Dutch hoofd, Ger. Haupt, generally taken to be in origin connected with Lat. caput, Gr. KerbOvi7)
• HEAD, SIR EDMUND WALKER, BART
• HEAD, SIR FRANCIS BOND, BART

Others, however, were hostile to it. In many works, such as those of a statistical or historical character, there are frequently to be found passages which could have been written in no other period, but are only of the nature of ejaculations and do not affect the argument. In stating the position of economics during this time we cannot ignore all writers, except those who belonged to one group, however eminent that group may have been, simply because they did not represent the dominant ideas of the period, and exercised no immediate and direct influence on the movement of economic thought. We must include the pioneers of the historical school, the economic historians, the socialists, the statisticians, and others whose contributions to economics are naw appreciated, and without whose labours the science as we know it now would have been impossible. If we take this broadly historical view of the progress of economics, it is obvious that even in England there was no general agreement, during the 19th century, as to the methods most appropriate to economic investigation. Suppose, now, we ignore the writers who were inaugurating new methods, investigating special problems or laboriously collecting facts, and concentrate attention on the dominant school, with its long series of writers from Adam Smith to See also:

• JOHN
• JOHN (1167–1216)
• JOHN (1290-c. 1320)
• JOHN (1296-1346)
• JOHN (1371–1419)
• JOHN (1468-1532)
• JOHN (1801-1873)
• JOHN (Heb. llni')
• JOHN (ZAPOLYA) (1487-1540)
• JOHN, 4TH MARQUESS OF TWEEDDALE (c. 1695-1762)
• JOHN, DON (1545-1578)
• JOHN, DON (1629–1679)
• JOHN, GOSPEL OF ST
• JOHN, or HAYS (1513–1571)
• JOHN, THE APOSTLE
• JOHN, THE EPISTLES OF

They will be forgotten, and their books will not be read. See also:

• ADAMS
• ADAMS, ANDREW LEITH (1827-1882)
• ADAMS, CHARLES FRANCIS (1807-1886)
• ADAMS, HENRY (1838— )
• ADAMS, HENRY CARTER (1852— )
• ADAMS, HERBERT (i858— )
• ADAMS, HERBERT BAXTER (1850—1901)
• ADAMS, JOHN (1735–1826)
• ADAMS, JOHN QUINCY (1767-1848)
• ADAMS, SAMUEL (1722-1803)
• ADAMS, THOMAS (d. c. 1655)
• ADAMS, WILLIAM (d. 162o)

S. Mill's Principles of Political Economy as a text-book. Important as it was for See also:

• THIRTY

This observation is true not only of old-world writers like the Mercantilists, but also of Ricardian economics. No one is concerned to prove that the Ricardian economics applies to the manorial system, and it is generally supposed at any rate that the world has been approximating more and more nearly during the last century to the conditions assumed in most of the reasoning of that school. On the principles we have explained, therefore, the Ricardian economics should supply just that body of general theory which is required in the investigation of modern economic problems, and the reputation of at any rate the leading writers should be as great as ever. It would be of immense See also:

• ADVANTAGE

This may serve to show that the ideals of our youth were not without See also:

• JUSTIFICATION

If it has the misfortune to be systematized by an enthusiastic but dull and incompetent See also:

• DISCIPLE

It is not unlike the procedure of the canonists and casuists of the middle ages with regard to the doctrine of See also:

• USURY

He is lucky if he can throw new light on a few old propositions. For the rest, he can only, with the utmost caution, adopt the suggestions of other minds as qualifications of old doctrines, never feeling quite sure that he is right in doing so. A complete restatement could only be undertaken by a group of men, trained in much the same conditions, accustomed to think and work together, each one engaged on a special department, but all acting under the control of one See also:

• MASTER (Lat. magister, related to tnagis, more, as the corresponding minister is to minus, less; the English form is due partly to the O. Eng. maegister, and partly to O. Fr. maistre, mod. maitre; cf. Du. meester, Ger. Meister, Ital. maestro)

No economist would deliberately make that assumption now unless he were dealing with some purely theoretical problem, for the See also:

• SOLUTION (from Lat. solvere, to loosen, dissolve)

Mill apparently is not content with the confusion between " law " and " agency " or " force," but opposes the one to the other. He is constantly speaking in terms which imply the conquering of one law by another, a See also:

• HABIT (through the French from Lat. habitus, from habere, to have, hold, or, in a reflective sense, to be in a certain condition; in many of the English senses the French use habitude, not habit)

Its importance has not been seriously, or at any rate successfully, called in question. Treated at first as a doctrine peculiarly applicable to See also:

• LAND

It never has been, and never can be, more than an indica- tion of the kind of thing which might be expected in a purely hypothetical world. When the aim of the man of affairs and the hypothesis of the economist was unrestricted competition, and measures were being adopted to realize it, general theory such as the classical economists provided was perhaps a sufficiently trustworthy See also:

• GUIDE (in Mid. Eng. gyde, from the Fr. guide; the earlier French form was guie, English " guy," the d was due to the Italian form guida; the ultimate origin is probably Teutonic, the word being connected with the base seen in O. Eng. witan, to know)

That is, original investigation of special problems has to be carried out on a more gigantic scale than any economist of the historical school ever dreamt of or the world requires, with the certain knowledge that at the end of it all the general theory will not correspond with the facts of life. For there is all the difference in the world between using a body of general theory as an indication of the factors to be considered in the study of a special problem, and undertaking special studies with a view to testing the general theory. If the necessary limitations of general economic theory are recognized, most of the difficulties we have noticed disappear. Now that the "industrial revolution" has extended practically all over the world, so that we have several countries carrying on production by modern methods, it is easily possible to See also:

• SKETCH (directly adapted from Dutch schets, which was taken from Ital. schizzo, a rough draft, Lat. schedium, something hastily made, Gr. oxE&os, sudden, off-hand, axeb6v, near by; Ger. Skizze and Fr. esquisse are from the same source)

At present the language of economics is for the ordinary Englishman like a foreign language of exceptional difficulty, because he is constantly See also:

• MEETING (from " to meet," to come together, assemble, 0. Eng. metals ; cf. Du. moeten, Swed. mota, Goth. gamotjan, &c., derivatives of the Teut. word for a meeting, seen in O. Eng. Wit, moot, an assembly of the people; cf. witanagemot)

The doctrine of free trade only prevailed in so far as it could be restated in terms which had a direct relevance to the existing position of England and existing conditions of international trade. And it was directly challenged by the representatives of Mr See also:

• CHAMBERLAIN (0. Fr. chamberlain, chamberlenc, Mod. Fr. chambellan, from O. H. Ger. Chamarling, Chamarlinc, whence also the Med. Lat. cambellanus, camerlingus, camerlengus; Ital. camerlingo; Span. camerlengo, compounded of 0. H. Ger. Chamara, Kamara [Lat.
• CHAMBERLAIN, JOSEPH (1836— )
• CHAMBERLAIN, JOSHUA LAWRENCE (1828– )
• CHAMBERLAIN, SIR NEVILLE BOWLES (1820-1902)

This, again, is a movement much more likely to extend than to be checked. Local governing authorities now discharge economic functions of enormous importance and complexity, involving sums of money larger than sufficed to run important states a generation ago. The scientific study of the economics of local administration is, however, in its infancy, and requires to be taken up in See also:

• EARNEST (probably a corruption of the obsolete arles or erles, adapted from Lat. equivalent arrha, due to a confusion with the adjective " earnest," serious, O. Eng. eornust, cognate with Ger. ernst)

(W. A. S.