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LESLIE, THOMAS EDWARD CLIFFE (1827-1882)

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Originally appearing in Volume V16, Page 493 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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LESLIE, See also:THOMAS See also:EDWARD CLIFFE (1827-1882) , See also:English economist, was See also:born in the See also:county of See also:Wexford in (as is believed) the See also:year 1827. He was the second son of the Rev. Edward Leslie, See also:prebendary of See also:Dromore, and See also:rector of Annahilt, in the county of Down. His See also:family was of Scottish descent, but had been connected with See also:Ireland since the reign of See also:Charles I. Amongst his ancestors were that accomplished See also:prelate, See also:John Leslie (1571–1671), See also:bishop first of Raphoe and afterwards of See also:Clogher, who, when holding the former see, offered so stubborn a resistance to the Cromwellian forces, and the bishop's son Charles (see above), the nonjuror. Cliffe Leslie received his elementary See also:education from his See also:father, who resided in See also:England, though holding See also:church preferment as well as possessing some landed See also:property in Ireland; by him he was taught Latin, See also:Greek and See also:Hebrew, at an unusually See also:early See also:age; he was afterwards for a See also:short See also:time under the care of a clergyman at Clapham, and was then sent to See also:King See also:William's See also:College, in the Isle of See also:Man, where he remained until, in 1842, being then only fifteen years of age, he entered Trinity College, See also:Dublin. He was a distinguished student there, obtaining, besides other honours, a classical scholarship in 1845, and a See also:senior moderatorship (See also:gold See also:medal) in See also:mental and moral See also:philosophy at his degree examination in 1846. He became a See also:law student at See also:Lincoln's See also:Inn, was for two years a See also:pupil in a conveyancer's See also:chambers in See also:London, and was called to the English See also:bar. But his See also:attention was soon turned from the pursuit of legal practice, for which he seems never to have had much inclination, by his See also:appointment, in 1853, to the professorship of See also:jurisprudence and See also:political See also:economy in See also:Queen.'s College, See also:Belfast. The duties of this See also:chair requiring only short visits to Ireland in certain terms of each year, he continued to reside and prosecute his studies in London, and became a frequent writer on economic and social questions in the See also:principal reviews and other See also:periodicals. In 1870 he collected a number of his essays, adding several new ones, into a See also:volume entitled See also:Land Systems and See also:Industrial Economy of Ireland, England and See also:Continental Countries. J.

S. See also:

Mill gave a full See also:account of the contents of this See also:work in a See also:paper in the Fortnightly See also:Review, in which he pronounced Leslie to be one of the best living writers on applied political economy." Mill had sought his acquaintance on See also:reading his first See also:article in See also:Macmillan's See also:Magazine; he admired his talents and took See also:pleasure in his society, and treated him with a respect and kindness which Leslie always gratefully acknowledged. In the frequent visits which Leslie made to the See also:continent, especially to See also:Belgium and some of the less-known districts of See also:France and See also:Germany, he occupied himself much in economic and social observation, studying the effects of the institutions and See also:system of See also:life which prevailed in each region, on the material and moral See also:condition of its inhabitants. In this way he gained an extensive and accurate acquaintance with continental rural economy, of which he made excellent use in studying parallel phenomena at See also:home. The accounts be gave of the results of his observations were among his happiest efforts; " no one," said Mill, " was able to write narratives of See also:foreign visits at once so instructive and so interesting." In these excursions he made the acquaintance of several distinguished persons, amongst others of M. Leonce de Lavergne and M. Emile de See also:Laveleye. To the memory of the former of 'these he afterwards paid a graceful See also:tribute in a See also:biographical See also:sketch (Fortnightly Review, See also:February 1881) ; and to the See also:close of his life there existed between him and M. de Laveleye relations of mutual esteem and cordial intimacy. Two essays of Leslie's appeared in volumes published under the auspices of the. See also:Cobden See also:Club, one on the " Land System of France" (2nd ed., 1870), containing an See also:earnest See also:defence of la petite culture and still more of la petite propriete; the other on " See also:Financial Reform " (1871), in which he exhibited in detail the impediments to See also:production and See also:commerce arising from indirect See also:taxation. Many other articles were contributed by him to reviews between 1875 and 1879, including several discussions of the See also:history of prices and the movements of See also:wages in See also:Europe, and a sketch of life in See also:Auvergne in his best manner; the most important of them, however, related to the philosophical method of political economy, notably a memorable one which appeared in the Dublin University periodical, Hermathena. In 1879 the See also:provost and senior See also:fellows of Trinity College published for him a volume in which a number of these articles were collected under the See also:title of Essays in Political and Moral Philosophy.

These and some later essays, together with the earlier volume on Land Systems, See also:

form the essential contribution of Leslie to economic literature. He had See also:long contemplated, and had in See also:part written, a work on English economic and legal history, which would have been his magnum See also:opus—a more substantial See also:fruit of his See also:genius and his labours than anything he has See also:left. But the MS. of this See also:treatise, after much pains had already been spent on it, was unaccountably lost at See also:Nancy in 1872; and, though he hoped to be able speedily to reproduce the missing portion and finish the work, no material was left in a See also:state See also:fit for publication. ,What the nature of it would have been may be gathered from an See also:essay on the " History and Future of Profit " in the Fortnightly Review for See also:November 1881, which is believed to have been in substance an See also:extract from it. That he was able to do so much may well be a subject of wonder when it is known that his labours had long been impeded by a painful and depressing malady, from which he suffered severely at intervals, whilst he never See also:felt secure from its recurring attacks. To this disease he in the end succumbed at Belfast, on the 27th of See also:January 1882. Leslie's work may be distributed under two heads, that of applied political economy and that of discussion on the philosophical method of the See also:science. The Land Systems belonged principally to the former See also:division. The author perceived the See also:great and growing importance for the social welfare of both Ireland and England of what is called " the land question," and treated it in this volume at once with breadth of view and with a See also:rich variety of illustrative detail. His See also:general purpose was to show that the territorial systems, of both countries were so encumbered with elements of feudal origin as to be altogether unfitted to serve the purposes of a See also:modern industrial society. The policy he recommended is summed up in the following See also:list of requirements, " a See also:simple jurisprudence See also:relating to land, a law of equal intestate See also:succession, a See also:prohibition of See also:entail, a legal See also:security for tenants' improvements, an open See also:registration of title and See also:transfer and a considerable number of See also:peasant properties." The volume is full of See also:practical See also:good sense, and exhibits a thorough knowledge of home and foreign agricultural economy; and in the handling of thesubject is everywhere shown the See also:special See also:power which its author possessed of making what he wrote interesting as well as instructive. The way in which sagacious observation and shrewd comment are constantly intermingled in the discussion not seldom reminds us of See also:Adam See also:Smith, whose manner was more congenial to Leslie than the abstract and arid See also:style of See also:Ricardo.

But what, more than anything else, marks him as an See also:

original thinker and gives him a See also:place apart among contemporary economists, is his exposition and defence of the See also:historical method in political economy. Both at home and abroad there has for some time existed a profound and growing dissatisfaction with the method and many of the doctrines of the hitherto dominant school, which, it is alleged, under a "fictitious completeness, symmetry and exactness " disguises a real hollowness and discordance with fact. It is urged that the See also:attempt. to deduce the economic phenomena of a society from the so-called universal principle of " the See also:desire of See also:wealth " is illusory, and that they cannot be fruitfully studied apart from the general social conditions and historic development of which they are the outcome. Of this See also:movement of thought Leslie was the principal representative, if not the originator, in England. There is no doubt, for he has himself placed it on See also:record, that the first See also:influence which impelled him in the direction of the historical method was that of See also:Sir See also:Henry See also:Maine, by whose See also:personal teaching of jurisprudence, as well as by the example of his writings, he was led " to look at the See also:present economic structure and state of society as the result of a long See also:evolution.", The study of those See also:German economists who represent similar tendencies doubtless confirmed him in the new See also:line of thought on which he had entered, though he does not seem to have been further indebted to any of them except, perhaps; in some small degree to See also:Roscher. And the writings of See also:Comte, whose " prodigious genius," as exhibited in the Philosophie See also:Positive, he admired and proclaimed, though he did not accept his system as a whole, "must have powerfully co-operated to form in him the See also:habit of regarding economic science as only a single See also:branch of See also:sociology, which should always be kept in close relation to the others. The earliest See also:writing in which Leslie's revolt against the so-called " orthodox school " distinctly appears is his Essay on Wages, which was first published in 1868 and was reproduced as an appendix to the volume on Land Tenures. In this, after exposing the inanity of the theory of the wage-fund, and showing the utter want of agreement between its results and the observed phenomena, he concludes by declaring that " political economy must be content to take See also:rank as an inductive, instead of a purely deductive science," and that, by this See also:change of See also:character, " it will gain in utility, See also:interest and real truth far more than a full See also:compensation for the See also:forfeiture of a fictitious title to mathematical exactness and certainty." But it is in the essays collected in the volume of 1879 that his attitude in relation to the question of method is most decisively marked. In one of these, on ` the political economy of Adam Smith," he exhibits in a very interesting way the co-existence in the Wealth of Nations of historical-inductive investigation in the manner of See also:Montesquieu with a priori See also:speculation founded on theologico-metaphysical bases, and points out the See also:error of ignoring the former See also:element, which is the really characteristic feature of Smith's social philosophy, and places him in strong contrast with his soi-disant followers of the school of Ricardo. The essay, however, which contains the most brilliant polemic against the " orthodox school," as well as the most luminous account and the most powerful vindication of the new direction, was that of which we have above spoken as having first appeared in Hermathena. It may be recommended as supplying the best extant presentation of one of the two contending views of economic method. On this essay mainly rests the claim of Leslie to be regarded as the founder and first See also:head of the English historical school of political economy.

Those who See also:

share his views on the philosophical constitution of the science regard the work he did, notwithstanding its unsystematic character, as in reality the most important done by any English economists in the latter See also:half of the 19th See also:century. But even the warmest partisans of the older school acknowledge that he did excellent service by insisting on a See also:kind of inquiry, previously too much neglected, which was of the highest interest and value, in whatever relation it might be supposed to stand to the See also:establishment of economic truth. The members of both See also:groups alike recognized his great learning, his patient and conscientious habits of investigation and the large social spirit in which he treated the problems of his science. (J. K.

End of Article: LESLIE, THOMAS EDWARD CLIFFE (1827-1882)

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