ure exhibits combinations which are by no means frequent. Seldom
is seen a conjunction of such cold purity of thinking with such
generosity of nature; seldom such considerateness, such industry,
patience, and carefulness of deliberation, with a boldness so entire;
seldom such ducal self-possession and self-sufficingness, with equal
openness to social and sympathetic impression; nor less rare, perhaps,
is the union of a reflective power so large and dominating with an
observation so active.

These mental qualities fit him in a peculiar degree for service in the
field of Political Economy as now commonly defined,--a branch of
literature which, more, perhaps, than any other, represents at once the
genius and the limitation of our time.

Political Economy is a half-science, not total or integral; and if it
pretend to spherical completeness, as it often does, it becomes open to
grave accusation. The charges against it, considered as a strict and
complete science, are two.

Of these the first has been cogently urged by Mr. Ruskin, while virtual
admissions to a like effect were made by Mr. Buckle in his spirited
account of Adam Smith. It is this: as a science, Political Economy must
assume the perfect selfishness of every human being. Every science
requires necessary, and therefore invariable, conditions, which, when
expounded, are named laws. Such in Astronomy is gravitation, with the
law of its diminution by distance; such in Chemistry is chemical
attraction, with the law of definite proportions. The natural and
perpetual condition assumed by Political Economy is the absolute
supremacy in man of pecuniary interest. Absolute: it can admit no
modification of this; it can make no room within its province for
generosity, or for any action of man's soul, without forfeiting, so far,
its claim to the character of a science. Put a dollar, with all honor,
liberal justice, and humane attraction, on the one hand; put a dollar
and one cent, with mere legal right and consequent safety, on the other
hand; and Political Economy must assume that every man will gravitate to
the latter by the same necessity which makes the balance incline toward
the heavier weight. Or, conceding the contrary, it yields also its claim
to the character of a perfect science, and takes rank among those
half-sciences which partly expound necessary laws and partly contingent
effects.

Now this assumed sovereignty of pecuniary interest seems to us _not_ a
final