Economic StaTisTICS
41. One of the chief uses, if not absolutely the most important of
all the uses of the study of Commercial or Economic Geography, is to
enable us to form some reasonable estimate of the future course of
commercial development, so far as that is governed by geographical
conditions. Such an estimate must, of course, be based on one’s know-
ledge of forces that can be seen in operation at the present time, and
must be recognised as liable to be falsified by discoveries which it is
impossible to foresee. The keenest and most widely informed have
made forecasts which have proved to be utterly wide of the truth, but
which could not be called unreasonable at the time. When Adam Smith
wrote that ‘ the small quantity of foreign corn imported, even in times
of the greatest scarcity, may satisfy our farmers that they can have
nothing to fear from the freest importation’ (Wealth of Nations,
Book IV. Chap. II.), it was not expected that any one should be able
to foresee the ultimate consequences of the inventions of the ingenious
young instrument maker whom Smith had befriended at Glasgow.
When Dr. P. Colquhoun in his Wealth of the British Empire (2nd
edition, 1815) demonstrated the utter inutility of the new British
colony in Australia, even that can hardly be pronounced unreasonable
in the light of the knowledge of the time. Such forecasts may serve to
remind us of the tacit qualifications with which all attempts to anti-
cipate the future are to be interpreted, but do not show the inutility
of making such anticipations as the circumstances admit of.
42. In attempting such forecasts statistical data are unquestionably
an important aid. One of the greatest advantages which the future
may be expected to have over the present will consist in the greater
accumulation of statistical data, and greater insight as to the kind of
data to be collected and the method of handling them. In Commercial
Geography the value of figures is two-fold. First, they help at any
particular time to distinguish the important from the unimportant.
Second, when we have figures for a series of years they direct attention
to changes that have been in progress in the past, and may thus serve
bo suggest the most fruitful branches of inquiry with reference to any
geographical causes that may have contributed to such changes, and
help us to estimate with more chance of success their probable action in
the future. In both ways they serve as a guide to what is most worthy
of examination in our special subject. In order that they may illus-
brate changes in progress it is-obvious that the series are likely to be