PREFACE

It is the simpler and more fundamental aspects of the theory which
have been chiefly dealt with. Some refinements that bulk large in the
literature of the subject have been disregarded. I have directed
attention to the leading principles, and with a view to their practical
significance rather than their theoretical nicety. More especially,
those have been developed for which there seemed to be a possibility
of applying the processes of test and verification undertaken in the
second Part. Some intricate and much discussed elaborations of
theory, especially on the play of demand and on the effects of import
and export taxes, have been almost entirely ignored.
To the conversant reader an explanation is due, and perhaps an
apology, for the simplicity of Part I and for the way in which the
illustrative figures are used. The procedure followed can hardly be
dignified by calling it mathematical, since only the simplest operations
in arithmetic are carried on. My inability to use the methods of
higher mathematics prevents me from following beyond the initial
stages the elaborated treatment which has been applied to the subject
by a long succession of 19th century writers. The excuse which I
would offer for handling the problems in ways that must seem elementary
 to the mathematical economists is two-fold. First, with the
tools at my command I have tried to grapple with parts of the subject
at large which do not seem to have received attention from those
better equipped; and thereby perhaps something has been added to
the theoretic framework. And second, I have some hope that the very
simplicity of the computations and illustrations of this book will
contribute to their practical significance. In order to come as close as
possible to actuality, the theoretic conclusions have here been worked
out in terms of prices and money incomes. By thus pushing them
to the stage of concreteness and verisimilitude, they have been made
more amenable to test, verification, correction.
In Part II, which takes up these processes of verification, I have
departed farther from the beaten track. The pure theory of international
 trade constitutes only the initial stage toward the ascertainment
 of the things we wish in the end to know. Such indeed is the
case with the whole of the pure theory of economics, which can be
called “the” theory rather than “a” theory, solely on the ground that
no other has been put forward which is generalized, consistent, intellectually
 satisfactory. After all, what we wish to attain is not a
neat logical structure, but an understanding of the actualities. We