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