v PREFACE 
thropist, every public-spirited citizen, does possess and apply 
to the conduct of affairs some such standard or criterion as we are 
seeking. Some notion or idea, more or less clear and explicit, of 
the general welfare, crossed and blurred no doubt by other in- 
terests and passions, is an operative and directive influence in his 
policy. Moreover, though idiosyncrasies will everywhere affect 
this operative ideal, there will be found among persons of widely 
different minds and dispositions a substantial body of agreement 
in their meaning of human welfare. The common social environ- 
ment partly evokes, partly imposes, this agreement. In fact, all 
cooperative work for social progress implies the existence of some 
such standard as we are seeking. The complex image of human 
values which it contains is always slowly changing, and varies 
somewhat among different sorts and conditions of men. But for 
the interpretation of economic goods and processes it has, at any 
time, a real validity. For it is anchored to certain solid founda- 
tions of human nature, the needs and functions to which, alike 
in the individual and in the society, we give the term ‘organic.’ 
Only by considering the organic nature of man and of human 
society can we trace an intelligible order in the evolution of 
industry. The wants of man, and therefore the economic opera- 
tions serving them must be treated as organic processes. This 
term, borrowed from biology, must be extended so as to cover 
the entire physical and spiritual structure of human society, for 
no other term is so well fitted to describe the nature of the federal 
unity which society presents. The standard of values thus set 
up is the current estimate of ‘organic welfare.’ 
The justification of these terms and of this mode of human 
valuation is to be found in their application to the task before 
us. These tools will be found to do the work better than any 
others that are available. 
In seeking to translate economic values into human by refer- 
ence to such a standard of organic welfare, I take as the aptest 
material for experiment the aggregate of goods and services that 
constitute the real income of the British nation. In order to re- 
duce that income to terms of human welfare, I first examine 
separately the economic costs of production and the economic 
utilities of consumption which meet in this concrete wealth, 
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