PREFACE.

XXV

premises to the conclusion, and flinching from
no consequences at which it arrives, forms a sort
of experimentum crucis, by which the truth or

falsity of the principles maintained will be rendered
 manifest, and is the very kind of exposition

 which an examiner of their correctness
would desire.

It was in fact the clear, able, and uncompromising
 manner in which the author of the Dialogues
 explained the principles of Mr. Ricardo,
together with the startling and (the present
writer must be permitted to say) the extravagant
 consequences to which he pushed them,
that first suggested the following treatise, the
author of which takes this opportunity of expressing
 his regret (a regret shared by many
others), that discussions so valuable for either

confirming or disproving the doctrines which they

enforced, should not have been conducted to their

proper and their promised termination.