THE  SOCIALISTS  OF  THE  CHAIR.

267

With  this  theory,  the  problems  relating  to  the  government
of  societies  are  wonderfully  simplified.  The  statesman  has
only  to  fold  his  arms.  The  world  will  go  on  of  itself  to  its
appointed  end.  It  is  the  optimism  of  Leibnitz  and  of  the
eighteenth  century  transported  into  Political  Economy.  Relying ­
  on  this  philosophical  doctrine,  Economists  declare  certain
general  principles  applicable  in  all  times  and  to  all  peoples,
because  they  are  absolute  truths.
Political  Economy  was  essentially  cosmopolitan.  It  took
no  account  of  the  division  of  men  into  separate  nations,  nor  of
the  diversity  of  interests  that  may  arise  therefrom,  any  more
than  it  busied  itself  with  the  particular  wants  and  conditions
resulting  from  the  history  of  the  different  States.  It  saw  only
the  good  of  humanity  considered  as  one  large  family,  just  as
every  abstract  science  and  every  universal  religion,  particularly
Christianity,  had  done.
Having  thus  expounded  the  old  doctrine,  the  new  Economists ­
  proceed  to  criticise  it.  They  accuse  it  of  taking  a  onesided ­
  view  of  things.  Without  doubt,  they  say,  man  pursues
his  own  interest,  but  more  than  one  motive  acts  on  his  mind
and  regulates  his  actions.  By  the  side  of  egoism  there  is  the
sentiment  of  collectivity,  the  gemeinsinn,  the  social  instinct,
which  is  manifested  in  the  formation  of  the  family,  the  Commune,
  and  the  State.  Man  is  not  like  the  brute,  that  knows
only  the  satisfaction  of  its  wants  ;  he  is  a  moral  being,  who
understands  obedience  to  duty,  and  who,  from  his  religious  or
philosophical  training,  is  often  induced  to  sacrifice  his  satisfactions, ­
  his  welfare,  and  even  his  life,  for  his  country,  for  humanity,
for  truth,  and  for  God.  It  is,  therefore,  a  mistake  to  base  a
series  of  deductions  on  the  aphorism  that  man  acts  solely  under
the  sway  of  a  single  motive,  self-interest  These  “  general  and
constant  facts  of  human  nature,”  from  which  Rossi  would
deduce  economic  laws,  are  imaginary.  In  different  countries,
at  different  epochs,  men  obey  motives  which  are  not  always  the
same,  seeing  that  they  spring  from  different  ideas  of  well-being,
right,  morality,  and  justice.  The  savage  procures  the  wherewithal ­
  to  live  by  hunting  and  devouring,  at  need,  even  his
fellows  ;  the  citizen  of  antiquity,  by  reducing  them  to  slavery.