Fisher bases the interest rate, there could be no interest; but he insists that it is equally true that were the technical superiority of present goods annihilated, interest would disappear. This consideration he regards as sufficient ground for treating the technical superiority of present goods as a cause of interest.

What most students have regarded as of chief significance in Fisher's criticism, and in the similar criticism of Bortkiewicz, is the proof that in every example by which Böhm-Bawerk has sought to exhibit the operation of the technical superiority of present goods, a preference for present goods is tacitly assumed. It is possible, in thought, to derive an interest rate from time preference alone. It is not possible to derive a rate from the technical superiority of present goods alone, if we accept the presuppositions that lie at the basis of the value theories of both BöhmBawerk and Fisher. A close examination of the arguments in Excursus XII will show that it remains true here, as in the main body of the text, that time preference inevitably slips in to validate the operation of the superiority of present goods.

With the single exception of the treatment of the relation of productivity to the interest rate, the system of Böhm-Bawerk, as Lore presented, appears to be logically unassailable. Further criticism of it must confine itself to the presuppositions of the system. That these, however, are not universally acceptable the history of recent criticism shows clearly enough.

Böhm-Bawerk and his entire school have erected valuation into what is essentially a logical process. Böhm-Bawerk's value theory has been described as a psychological theory, but as every one now knows, this description is misleading. The theory assumes as its starting-point satisfactions-whether hedonistically conceived or not-that are definitely measurable in themselves. From the magnitudes of these satisfactions all value magnitudes are derived by a logical process. Impulse, tradition, social forces, operate to influence the satisfaction magnitudes; but when the latter are taken for granted, valuation is strictly an individualistic, rational process.

What, however, does psychology know of this antecedent structure of satisfaction magnitudes, or utilities? Practically nothing. There are such magnitudes, no doubt, but that they present the form that has been given to them by the value theorists is highly improbable. Not satisfactions, but goods, are valued in the first instance. Individual whim and social influence play directly upon

the structure of values. If any one ever attempts to give definite magnitudes to his satisfactions, it is because he has been trained to do so through the handling of goods.

When value is approached from a truly psychological point of view, immediacy is its universal characteristic. One value is not derived from another; all are on the same footing. There may be a long-run tendency to adjust values to satisfactions, but this tendency must be treated as a psychological, not as a logical, process. The relation between income values and capital values, like all other value relations, is psychological, not logical, as assumed by both Böhm-Bawerk and Fisher. From this point of view, it appears that the technical superiority of present goods may indeed be erected into an independent cause of interest. Let this superiority increase or decrease: readjustments in capital value must follow, if at all, through a laborious psychological process, not through a timeless logical process. Accordingly, Böhm-Bawerk's interest doctrine, if open to attack on the basis of a purely logical value theory, is the more likely to survive when the logical theory gives way to a theory better grounded in psychology.

ALVIN S. JOHNSON.

Cornell University.

NEW BOOKS

BOGARDUS, E. S. An introduction to the social sciences; a textbook outline. (Los Angeles: University of Southern California. 1918. Pp. 206. $1.50.)

BULLOCK, C. J. The elements of economics. Second edition. (Boston: Silver, Burdett. 1913. Pp. vii, 378. $1.)

"Changes have been made as the events of the last eight years have made necessary."

CANNAN, E. Wealth. A brief examination of the causes of economic welfare. (London: King. 1913. 3s. 6d.)

CHAPMAN, S. J. Elementary economics. (New York: Longmans. 1913. Pp. x, 169. 75c.)

To his Outlines of Political Economy and his Political Economy (Home University Series) Professor Chapman now adds a third elementary textbook, which is stated to be introductory to the Outlines. In a general way it has the merits of his other texts and unfortunately their defects. While perhaps not absolutely so abstruse and dry as reviewers have pronounced the previous works, this book would be, relatively to the capabilities of the younger pupils for whom designed, equally as unsuited for purposes of instruction. It is certainly to be hoped that with publication within

a short period of three "elementary" textbooks, Professor Chapman will rest content and turn his unquestionably great powers to something at the same time more worthy of his efforts and more likely to be successful. H. E. M. DIEHL and MOMBERT. Ausgewählte Lesestücke zum Studium der politischen Oekonomie. Vol. VII. Wirtschaftskrisen. Vol. VIII. Kapitalsins und Unternehmergewinn. (Karlsruhe i.B.: G. Braun'sche Hofbuchdr. 1913. Pp. vii, 204; viii, 197. 2.60 M. each.) ELLWOOD, C. A. Sociology and modern social problems. Revised and enlarged. (New York: American Book Co. 1913. Pp. 394.)

Use has been made of the census of 1910 to revise the statistics. Two new chapters: The Bearing of Modern Psychology on Social Problems and Theoretical Summary, have been added.

GOWIN, E. B. Sociology. (Middletown, Ct.: Wesleyan Store. 1913. Pp. 49, 7. 50c.)

HANISCH, G. Die klassischen Werttheorien. (Berlin: Puttkammer & Mühlbrecht. 1913. Pp. 44. 0.80 M.)

HOBHOUSE, L. T. and others. Property: its duties and rights, historically, philosophically, and religiously regarded. (London: Macmillan. 1913. 5s.)

VON

To be reviewed.

KleinwaecHTER, F. Lehrbuch der Volkswirtschaftspolitik. (Leipzig: Hirschfeld. 1913. 5 M.)

LORIA, A. The economic synthesis. A study of the laws of income. Translated from the Italian by M. E. Paul. (London: Allen. 1913. 5s.)

NELSON, L. Die Theorie des wahren Interesses und ihre rechtliche und politische Bedeutung. (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. 1913. 0.80 M.)

NEURATH, O. and SCHAPIRE-NEURATH, A. Lesebuch der Volkswirtschaftslehre. I. Plato bis Ricardo. II. Sismondi bis George. (Leipzig: Gloeckner. 1913. Pp. viii, 281; vii, 287. 4 M. each.) STEUART, J. Untersuchung über die Grundsätze der Volkswirtschaftslehre. Translated from the English by A. JOHN. Two volumes. Sammlung sozialwissenschaftlicher Meister, 15. (Jena: Fischer. 1913. 7.50 M.)

WAGNER, A. Les fondements de l'économie politique (Paris: Giard & Brière. 1913. 10 fr.)

Economic History and Geography

An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States. By CHARLES A. BEARD. (New York: The Macmillan Company. 1913. Pp. vi, 330. $2.25.)

Students of our national history are not unaware that our Constitution was framed, favored, and adopted by the people who

represented the "Big Business" of that day. But Professor Beard points out that no one has, as yet, scrutinized the economic forces contending over the cradle of the new nation, with the minute particularity they deserve. Professor Farrand has produced a definitive work upon the discussions in the Convention of 1787; and a cloud of witnesses from Bancroft, von Holst and Fiske, to Farrand and McLaughlin has surveyed the results of those debates from the political, the legal, and the philosophical points of view.

Professor Beard invites scholars now to place the emphasis where he considers that it really belongs, "to turn away from barren 'political' history to a study of the real economic forces which condition great movements in politics." Perhaps it is unnecessary to depreciate political history in order to exalt the horn of economic history, but allowance can be made for a fruitful enthusiasm. For Professor Beard has turned a light upon a great mass of material relating to economic conditions in the period of the Confederation, which is waiting for the patient investigator. Making due use and acknowledgment of the previous researches of Professors Turner, Seligman, and Dodd, and of Doctors Ambler, Libby, Schaper, and others, he has himself made a distinct contribution to knowledge of the financial circumstances and presumable motives of the leaders of 1787.

Especially illuminating are his chapters on A Survey of Economic Interests in 1787, The Economic Interests of the Members. of the Convention, The Popular Vote on the Constitution, and The Economics of the Vote on the Constitution. These chapters contain the results of laborious investigations among the archives. of the Treasury Department and the Congressional Library. At least five sixths of the Fathers who sat in the convention were "economic beneficiaries from the adoption of the Constitution." Out of 55 members, 40 were owners of public securities, 24 of them held as much as five thousand dollars worth, or more, and the same number were rated as capitalists with loans to protect. The convention contained no representative of the so-called debtor-classes, the small farmers and mechanics. Considering that about three fourths of the adult males in the country never voted on the Constitution, and that very possibly a majority of those who did vote were opposed to its ratification, we are assured that the economic foundations of our first political differences were broad and deep.

The final word with which Professor Beard sums up his suggestive and stimulating essay is this:

The Constitution was not created by "the whole people" as the jurists have said; neither was it created by "the states" as southern nullifiers long contended; but it was the work of a consolidated group whose interests knew no state boundaries and were truly national in their scope.

For the complete demonstration of his thesis Professor Beard invites scholars to engage in a searching and precise study of tax returns, wills and mortgages, and shipping records, from Maine to Georgia, of the complete history of transactions in public securities, and in land speculations, and finally a study of the geographic distribution of manufacturing establishments and of the owners and investors. With a fine courage Professor Beard writes: "A really fine analytical treatment of this problem would, therefore, require a study of the natural history of the (approximately) 160,000 men involved in the formation and adoption of the Constitution." Here would be, indeed, a sort of encyclopedic Domesday Book survey, undertaken one hundred and twenty-five years after the causal event. As our author admits, it can never be perfectly achieved, because so many records, local, state, and national, are not completely preserved.

C. H. LEVERMORE.

The Economic Utilization of History. By HENRY W. FARNAM. (New Haven: Yale University Press. 1913. Pp. viii, 220. $1.25.)

Diverse as are the topics in this little volume of Professor Farnam's, its successive chapters show unity of purpose and of viewpoint. The dominant note is an appeal for the same patience, accuracy, and devotion to truth on the part of the economist as is found in the work of the natural scientist. The early chapters develop this ideal from a methodological and analogical standpoint. History and current economic and social experimentation afford the phenomena to be observed and treated by the methods and in the spirit of science. These phenomena are multifarious, so that hasty generalization is dangerous. At the other extreme, the statistical method encounters the dangers of a refinement of method in excess of the possibilities of accurate use of highly diverse materials. A scientific attitude can be realized only by making issues "more and more specific, taking into account only