The controversy between conservatives and reformers, still
pending, finds its counterpart, in the history of philosophy, in
the quarrel between realists and nominalists; it is almost
useless to add that, on both sides, right and wrong are equal,
and that the rivalry, narrowness, and intolerance of opinions
have been the sole cause of the misunderstanding.
Thus two powers are contending for the government of the world,
and cursing each other with the fervor of two hostile religions:
political economy, or tradition; and socialism, or utopia.
What is, then, in more explicit terms, political economy? What
is socialism?
Political economy is a collection of the observations thus far
made in regard to the phenomena of the production and
distribution of wealth; that is, in regard to the most common,
most spontaneous, and therefore most genuine, forms of labor and
exchange.
The economists have classified these observations as far as they
were able; they have described the phenomena, and ascertained
their contingencies and relations; they have observed in them, in
many cases, a quality of necessity which has given them the name
of LAWS; and this ensemble of information, gathered from the
simplest manifestations of society, constitutes political
economy.
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