Page:The Economic Journal Volume 1.djvu/32

For himself, he (Professor Foxwell) had long been interested in the formation of such an Association as was now proposed; and the communications he had received on the subject during the last ten years had satisfied him that the demand for an Economic Society was widespread and increasing. It would be admitted that the present time was a critical one from the economic point of view; and that it was just now extremely important that economic opinion should be vigorously expressed, and duly influential in practical politics. The position and authority of economic science in England was clearly not now what it was in 1846. The generation which had elapsed since the triumph of free trade had certainly seen a remarkable development of economics; but for that very reason economic opinion had lost something of its former unanimity and confidence, and had failed to impress itself so forcibly on men of affairs. With originality, we had had eccentricity. The importance of new points of view had been exaggerated; and the great body of common doctrine, the central scientific tradition, had been relatively ignored. Hence an appearance of confusion and discord, which he thought most unfortunate in its effects, and not warranted by the actual state of cultivated economic opinion. The formation of this Association would, he believed, do something to correct this eccentricity and give strength to the economic Centre. It might serve, too, to concentrate and focus the opinion of economists, and to provide a means of ascertaining it, and of bringing its influence to bear upon the discussion of measures in which important economic considerations were involved. In this and other ways it might be hoped that it would do something to bridge over the separation between the theorists and the men of affairs. In the time of Ricardo and McCulloch the economists were perhaps too much immersed in current business and politics. At the present time the danger lay in the opposite direction. Isolation was bad for both sides. The theorist was apt to become academic in the bad sense of that word, even pedantic: the man of affairs was apt to be shortsighted in his action, and deficient in imaginaton and breadth of of view. It was the earnest hope of those who had promoted this Association that it mght afford a common meeting-ground for the representatives of theory and practice, and tend at the same time to the development of the science, and to the increase of its influence on social progress and reform. The names of those who wished to join might be sent to Mr. T. H. Elliott, at the Local Government Board, to Mr. L. L. Price,