Sumner in his latest and ripest period. The popular tendency in thinking of him is to hark back to his vigor as the embattled champion of free trade and sound money, and if something is said of the latter part of his career, it is likely to have to do with his opposition to the imperialistic movement. Popular mention at the book destined to be his last, the Folkways, is generally perfunctory and vague. Such an attitude is natural enough, for Sumner's activities of thirty years ago were such as to leave a lasting impression upon his friends, and an even more persistent recollection, if that were possible, in the minds of those whom he assailed.[1] Upon this period of tremeadous vigor, in the classroom, in the faculty councils, in publication, and on the platform, there ensued, in the early nineties, a breakdown in health which coincided with Professor Sumner's withdrawal from the field of political economy, and which, in the eyes of the public, seemed to mark the end of his effective career. Many of us would be happy enough to conclude a career with the renown which Sumner enjoyed as a political economist, especially if we include several substantial volumes on economic subjects, published in the later nineties and taken by some to be signs of the closing up of a lifework. But to him the end of labors in this field merely marked the termination of one more phase of a full life. And the later and final mode was there already and had been from the beginning. I have said that Sumner was always a sociologist; this is reported to have been evident even in his clerical period, but more definitely it dates, as has been remarked, from his acquaintance with Spencer. For he had read The Study of Sociology at the time of its publication in the early seventies, and used frequently to mention the sense of intellectual assent and emancipation which broke over him upon making acquaintance with this and the larger sociological works of Spencer.
- ↑ Says "the distinguished American economist," quoted in the Sketch previously referred to: "... the results of his experience in the discussion of the relative merits and advantages of the systems of free trade and protection have been such that probably no defender of the latter would now be willing to meet him in a public discussion of these topics."
