The application of Aristotle’s causes to the problem of
wealth production, not only provides us with a clear-cut
proof otP the economic impossibility of communist theories
(whether considered as a diagnosis or as a remedy of
economic 1lls), but gives us also an instrument of historical
criticism. Thus Quesnay and the Physiocrats over-empha-
sised a part of the material cause (land), Adam Smith,
Ricardo and Marx the efficient cause (labour), while the
exchange-value school made too much of the final cause
(demand). These and other applications of the four-fold
principle are admirably brought out by Mr. Bain.
v.
We are now in a position to form some conception of the advice which Aristotle would give us if he could be summoned from the shades to view our modern world.
Insisting as he always did on the difference between the ideally best constitution and the best constitution possible under particular historical and political conditions, he would probably agree that any other government than that of ‘extreme’ demo (i.e. government by public opinion and the general will operating through adult franchise) was impossible in England now. He would warn us that anything approaching to communism, syndicalism, or the ‘ nationalization of all means of production and distribution ’ would be economically disastrous and politically fatal, for it would eventually involve the ruin of the State. To those who would fain abolish the State or replace it by a collection of self-governing groups, he would reply that they were aiming at what was impossible, and, in a world composed of competing national States, undesirable.
In our industrial problems he would insist on the necessity of the encouragement of the virtues of industry, efficiency, inventiveness and thrift, both among employers and employed.
He would point out that our material progress had been
