social state of peoples, of which state the political laws are only the expression."[1] This remark governed all the researches of Le Play.
This division of legislation into a clear and an obscure region has one curious consequence: it is very rare for people who are not members of the legal professions to undertake any discussion of equity; they know that it is necessary to have an intimate knowledge of certain rules of law, in order to be able to argue about these questions: an outsider would run the risk of making himself ridiculous if he were to venture on an opinion; but on the question of divorce, of paternal authority, of inheritance, every man of letters believes himself as learned as the cleverest lawyer, because in this obscure region there are no well-defined principles, nor regular deductions.
(3) In economics, the same distinction is, perhaps, still more evident; questions relative to exchange can be easily expounded; the methods of exchange are very much alike in the different countries, and it is hardly likely that any very violent paradoxes will be made about monetary circulation. On the other hand, everything relative to production presents a complexity which is sometimes inextricable; it is in production that local traditions are most strongly maintained; ridiculous Utopias regarding production may be invented indefinitely without revolting the common sense of readers. Nobody denies that production is the fundamental part of any economic system; this is a truth which plays a great part in Marxism, and which has been acknowledged even by authors who have been unable to understand its importance.[2]
