little makes it sick."[1] At times he goes further still in his dissent from current views, and it is quite possible to cull from his pamphlets scattered passages that appear to support Roscher's classification.[2] There are, for example, several remarks about the Laws of Nature[3] which read almost as if he shared that belief in a pre-established harmony of interests which, in the ease of Adam Smith, reduced the free-trade proposition to the rank of a mere corollary. But it would be a mistake to consider such passing remarks as indices of Petty's true position. Not only can each specific condemnation of some restriction upon trade be offset by a specific commendation of some other restriction, but, what is far more important, it is clear also that to represent Petty as an advocate of laissez-faire on principle is altogether to misrepresent him. On the contrary, he not only assumed, like the political disciple of Hobbes that he was, that the government is justified in doing anything whereby the national wealth will be increased, but he was unwearying in devising schemes, sometimes legislative, sometimes administrative, for that end. Some of his schemes are little short of fantastic.[4] Many of them evince an entire disregard for the wishes and interests of individuals. In short, if we understand mercantilism to consist, broadly speaking, in a tendency to force the transition from local to national economic coherence by means of governmental interference with the activities of individuals in business, then Petty was one of the most extreme among English mercantilists.
Cornell University.
