THE aim of a pure science of Political Economy, as distinct from the mixed form of it which is the subject-matter of the existing orthodox treatises, is to find such a formula, symbol, or abstract expression for the movements involved in the process of industry as shall form a solid foundation for the applied science of the same; a foundation on which the applied science can build itself up as a reliable working scheme for increasing the wealth of the nation and of the world. For although this abstract symbol, and the abstract corollaries that immediately flow from it are, as we shall now see, both simple in themselves and few in number, nevertheless without them, as without the law of gravitation in astronomy, there could be no reliable pathways or finger posts that would enable us to find our way through the perplexing mazes and the wheel-within-wheel complications of industrial phenomena. Without further preliminary then I shall now proceed to exhibit the character of this central abstract symbol, and of the way in which its separate aspects integrate themselves into a unity; leaving to succeeding chapters both the differentiated aspects of it, and their application as a critical organon to the successive doctrines of the orthodox schools, as they come singly or in groups under review.

To begin with, then, we may say that the essential factors involved in the phenomena of wealth, and for the relationship between which some abstract symbol or formula must be found, may all be reduced to four, namely, Production, Consumption, the powers of Nature, and the powers of Man. And the first point we would notice is that the relationship between the first two factors is always the same, namely of production passing into consumption, consumption again into production, that in turn into consumption again, and so on continuously and without break or pause, like a revolving wheel. And this continuous circular movement, we must further figure to ourselves as taking place in a medium thick with powers of Nature of all kinds and on all hands - wind, water, soil, steam, electricity, and the like - which it is the function of our fourth factor, the powers of Man, to yoke and harness to his service in the process of keeping the circular double-sided wheel of production and consumption a-going. If this be true, it would next appear evident that the processes of industry are processes of wealth re-production, and not merely processes of production as separate isolated acts, inasmuch as after every act of production an act of consumption must follow before production can start forward again; in the same way as the parts of a running wheel that are in the air must come round in turn to the ground, before there can be any further progression.

And as the movement as a whole is a continuous progression along the highway of time, this double-sided act of the production and consumption of wealth differs from the one-sided act of production alone, with which the orthodox economists have concerned themselves, as the progression of a carriage wheel differs from that of a cripple hopping along on one leg. I am aware of course that it makes no difference how the ground is covered in the process of wealth production so long as it is covered; in the same way as it makes no difference in the sequences of day and night, whether the earth goes round the sun or the sun round the earth. The difference only appears when we proceed to make logical deductions from the symbols with which we start, as, for example, when the orthodox economists starting out with their central presuppositions of the 'economic man,' laissez-faire, absolute freedom of contract, and free competition, proceed to deduce from them the fundamental laws of their science - 'fundamental propositions' concerning capital, profit, rent, labour, population, foreign trade, and the like.

And then it is found that instead of deducing these laws of the increase or decree of wealth from the symbol of a revolving wheel of production and consumption, they have deduced them from the symbol of a rod or stick of production alone, broken up into isolated pieces of varying lengths, and joined end to end from day to day, week to week, or year to year, as the case may be, to form not a continuous unbroken line of wealth production but a chopped and divided one - a procedure which, as we shall see, parallels at every point the procedure of those Greek philosophers who with Zeno insisted on regarding a line as made up of separate points lying side by side, and which involved them in all the fallacies of the flying arrow, of Achilles and the tortoise, and the other paradoxes familiar to the students of Greek philosophy. But of this more anon. What we have to make sure of here is that our symbol of the revolving wheel has not merely points of analogy with the true symbol on which a pure science of political economy is to be based, but is in every particular identical with it; so that the laws and 'fundamental propositions' mathematically deducible from the nature of a revolving wheel may be transferred bodily to the phenomena of wealth production in all its aspects, and will be found to be mathematically true of them as well.

The first point of identity then which we would note between a mechanical wheel and the wheel of wealth is, that just as the two separate halves or aspects of a wheel are so rigidly bound together that the one side cannot be slowed or accelerated without slowing or accelerating the other, so too it is with the movement of wealth reproduction, where any brake put on the side of consumption is immediately transmitted to the side of production. For who will go on producing unless someone somewhere goes on consuming, and consuming precisely to the extent of the production? If what is produced were not consumed it would go bad and turn mouldy or sour, like food and drink; or rot or become worm or moth-eaten like clothing and furniture; or fall into ruin and decay, like buildings and dwelling houses. On the other hand, were the things produced such as defied time, like the pyramids; or lasted a long time relatively, like well-built roads and bridges; or improved by time, like spirits and wines; or could be stored for a time before being used, like corn, or timber, or other raw productions of the soil; or are not to be estimated in terms of time at all, like works of art and genius; they must one and all be consumed, in the economic sense of the term, else on the ensuing revolutions of the wheel they will cease to be produced.