Investigations into the Method of the Social Sciences

That the Basic Notions of the Historical School of German Economists Have Long Been Known in Political Science

1.

It is an obvious thought that history is an excellent teacher for the statesman and thus also an important basis for politics, the science of the statesman. It is so obvious that it could not be left to the nineteenth century to express it. We might almost believe that the study of history has so much the greater significance for the practical statesman the poorer the development of the science we call “politics.” We might almost believe that a writer on the art of government appears to be the more completely dependent on history the less his insight into the nature of state affairs is and the less his direct experience with such affairs is. Thus it is certainly nothing to be surprised at if the writers of antiquity and the Renaissance not only did not fail to recognize the importance of the study of history for science and the practice of politics, but emphasized it in innumerable variations, upon occasion even to excess.

Plato expressly emphasizes that investigations into political matters “are not to be based on empty theories, but on history and actual events.”1 This is a view which, as is well known, actually becomes a principle of research with Aristotle.2

With the revival of learning in the West a number of excellent writers again began to make the “art of government” the object of scientific investigation. Then, along with the writings of the ancients which had dealt directly with politics, it was the historical works of classical antiquity which understandably were the chief sources from which they drew and whose significance for the “politician” they could not possibly overlook. On the one hand—this became the prevailing opinion—the “politician” would find examples written down in historical works that he could use for guidance in similar cases. On the other hand the judgment of writers on history was also of no slight value concerning historical facts. The more a nation stood out because of its deeds and successes and the more excellent the historical writer, the more useful the study of history was thought to be in respect to the science and the practice of the art of government. Therefore the history of Greece and Rome was considered especially instructive, particularly the history of their golden ages, as presented by the outstanding historians of antiquity.

N. Macchiavelli believed that in the political confusions of his time it was necessary “ad ea remedia confugere, quae a veteribus per leges instituta et excogitata fuerunt,” and lamented as the main reason for the collapse of the governmental conditions of his time “quod historiarum usu legitimo destituamur nec eos fructus ex illarum lectione percipiamus, quos illae natura sua alias producere queunt.”3

However, even this high estimation of history by the Florentine statesman and historian did not seem sufficient to many of his contemporaries. Does not the anonymous author of the work “De regno adversus Nic. Macchiavellum libri III” (Innoc. Gentiletus) reproach his great opponent with άγιστορησίαγ when he stresses the great value of a basic study of history for the writer on politics, and does he not show the intention of wanting to be more historical than his opponent?4

To no less a degree J. Bodin is convinced of the importance of the study of history, for the politician, the statesman, and the lawgiver.

“Cum historia,” he writes, “laudatores habeat complures, qui veris eam ac propriis laudibus exornarunt, ex omnibus tamen nemo verius ac melius, quam qui vitae magistram appellavit; nam ea vox omnes omnium virtutum ac disciplinarum utilitates amplexa, significat, hominum vitam universam ad sacras historiae leges . . . dirigi oportere . . . ex quibus (historiis) non solum praesentia commode explicantur, sed etiam futura colliguntur certissimaque rerum expetendarum ac fugiendarum praecepta confiantur.”5

And in another place: “Nec tamen Rempublicam idearum sola notione terminare decrevimus, qualem Plato, qualem etiam Thomas Maurus inani opinione sibi finxerunt: sed optimas quasque civitatum florentissimarum leges, quantum quidem fieri poterit, proxime consequemur.”6

Even Bacon is no exception to this. After all, he characterizes history as the repertory of models of the past, as “fundamentum prudentiae civilis” and even justifies his ability to deal with politics expressly by his historical studies.7

2.

The idea must early have struck the reflective political writers of comparing all state constitutions and laws and thus arriving at a science of the constitution and legislation of states, that is, at a “politics” on a thoroughly historical basis. If history is the teacher, and, as assumed, the best teacher of statesmen, what notion was more obvious than to establish a science of politics by comparing state institutions and their results in various nations? In fact, Plato already expressed this notion and thus set up a problem which Aristotle attempted to solve in a certain sense. And a J. Bodin marked its solution as the most important task of his life. He says of the politicians of his time:

“Legissent Platonem qui legum tradendarum ac moderandae civitatis unam esse formam putavit, si omnibus omnium aut magis illustrium rerum publicarum legibus in unum collectis viri prudentes eas inter se compararent atque optimum genus ex eis conflarent. Ad hoc igitur institutum omnia mea studia, omnes contuli cogitationes.”8

Macchiavelli already expresses the same thought. He says: “Vetus dictum est quod ut sapientissime pronunciatur, ita diligenter observari debet: Res futuras ex contemplatione praeteritarum conjici cognoscique posse. Quaecunque enim per universum orbem fiunt, habuerunt olim aliquid simile, quod eodem modo antiquitus et ex iisdem causis ut haec quae nunc videmus factum fuit. . . Eo magis etiam videris, ex praeteritis futurarum rerum eventus posse conjicere.”9

Prof. Nic. Stupanus of Basel (1599) expresses himself similarly in the dedication to his edition of Macchiavelli’s Prince:

“Non faciunt sapientes Reipublicae gubernatores omnia, quae ab aliis facta esse in historiis perhibentur; sed propterea historiarum lectioni diligentissime incumbunt eorum optimi quique, ut insignem rerum praeteritarum cognitionem nacti, ceu rebus illis, quos legerunt, gerendis interfuissent, deinde in capiendis novis consiliis et rerum agendarum de-liberatione Causas, Consilia, Progressus, Eventusque praeteritarum rerum promptos in animo habeant, praesentia exempla cum praeteritis, domestica cum peregrinis, similia cum similibus, contraria cum contrariis ubique possint conferre et ex praeteritis futurarum rerum eventus praevidere. Quae si ita se habere omnes intelligimus.”10

3.

The same constitution and legislation is not adequate for all nations and times. Rather, each nation and each age needs particular laws and state institutions corresponding to its own character. These ideas, too, were not so recondite that writers of the nineteenth century had to be the first to establish them. That nations are not completely alike and that it is dangerous to apply uncritically the state constitutions and laws of one nation to another was known both to the ancients and to the writers of the Renaissance.

Plato stresses that the geographical location of a country is of no slight influence on the nature of its people and that legislation must not neglect to take this fact into consideration. The lawgiver, he says, must keep his eyes open for all differences of this kind and he must try to examine them, as far as is humanly possible, before he undertakes to devise laws.11

And in another place:

“It is hardly possible that any definite political institution can be preserved uncontested in practice as in theory. This seems, rather, to be just as impossible as to prescribe for each body one definite way of living in which one and the same thing would not prove harmful to it at one time and useful at another.”12

Aristotle emphasizes no less decisively the relativity of political institutions. “Politics,” he says, “has not merely to examine the per se most desirable constitution or government most desirable in itself but also the one which under certain circumstances is the most suitable, which is best adapted to these circumstances. It is the duty of the politician to examine every state and its institutions as they really are, and to investigate the peculiarity of its institutions. He must be acquainted with the real state of affairs before he can go ahead to improve them.”13

N. Macchiavelli also is not unfamiliar with the spatial and temporal relativity of political institutions. He writes:

“Sicuti diversae causae esse solent, quibus urbium fundamenta ponuntur, ita quoque diversae ipsis rationes legum et institutorum existere consueverunt.”14

And in another place: “Qui cupit vel rempublicam vel sectam suam diuturnam esse, eam saepe corrigere debet et veluti ad prima sua principia revocare . . . praecipue sunt respublicae atque sectae, quibus salutares sunt illae mutationes, per quas corriguntur, emendantur et ad primam suam originem principiumque revocantur.”15

J. Bodinus expresses himself quite in detail on the relativity of political institutions. In his Republic he writes a separate chapter: “De conformando civitatum statu pro regionum ac populorum varietate, quibusque disciplinis populorum mores dissimilesque naturae percipiantur.”16

He further expresses himself as follows: “In toto genere animantium non modo innumerabiles sunt figurae, verumetiam earum, quae figuram eandem habent, maxima varietas est; sic hominum inter se admirabilis est ac pene incredibilis dissimilitudo variaque pro locorum diversitate natura,” and he accordingly sets himself the task:

“explicare, quae quibus populis leges congruant, quis cuique civitati status conveniat, quibusque rationibus gentium mores ac naturae percipiantur: ne aut formam civitatis a populi moribus alienam instituamus, aut naturae leges hominum arbitrio ac voluntati, repugnante natura, servire cogamus; quod plerique facere conati florentissima imperia funditus everterunt.”17

And in other places: “Principem ac legislatorem populi mores ac naturam regionis, in qua civitas est, nosse prius oportet, quam legum aut civitatis conversionem moliatur: cum de omnibus rerumpublicarum arcanis mullum majus sit, quam ad varios gentium mores ac naturas civitatis cujusque leges ac formam congruentem accommodare.”

“Peccatur ab iis, qui ab alienis civitatibus leges acceptas ad eam quae plane contraria ratione dirigatur rempublicam adhiberi putant oportere.”18

4.

This insight, so clearly expressed by such prominent writers, into the significance of the study of history for the politician and the relativity of political institutions has never again been completely lost, as we probably do not need to say, neither in general nor in respect to a particular branch of the political sciences. Even the writers of the Age of Enlightenment in France have been quite especially charged with lack of historical sense and the tendency toward “absolutism” in politics. Yet they by no means fail to recognize as fully as the historical school of German economists assumes the significance of the study of history for the statesman and the principle of the merely relative justification of political institutions.19

To be sure, historical studies could not gain for the social philosophers of the Enlightenment in general and the physiocrats in particular the significance which historians and even philosophers of history were inclined to attribute to them. Anyone who attacks existing institutions and is in favor of a new order of things understandably does not feel the call to investigate their historic origin and to follow their development with loving care. His first task is to show their harmfulness in respect to the present. Just as little can it reasonably be expected of writers who represent the intellectual movement of the French Revolution in the field of economy to emphasize the possible former justification of the institutions they are attacking. Nor can they be expected to emphasize the justification, which is only relative in respect to spatial and temporal conditions, of the institutions they are advocating. Such a thing is contrary to the practical-reformatory task of the physiocrats. It would mean, however, failure to recognize the significance of these writers who were under the recent impression of Voltaire’s Philosophy of History or Montesquieu’s Spirit of Laws, if one wanted to conclude from their not doing this that they had in general misunderstood the significance of the study of history for political science. One should not believe for this reason that they were in principle of the opinion that the same institutions which they recommended for France of the eighteenth century were suitable for all other nations and times, thus e.g., for the Tungus and the Kalmucks or the France of St. Louis.

Truly, only ignorance could assert that even A. Smith had not recognized the significance of the study of history for our science and the influence of spatial and temporal conditions on economic institutions.

The same thing holds true of A. Smith in his relation to the physiocrats that an excellent writer on the historical development of Greek philosophy says of Aristotle in contrast to Plato. He says that the former was not only a splendid speculative thinker like the latter, but was also an indefatigable observer, that he had given his system a broad supporting basis of knowledge based on experience and had tried to establish his philosophical theses by an all-round consideration of actual data.

The gifted Sismondi remarks very correctly concerning the author of the Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations:

“Adam Smith reconnut que la science du gouvernement ne pouvait se fonder que sur l’histoire des peuples divers et que c’était seulement d’une observation judicieuse des faits qu’on pouvait deduire les principes. Son immortel ouvrage, ‘De la nature et des causes de la richesse des nations’ . . . est en effet le resultat d’une étude philosophique de l’histoire du genre humain.”20

Another thorough-going scholar, E. Baumstark, expresses himself on this as follows:

“The political part of our science particularly needs a historical basis, for without this it will go dangerously astray. With this I do not mean that a meager historical introduction be given with each doctrine. I mean, rather, that all of economics in its connections be placed upon historical bases instead of upon mere dogma and be developed as a result of research into the history of commerce, of culture, of the state, and of humanity in general. What vigor A. Smith and Ferguson have breathed into their immortal works in this way!”21

One may think as always about the results attained by A. Smith, one may declare them as ever so imperfect, yet one thing at any rate is refuted by the above two characterizations of Smith’s work by two real experts on it. (That they are experts deserves special emphasis today when so many things are “read” but not much is read.) The refutation is better than any accumulation of citations from A. Smith’s writings could be. It is refutation of the charge, which not even the founder of our science was spared, of underestimating the value of historical study for our science and of unhistorical absolutism in the previously mentioned meaning of the word.

Among A. Smith’s followers Sismondi in particular emphasizes the study of history as the basis of research in the field of political economy and the idea of the relativity of all political institutions. He says:

“Ce n’est pas sur des calculs arides qu’elle (la science d’écon. pol.) est fondée, ce n’est pas non plus sur un enchaînement mathématique de théorèmes déduits, d’axiomes obscurs, donnés pour des vérités incontestables…. L’économie politique est fondée sur l’étude de l’homme et des hommes; il faut connaître la nature humaine, l’état et le sort des sociétés en différents temps et en différents lieux, il faut consulter les historiens et les voyageurs etc. Une pareille étude . . . c’est la philosophie de l’histoire et des voyages.”22

And in another place: “On est tombé dans de graves erreurs, pour avoir toujours voulu généraliser tout ce qui rapporte aux sciences sociales . . . Il faut s’attacher tantôt à un temps, tantôt à un pays, tantôt à une profession, pour voir bien ce qu’est l’homme et comment les institutions agissent sur lui. Ceux au contraire qui l’ont voulu voir isolé du monde, ou plutôt qui ont considéré abstraitement les modifications de son existence, sont toujours arrivés à des conclusions démenties par l’experience.”23

We refrain from citing the long list of German writers, who obviously as a result of stimulation such as this have stressed the importance of history for political economy (its importance as a means for understanding the present and as an empirical basis for social research!). They have also stressed the relativity of economic institutions and laws, and were doing both in the first three decades of our century, that is, long before the founding of the “historical school of economists in Germany.”24 After all, it is more than sufficiently clear from the passages cited above, which, it scarcely needs be noted, could be increased and complemented without any trouble, that the principles under discussion here were never completely foreign either to the social sciences in general or—since it was established as a separate science—to political economy in particular. There has been no epoch in the development of our science when the leading principles of the historical school of German economists have not been expressed in excellent writings of world-famous authors known and accessible to every educated person even today. There was truly no need of the discovery of the above truths in the middle of the nineteenth century or even of the establishment of a special school for their dissemination.

 

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25 De Legibus, III, 684 and 692.

26 Pol., IV, 1.

27 Disputationum de Republica (Lugd. Bat., 1643), Lib. I, Proëm, fol. 7 ff.

28 (Lugd. Bat., 1647), Lib. I, Praef. p. 3 ff.

29 De Methodo (Argent., 1627), Proëm, p. 1 et Praef. fol. 6.

30 De Republica (1591), Lib. I, Cap. I, p. 4.

31 De augm. scient., Lib. II, Cap. V, pass, et Lib. VIII, Cap. Ill, §1.

32 J. Bodini, De Methodo ad historiarum cognitionem, 1566 (Argentorati, 1627), Praef. p. 3.

33 Disput, de Republica (Lugd. Bat., 1643), Lib. Ill, Cap. XLIII, p. 410 ff. Conf. Lib. I, Cap. XXXIX, p. 115.

34 (Montsibelgardi, 1599), p. 1 ff.

35 De Legibus, V, 747.

36 Ibid., I, 636. Plato goes so far in considering the individuality of social and political conditions that he even declares it an absurdity to want to limit a farsighted statesman by laws. For these, since they are general, never are fully fitted to the peculiarity of individual people and situations, and especially, since they are fixed, they could never keep pace with changing conditions. Only where the true art of government is lacking, it is, to be sure, better to stick to laws (which are tested by experience!) than to follow the selfish and irrational pleasure of the rulers.

37 Pol., IV, 1.

38 Disput. (1643), Lib. I, Cap. II, p. 13.

39 Ibid., Lib. Ill, Cap. 1, p. 283.

40 De Rep. (1591), Lib. V, Cap. 1, p. 750.

41 De Rep. (1591), Lib. V, Cap. 1, p. 750.

42 Ibid., Lib. V, Cap. 1, p. 754 and Lib. IV, Cap. 3, p. 663.

43 Quelles sont, suivant le temps, les lieux et les circonstances, les conclusions justement et clairement deduites de l’ordre politique? This question turns up again and again in the writings of individual physiocrats (Ephémérides du citoyen. Program article by Baudeau [Paris, 1767], I, p. 5 ff.).

44 Sismondi, Nouv. Princ. (Paris, 1827), I, p. 47 ff.

45 Baumstark, Kameralistische Encyclopädie (Heidelberg, 1835), p. viii ff.

46 Sismondi, De la Richesse commerciale (Genève, 1803), I, p. xiv ff.; Storch, Cours d’E. P. (Paris, 1823), I, p. 36.

47 Sismondi, Etudes sur l’E. P. (Paris, 1837), I, p. iv.

48 Cf. especially K. H. Rau, Lehrbuch der politischen Oekonomie (Heidelberg, 1826), I, §18; G. F. Krause, Versuch eines Systems der National- und Staatsökonomie mit vorzüglicher Berücksichtigung Deutschlands, aus dem Gang der Völkercultur etc. entwickelt (Leipzig, 1830), II, p. vi; E. Baumstark, Kameralistische Encyclopädie (Heidelberg, 1835), p. iv ff. (where the author very decidedly attacks the derivation of economic principles from definitions instead of from history and life, and emphasizes the necessity of placing all of the theory of public economy in its historical connection on historical bases instead of on mere dogmatism, and of developing it as the result of research on the history of commerce, culture, the state, and humanity in general); J. Schön, Die Staatswissenschaft, geschichtsphilo-sophisch begründet, 1st ed. (Breslau, 1831), 2nd ed. (1840). (My work—says the author—is concerned with the task of letting politics shine forth as a philosophy of political history and to develop historical social laws in place of scattered rules, p. vii of the 2nd ed.).

• 1De Legibus, III, 684 and 692.
• 2Pol., IV, 1.
• 3Disputationum de Republica (Lugd. Bat., 1643), Lib. I, Proëm, fol. 7 ff.
• 4(Lugd. Bat., 1647), Lib. I, Praef. p. 3 ff.
• 5De Methodo (Argent., 1627), Proëm, p. 1 et Praef. fol. 6.
• 6De Republica (1591), Lib. I, Cap. I, p. 4.
• 7De augm. scient., Lib. II, Cap. V, pass, et Lib. VIII, Cap. Ill, §1.
• 8J. Bodini, De Methodo ad historiarum cognitionem, 1566 (Argentorati, 1627), Praef. p. 3.
• 9Disput, de Republica (Lugd. Bat., 1643), Lib. Ill, Cap. XLIII, p. 410 ff. Conf. Lib. I, Cap. XXXIX, p. 115.
• 10(Montsibelgardi, 1599), p. 1 ff.
• 11De Legibus, V, 747.
• 12Ibid., I, 636. Plato goes so far in considering the individuality of social and political conditions that he even declares it an absurdity to want to limit a farsighted statesman by laws. For these, since they are general, never are fully fitted to the peculiarity of individual people and situations, and especially, since they are fixed, they could never keep pace with changing conditions. Only where the true art of government is lacking, it is, to be sure, better to stick to laws (which are tested by experience!) than to follow the selfish and irrational pleasure of the rulers.
• 13Pol., IV, 1.
• 14Disput. (1643), Lib. I, Cap. II, p. 13.
• 15Ibid., Lib. Ill, Cap. 1, p. 283.
• 16De Rep. (1591), Lib. V, Cap. 1, p. 750.
• 17De Rep. (1591), Lib. V, Cap. 1, p. 750.
• 18Ibid., Lib. V, Cap. 1, p. 754 and Lib. IV, Cap. 3, p. 663.
• 19Quelles sont, suivant le temps, les lieux et les circonstances, les conclusions justement et clairement deduites de l’ordre politique? This question turns up again and again in the writings of individual physiocrats (Ephémérides du citoyen. Program article by Baudeau [Paris, 1767], I, p. 5 ff.).
• 20Sismondi, Nouv. Princ. (Paris, 1827), I, p. 47 ff.
• 21Baumstark, Kameralistische Encyclopädie (Heidelberg, 1835), p. viii ff.
• 22Sismondi, De la Richesse commerciale (Genève, 1803), I, p. xiv ff.; Storch, Cours d’E. P. (Paris, 1823), I, p. 36.
• 23Sismondi, Etudes sur l’E. P. (Paris, 1837), I, p. iv.
• 24Cf. especially K. H. Rau, Lehrbuch der politischen Oekonomie (Heidelberg, 1826), I, §18; G. F. Krause, Versuch eines Systems der National- und Staatsökonomie mit vorzüglicher Berücksichtigung Deutschlands, aus dem Gang der Völkercultur etc. entwickelt (Leipzig, 1830), II, p. vi; E. Baumstark, Kameralistische Encyclopädie (Heidelberg, 1835), p. iv ff. (where the author very decidedly attacks the derivation of economic principles from definitions instead of from history and life, and emphasizes the necessity of placing all of the theory of public economy in its historical connection on historical bases instead of on mere dogmatism, and of developing it as the result of research on the history of commerce, culture, the state, and humanity in general); J. Schön, Die Staatswissenschaft, geschichtsphilo-sophisch begründet, 1st ed. (Breslau, 1831), 2nd ed. (1840). (My work—says the author—is concerned with the task of letting politics shine forth as a philosophy of political history and to develop historical social laws in place of scattered rules, p. vii of the 2nd ed.).
• 25Plato expressly emphasizes that investigations into political matters “are not to be based on empty theories, but on history and actual events.” This is a view which, as is well known, actually becomes a principle of research with Aristotle.
• 26Plato expressly emphasizes that investigations into political matters “are not to be based on empty theories, but on history and actual events.” This is a view which, as is well known, actually becomes a principle of research with Aristotle.
• 27N. Macchiavelli believed that in the political confusions of his time it was necessary “ad ea remedia confugere, quae a veteribus per leges instituta et excogitata fuerunt,” and lamented as the main reason for the collapse of the governmental conditions of his time “quod historiarum usu legitimo destituamur nec eos fructus ex illarum lectione percipiamus, quos illae natura sua alias producere queunt.”
• 28However, even this high estimation of history by the Florentine statesman and historian did not seem sufficient to many of his contemporaries. Does not the anonymous author of the work “De regno adversus Nic. Macchiavellum libri III” (Innoc. Gentiletus) reproach his great opponent with άγιστορησίαγ when he stresses the great value of a basic study of history for the writer on politics, and does he not show the intention of wanting to be more historical than his opponent?
• 29“Cum historia,” he writes, “laudatores habeat complures, qui veris eam ac propriis laudibus exornarunt, ex omnibus tamen nemo verius ac melius, quam qui vitae magistram appellavit; nam ea vox omnes omnium virtutum ac disciplinarum utilitates amplexa, significat, hominum vitam universam ad sacras historiae leges . . . dirigi oportere . . . ex quibus (historiis) non solum praesentia commode explicantur, sed etiam futura colliguntur certissimaque rerum expetendarum ac fugiendarum praecepta confiantur.”
• 30And in another place: “Nec tamen Rempublicam idearum sola notione terminare decrevimus, qualem Plato, qualem etiam Thomas Maurus inani opinione sibi finxerunt: sed optimas quasque civitatum florentissimarum leges, quantum quidem fieri poterit, proxime consequemur.”
• 31Even Bacon is no exception to this. After all, he characterizes history as the repertory of models of the past, as “fundamentum prudentiae civilis” and even justifies his ability to deal with politics expressly by his historical studies.
• 32“Legissent Platonem qui legum tradendarum ac moderandae civitatis unam esse formam putavit, si omnibus omnium aut magis illustrium rerum publicarum legibus in unum collectis viri prudentes eas inter se compararent atque optimum genus ex eis conflarent. Ad hoc igitur institutum omnia mea studia, omnes contuli cogitationes.”
• 33Macchiavelli already expresses the same thought. He says: “Vetus dictum est quod ut sapientissime pronunciatur, ita diligenter observari debet: Res futuras ex contemplatione praeteritarum conjici cognoscique posse. Quaecunque enim per universum orbem fiunt, habuerunt olim aliquid simile, quod eodem modo antiquitus et ex iisdem causis ut haec quae nunc videmus factum fuit. . . Eo magis etiam videris, ex praeteritis futurarum rerum eventus posse conjicere.”
• 34“Non faciunt sapientes Reipublicae gubernatores omnia, quae ab aliis facta esse in historiis perhibentur; sed propterea historiarum lectioni diligentissime incumbunt eorum optimi quique, ut insignem rerum praeteritarum cognitionem nacti, ceu rebus illis, quos legerunt, gerendis interfuissent, deinde in capiendis novis consiliis et rerum agendarum de-liberatione Causas, Consilia, Progressus, Eventusque praeteritarum rerum promptos in animo habeant, praesentia exempla cum praeteritis, domestica cum peregrinis, similia cum similibus, contraria cum contrariis ubique possint conferre et ex praeteritis futurarum rerum eventus praevidere. Quae si ita se habere omnes intelligimus.”
• 35Plato stresses that the geographical location of a country is of no slight influence on the nature of its people and that legislation must not neglect to take this fact into consideration. The lawgiver, he says, must keep his eyes open for all differences of this kind and he must try to examine them, as far as is humanly possible, before he undertakes to devise laws.
• 36“It is hardly possible that any definite political institution can be preserved uncontested in practice as in theory. This seems, rather, to be just as impossible as to prescribe for each body one definite way of living in which one and the same thing would not prove harmful to it at one time and useful at another.”
• 37Aristotle emphasizes no less decisively the relativity of political institutions. “Politics,” he says, “has not merely to examine the per se most desirable constitution or government most desirable in itself but also the one which under certain circumstances is the most suitable, which is best adapted to these circumstances. It is the duty of the politician to examine every state and its institutions as they really are, and to investigate the peculiarity of its institutions. He must be acquainted with the real state of affairs before he can go ahead to improve them.”
• 38“Sicuti diversae causae esse solent, quibus urbium fundamenta ponuntur, ita quoque diversae ipsis rationes legum et institutorum existere consueverunt.”
• 39And in another place: “Qui cupit vel rempublicam vel sectam suam diuturnam esse, eam saepe corrigere debet et veluti ad prima sua principia revocare . . . praecipue sunt respublicae atque sectae, quibus salutares sunt illae mutationes, per quas corriguntur, emendantur et ad primam suam originem principiumque revocantur.”
• 40J. Bodinus expresses himself quite in detail on the relativity of political institutions. In his Republic he writes a separate chapter: “De conformando civitatum statu pro regionum ac populorum varietate, quibusque disciplinis populorum mores dissimilesque naturae percipiantur.”
• 41“explicare, quae quibus populis leges congruant, quis cuique civitati status conveniat, quibusque rationibus gentium mores ac naturae percipiantur: ne aut formam civitatis a populi moribus alienam instituamus, aut naturae leges hominum arbitrio ac voluntati, repugnante natura, servire cogamus; quod plerique facere conati florentissima imperia funditus everterunt.”
• 42“Peccatur ab iis, qui ab alienis civitatibus leges acceptas ad eam quae plane contraria ratione dirigatur rempublicam adhiberi putant oportere.”
• 43This insight, so clearly expressed by such prominent writers, into the significance of the study of history for the politician and the relativity of political institutions has never again been completely lost, as we probably do not need to say, neither in general nor in respect to a particular branch of the political sciences. Even the writers of the Age of Enlightenment in France have been quite especially charged with lack of historical sense and the tendency toward “absolutism” in politics. Yet they by no means fail to recognize as fully as the historical school of German economists assumes the significance of the study of history for the statesman and the principle of the merely relative justification of political institutions.
• 44“Adam Smith reconnut que la science du gouvernement ne pouvait se fonder que sur l’histoire des peuples divers et que c’était seulement d’une observation judicieuse des faits qu’on pouvait deduire les principes. Son immortel ouvrage, ‘De la nature et des causes de la richesse des nations’ . . . est en effet le resultat d’une étude philosophique de l’histoire du genre humain.”
• 45“The political part of our science particularly needs a historical basis, for without this it will go dangerously astray. With this I do not mean that a meager historical introduction be given with each doctrine. I mean, rather, that all of economics in its connections be placed upon historical bases instead of upon mere dogma and be developed as a result of research into the history of commerce, of culture, of the state, and of humanity in general. What vigor A. Smith and Ferguson have breathed into their immortal works in this way!”
• 46“Ce n’est pas sur des calculs arides qu’elle (la science d’écon. pol.) est fondée, ce n’est pas non plus sur un enchaînement mathématique de théorèmes déduits, d’axiomes obscurs, donnés pour des vérités incontestables…. L’économie politique est fondée sur l’étude de l’homme et des hommes; il faut connaître la nature humaine, l’état et le sort des sociétés en différents temps et en différents lieux, il faut consulter les historiens et les voyageurs etc. Une pareille étude . . . c’est la philosophie de l’histoire et des voyages.”
• 47And in another place: “On est tombé dans de graves erreurs, pour avoir toujours voulu généraliser tout ce qui rapporte aux sciences sociales . . . Il faut s’attacher tantôt à un temps, tantôt à un pays, tantôt à une profession, pour voir bien ce qu’est l’homme et comment les institutions agissent sur lui. Ceux au contraire qui l’ont voulu voir isolé du monde, ou plutôt qui ont considéré abstraitement les modifications de son existence, sont toujours arrivés à des conclusions démenties par l’experience.”
• 48We refrain from citing the long list of German writers, who obviously as a result of stimulation such as this have stressed the importance of history for political economy (its importance as a means for understanding the present and as an empirical basis for social research!). They have also stressed the relativity of economic institutions and laws, and were doing both in the first three decades of our century, that is, long before the founding of the “historical school of economists in Germany.” After all, it is more than sufficiently clear from the passages cited above, which, it scarcely needs be noted, could be increased and complemented without any trouble, that the principles under discussion here were never completely foreign either to the social sciences in general or—since it was established as a separate science—to political economy in particular. There has been no epoch in the development of our science when the leading principles of the historical school of German economists have not been expressed in excellent writings of world-famous authors known and accessible to every educated person even today. There was truly no need of the discovery of the above truths in the middle of the nineteenth century or even of the establishment of a special school for their dissemination.