prevent him from
adopting the same methods of reasoning. 'Induction' soon does its
office, and supplies a few simple principles, from which we may make a
leap to our conclusions by a rapid, deductive process.

The problems appear to be too simple to require long preliminary
investigations of fact. Torrens speaks of proving by 'strictly
demonstrative evidence' or of 'proceeding to demonstrate' by strict
analysis.[359] This is generally the preface to one of those
characteristic arithmetical illustrations to which Ricardo's practice
gave a sanction. We are always starting an imaginary capitalist with
so many quarters of corn and suits of clothes, which he can transmute
into any kind of product, and taking for granted that he represents a
typical case. This gives a certain mathematical air to the reasoning,
and too often hides from the reasoner that he may be begging the
question in more ways than one by the arrangement of his imaginary
case. One of the offenders in this kind was Nassau Senior (1790-1864),
a man of remarkable good sense, and fully aware of the necessity of
caution in applying his theories to facts. He was the first professor
of Political Economy at Oxford (1825-1830), and his treatise[360] lays
down the general assumption of his orthodox contemporaries clearly and
briefly. The science, he tells us, is deducible from four elementary
propositions: the first of which asserts that every 'man desires to
obtain additional wealth with as little sacrifice as possible'; while
the others state the first principles embodied in Malthus's theory of
population, and in the laws corresponding to the increasing facility
of manufacturing and the decreasing facility of agricultural
industry.[361] As these propositions include no reference to the
particular institutions or historical development of the social
structure, they virtually imply that a science might be constructed
equally applicable in all times and places; and that, having obtained
them, we need not trouble ourselves any further with inductions. Hence
it follows that we can at once get from the abstract 'man' to the
industrial order. We may, it would seem, abstract from history in
general. This corresponds to the postulate explicitly stated by
M'Culloch. 'A state,' he tells us, 'is nothing more than an aggregate
of individuals': men, that is, who 'inhabit a certain tract of
country.'[362] He infers that 'whatever is most advantageous to them'
(the individuals) '