FOUNDING CLASSICAL ECONOMICS IN FRANCE

MILL, J.

Élémens d'Économie Politique [i.e. Elements of Political Economy]. Traduits de l'anglois par J.T. Parisot.

Paris, Bossange Frères, 1823. 8vo. Completely uncut in the original printed wrappers. A bit of wear to spine and extremities, and internally a bit of light brownspotting, but overall a very nice copy in the rare and fragile original wrappers. VIII, 318 pp.

The very rare first edition of the first French translation of the seminal main work by the co-founder of classical economics (together with Ricardo) and a main popularizer of utilitarianism James Mill. The work is considered the first textbook of Ricardian economics as well as the first popular exposition of the principles of classical economics. As such the work, and the important translations of it into the other main languages of Europe - French and German -, came to exercise a profound influence on later economis.
The work originally appeared in English in 1821, and apart from the first edition, the present first French translation constitutes the most important edition of the work.

"In Elements of Political Economy, James Mill describes his ideas (in the Schumpeterean sense) using economic thought and economic analysis. He uses examples of the Industrial Revolution (industry) and the agricultural industry surrounding England. The utilitarian economist, father of John Stewart Mill, discusses his theory of velocity of circulation of money, the interest from capital as the result of wages of labor (against Ricardian theory), and many other economic principles. James Mill historically writes "the aggregate of commodities, taken all together, there is neither fall nor rise" an issue later paraphrased by Karl Marx in his Das Kapital." (Review - from the 1999-edition of the work).

"James Mill, (1773 - 1836), Scottish philosopher, historian, and economist. He was prominent as a representative of philosophical radicalism, a school of thought also known as Utilitarianism, which emphasized the need for a scientific basis for philosophy as well as a humanist approach to politics and economics. His eldest son was the celebrated Utilitarian thinker John Stuart Mill.... His Elements of Political Economy (1821), an especially precise and lucid work, summarizes the views of the philosophical radicals..." (British Encycl.).

Order-nr.: 42910