"It was only in the middle of the last century, of that eighteenth century which handed over all subjects and all principles without exception to free discussion, that these _spéculative_ purveyors of ideas, applied by them to all things without being really applicable to anything, began to write upon political economy. There existed previously a system of political economy, not to be found in books, but which had been put in _practical_ operation by governments. Colbert, it is said, was the inventor of it, and it was adopted as a rule by all the nations of Europe. The singular thing is, that in spite of contempt and maledictions, in spite of all the discoveries of the modern school, it still remains in practical operation. This system, which our authors have called the _mercantile system_, was designed to.... impede, by prohibitions or import duties, the entry of foreign products, which might ruin our own manufactures by their competition. Economic writers of all schools* have declared this system untenable, absurd, and calculated to impoverish any country. It has been banished from all their books, and forced to take refuge in the _practical_ legislation of all nations. They cannot conceive why, in measures relating to national wealth, governments should not follow the advice and opinions of learned authors, rather than trust to their _experience_ of the tried working of a system which has been long in operation. Above all, they cannot conceive why the French government should in economic questions obstinately set itself to resist the progress of enlightenment, and maintain in its _practice_ those ancient errors, which all our economic writers have exposed. But enough of this mercantile system, which has nothing in its favour but _facts_, and is not defended by any speculative writer."* * Du Système de l'Impot, par M. le Vicomte de Saint-Chamans, p. 11. Such language as this would lead one to suppose that in demanding for every one _the free disposal of his property_, economists were propounding some new system, some new, strange, and chimerical social order, a sort of _phalanstère_, coined in the mint of their own brain, and without precedent in the annals of the human race. To me it would seem that if we have here anything factitious or contingent, it is to be found, not in liberty, but in protection; not in the free power of exchanging, but in customs duties employed to overturn artificially the natural course of remuneration. But our business at present is not to compare, or pronounce between, the two systems; but to inquire which of the two is founded on experience. The advocates of monopoly maintain that _the facts_ are on their side, and that we have on our side only _theory_.