[98] I have before me Professor A. GRAZIADEI's article _Intorno alla teoria edonistica del valore_. (In _Riforma Sociale_, September 15th, 1900); in which A. fails to see how the purist theory of value dovetails in with the doctrines of Psychophysics and Psychology. I can well believe it! Psychophysics and Psychology are natural sciences and cannot throw light on economic fact which is mental and of value. I may be allowed to point out, that, even three years ago, I gave a warning against the confusion of economics with psychology. (See in this volume pp. 72-75.) He who appeals to psychology (naturalistic) in order to understand economic fact, will always meet with the delusion, opportunely shown up by Graziadei. I have stated the reasons owing to which economics cannot dwell where the psychologists and hedonists say; now Graziedei has questioned the door-keepers (Fechner, Wundt, etc.), and has learnt that it does not dwell there. Well and good! [99] CAMILLO TRIVERO, _La teoria dei bisogni_, Turin, Bocca, 1900, pp. 198. Trivero means by _need_ 'the condition of a being, either conscious or unconscious (man, animal, plant, thing), in which it cannot remain': so that it can be said 'that all needs are ultimately condensed into the supreme _need_ or _end_ of being or becoming.' _Need_ for him is hence actual reality itself. But since, on the other hand, he declares that he does not wish to solve nor even to consider the philosophical problem, it is hard to understand what a _theory of needs_ (_i.e._ of reality) can be, and for what reason he goes back to such generalities. It is true that Trivero believes that, by going back to the general concept of _need_, he can establish the _parent theory_ on which rest the particular doctrines of needs; and amongst them economics, which concerns itself with _economic_ needs. If there are _species_--he says--we ought to determine of what _genus_ they are species. But he will allow me to remark that the genus to look for is, as logic teaches, the _proximate_ genus. To jump to such a great distance as to reality or to fact, would only lead to the noble discovery: that economic needs are part of reality, are a group of facts. And what he does is to make an equally valuable discovery: that the true theory of history is the theory of needs, which, granted his definition of _needs_, is as much as to say that history is history of reality and the theory of it is--the theory. I have then no objection to make to the meaning which Trivero wishes to give to the word _need_; but I must assert that, having given it this meaning, he has not afterwards constructed the theory of anything, nor thrown light on any special group of facts.