Principles of Political Economy, Vol. 1Roscher, Wilhelm
History
Principles of Political Economy, Vol. 1
Roscher, Wilhelm
Economics
By degrees, the knowledge necessary to these council officials, and which
found no place in the lectures on law, were formed into a special body of
doctrine. After such men as Morhof and Thomasius had prepared the
way,(148) Frederick William I., himself a clever cameralist, and author of
the masterly financial system of Prussia, took the important step of
founding, at Halle and Frankfurt on the Oder, special chairs of economy
and cameralistic science; which, considering the time, were very ably
filled by Gasser and Dithmar. (1727.) There was thus formed in the German
universities a distinct school of cameralists, which, through Jung, Rössig
and Schmalz, reached to the nineteenth century. The term cameralistic
science, the creature of chance, was used, it must be said, with very
various limits to its meaning.(149)
However, Political Economy in Germany developed out of the science of law
and the cameralistic sciences, while in England and Italy it had its
origin chiefly in the study of questions of finance and foreign commerce.
Section XX.
Private Economy. (Continued.)
If we abstract from cameralistic science as it was understood in the last
century, what it has in common with all economy,(150) and therefore with
public economy, next that which belongs to the aggregate of governmental
economy, there remains only a number of rules, such as those which govern
the principal branches of private business, and which indicate how they
are to be carried on with the greatest advantage to those who engage in
them. Such are forest and rural economy, mining science, technology,
including architecture, and all that concerns founderies, and commercial
science. Now that the expression cameralistic science is altogether
obsolete, the aggregate of these might be designated by the name private
economy. Obviously, we should have here, neither a simple nor pure
science, but only a compilation of natural-philosophical and economic
lemmas. Thus, in agriculture, for instance, a knowledge of the different
kinds of soil, of the tillage of land, of the different plants and animals
etc., belongs to the domain of natural science; while all that relates to
the cost of production, the employment of capital, the wages of labor, the
exchange of products, net product and the price of land, are purely
politico-economical. The political economists also require a knowledge of
the natural side of the cameralistic sciences. Such a knowledge is
indispensable to every detailed and living theory, and especially to the
application of economic science to practice. The great difference lies in
this, that the cameralist interests himself in the production of material
goods for their own sake, while the political economist regards them only
in their relations to national life.(151)
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