Pursuant to natural law? Certainly. But where do we get any natural law in Economics? To quote a sarcastic attempt at refutation, “Do we pick it off the trees?” Yes, some of it we pick off the trees. Who can intelligently observe the growth and fruitage of a tree without recognizing operations of natural law? How do trees grow except by operation of natural law? And except by operation of natural law, how do men’s bodies grow? Is it enough to answer that the growth of the body is a problem of physical science, which is subject to natural law, whereas Economic science contemplates a lawless lot of phenomena? Or men’s minds, do they unfold without the aid of any natural laws of human mentality? And what of social or mass mentality--shall we call it “public opinion” or “herd instinct”?--how does that phenomenon originate and develop except through processes of natural law? As with a tree, so with the whole physical universe, inclusive of the human body. And as with the human body, the physical body and the social mass, so with the mental equipment. Must not all, for their very existence and for their development also, be dependent upon and in all their activities responsive to natural law in one or another of its jurisdictions--responsive happily or unhappily according to their degree of conformity or defiance, of devotion or indifference?[3] [3] For an extended and impressive discussion of the application of natural law to Economics, see “Natural Law in Social Life”, by W. R. Lester, M. A., published by The United Committee for the Taxation of Land Values, 11 Tothill Street, London, S. W. 1, England. For a specific application to the coal industry, see minority report on the bituminous coal problem by Warren S. Blauvelt (formerly of Terre Haute, Ind., latterly of Troy, N. Y.) in the Proceedings of the National [American] Conference on Social Work at its fifty-third session in 1926. Individual activities, whether physical or mental, if that discrimination be permitted, assuredly work out well or ill as they harmonize or run counter to natural law. This must be true also of social activities. The choices made by human beings, and the influences which affect their choices, operate to produce harmony or discord in Economic relationships in so far as they harmonize or are in conflict with natural Economic law. Economics being the science of a certain range of social activities, “the science of mankind making a living,” as it has been aptly called--a science, and not a mere collection of odds and ends of information--the same conclusions must be true of the science of Economics as of the physical sciences. Both are scientific in so far and only in so far as they are within range of natural law.