18 OCTOBER 1963, Page 16

LINCOLN SAID IT SIR,—As a Labour man I am always

ready to listen to advice; but I feel the late Lord Keynes would have had something to say to your correspondent who so unthinkingly quotes Abraham Lincoln for my apparent benefit. The governments between the two world wars encouraged thrift for all they were worth; the result was a horrible phase of multiple human misery on a scale and to a degree which now seems incredible. Yet when the government abandoned thrift in order to make armaments it inaugurated a period of material well-being for the common man without parallel in history.

The fate of any government today which ignored Keynes and acted on Lincoln's dictum that 'you can- not bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift' 22 Nevern Road, SW5