HAD Professor Robertson flourished a century ago, Economi,:.; would never
have been called the Dismal Science. As expound,.1 by him, it is a tongue-twisting, headaching, brain-racking science but emphatically not dismal. To venture on this collection ,f essays without a thorough theoretical grounding would be way e of time, and it would be preferable to have considerably more than that ; it is not every competent Alpinist who can tackle t!',= Himalayas. But what fun they are! Professor Robertson grappl.=; with Mr. Keynes in the empyrean of interest theory, quoting AIL in Wonderland meanwhile; coins irreverant terminologies to &- scribe the most majestic mysteries of economics; switches dazzlina!v from abstract to concrete and back ; reviews his confreres in I manner calculated to rouse impotent envy in a junior critic ; an I
leaves as a positive residuum in the reader's mind the following conclusions. The rate of interest matters less than his contem- poraries think, and the trade cycle is less of a monetary pheno- menon than the price paid for economic advance with its inevitable discontinuity. On these primary fluctuations, however, there are superimposed secondary amplifications which are mainly mone- tary and susceptible to monetary remedy ; we can lower the price of progress, though a price must still be paid, and no single remedy is applicable in all circumstances. Qualified readers are urged to see for themselves how inadequate is this summary of Professor Robertson's brilliant eclecticism.
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