In whatever manner political economists may have settled the definition of productive and unproductive labour or consumption, the consequences which they have drawn from the definition are nearly the same.

The definition which appears the best adapted to render the ordinary doctrines relating to net produce true, would be this: The net produce of a country is whatever is annually produced beyond what is necessary for maintaining the stock of materials and implements unimpaired, for keeping all productive labourers alive and in condition for work, and for just keeping up their numbers without increase.

The definition of a science has almost invariably not preceded, but followed, the creation of the science itself.

Many persons, accordingly, who are profoundly conversant with the details of a science, would be very much at a loss to supply such a definition of the science itself as should not be liable to well-grounded logical objections.

The definition of a science must, indeed, be placed among that class of truths which Dugald Stewart had in view, when he observed that the first principles of all sciences belong to the philosophy of the human mind.

With respect to the definition in question, if definition it can be called which is not found in any set form of words, but left to be arrived at by a process of abstraction from a hundred current modes of speaking on the subject; it seems liable to the conclusive objection, that it confounds the essentially distinct, though closely connected, ideas of science and art.

With respect to the definition in question, if definition it can be called which is not found in any set form of words, but left to be arrived at by a process of abstraction from a hundred current modes of speaking on the subject; it seems liable to the conclusive objection, that it confounds the essentially distinct, though closely connected, ideas of science and art.

2. The definition most generally received among instructed persons, and laid down in the commencement of most of the professed treatises on the subject, is to the following effect:That Political Economy informs us of the laws which regulate the production, distribution, and consumption of wealth.

To this definition is frequently appended a familiar illustration.

This definition is free from the fault which we pointed out in the former one.

But though the definition is, with regard to this particular point, unobjectionable, so much can scarcely be said for the accompanying illustration; which rather sends back the mind to the current loose notion of Political Economy already disposed of.

Political Economy is really, and is stated in the definition to be, a science: but domestic economy, so far as it is capable of being reduced to principles, is an art.

The definition, though not liable to the same objection as the illustration which is annexed to it, is itself far from unexceptionable.

In a merely initiatory definition, scientific precision is not required: the object is, to insinuate into the learner's mind, it is scarcely material by what means, some general preconception of what are the uses of the pursuit, and what the series of topics through which he is about to travel.

When a definition so manifestly surpasses in extent what it professes to define, we must suppose that it is not meant to be interpreted literally, though the limitations with which it is to be understood are not stated.

But if so, the difference in kind is the radical distinction, and we should find out what that is, and found our definition upon it.

From the above considerations the following seems to come out as the correct and complete definition of Political Economy:"The science which treats of the production and distribution of wealth, so far as they depend upon the laws of human nature."

" For popular use this definition is amply sufficient, but it still falls short of the complete accuracy required for the purposes of the philosopher.

Political Economy, then, may be defined as follows; and the definition seems to be complete: "The science which traces the laws of such of the phenomena of society as arise from the combined operations of mankind for the production of wealth, in so far as those phenomena are not modified by the pursuit of any other object.

The above attempt to frame a stricter definition of the science than what are commonly received as such, may be thought to be of little use; or, at best, to be chiefly useful in a general survey and classification of the sciences, rather than as conducing to the more successful pursuit of the particular science in question.

We think otherwise, and for this reason; that, with the consideration of the definition of a science, is inseparably connected that of the philosophic method of the science; the nature of the process by which its investigations are to be carried on, its truths to be arrived at.

Geometry presupposes an arbitrary definition of a line, "that which has length but not breadth.

" Just in the same manner does Political Economy presuppose an arbitrary definition of man, as a being who invariably does that by which he may obtain the greatest amount of necessaries, conveniences, and luxuries, with the smallest quantity of labour and physical self-denial with which they can be obtained in the existing state of knowledge.

It is true that this definition of man is not formally prefixed to any work on Political Economy, as the definition of a line is prefixed to Euclid's Elements; and in proportion as by being so prefixed it would be less in danger of being forgotten, we may see ground for regret that this is not done.

" No mathematician ever thought that his definition of a line corresponded to an actual line.