QUESNAY, François.

£42,500 · Offered by Peter Harrington · No longer available

Physiocratie, ou constitution naturelle du gouvernement le plus avantageux au genre humain. First edition, Leiden issue as usual, of the books that gave the Physiocrats their name, one of the most important and original works on political economy to be published before the Wealth of Nations, a compilation of Quesnay's major writings which offered in one work the complete Physiocrat doctrine.François Quesnay (1694-1774) was the court physician to Louis XV, and his notion of a circular flow of income throughout the economy was influenced by the contemporary discovery of blood circulation through the human body. He believed that trade and industry were not sources of wealth, and instead argued that the real economic movers were agricultural surpluses flowing through the economy in the form of rent, wages, and purchases. Quesnay argued that regulation impedes the flow of income throughout all social classes and therefore economic development; and that taxes on the productive classes, such as farmers, should be reduced in favour of rises for unproductive classes, such as landowners, since their luxurious way of life distorts the income flow. Physiocratie gathers together, under the editorship of Pierre Samuel Dupont de Nemours, seven essays by Quesnay, each of which had originally appeared in the Journal de l'agriculture under Dupont's editorship. It is preceded by a long introductory "Discours de l'éditeur" by Dupont; the second volume comprises his own commentary and analysis. Q

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