‎(HERRENSCHWAND, J.F. DE.)‎
‎De l'économie politique et morale de l'espèce humaine.‎

‎A Londres, de l'Imprimerie de Cooper & Graham, 1796. 2 volumes. (24), 408 pp.; (4), 454 pp. 8vo. Modern half red morocco, spines with gilt lettering, marbled boards. Kress B.3197; Goldsmiths 16541; Einaudi 2888 (4to edition); INED 2264bis (4to edition). First edition, both a 4to and a 8vo edition were published. 'The dynamic aspects of population growth were treated more fully by Herrenschwand, a Swiss-born sometime French official, than by any other French author. Throughout his work runs the view that although man's procreative power is without inherent limit, population 'can multiply only in proportion to its support', and does increase as man's cultural progress enables him to increase the available food supply. He seems to have believed, moreover, despite his great faith in man's capacity for intellectual and cultural progress, that unless appropriate economics policies were persued by statesman, population pressure and misery would be the lot of the lower classes, who comprised about three quarters of the population' (Spengler, French Predecessors of Malthus). Herrenschwand borrowed his conception of nature from Shaftesbury, was influenced by Adam Smith and Arthur Young, and apparently knew the works of Franklin, Steuart, Decker, Price, Davenant, and Temple, and was a critic of Necker's views and policies. Arthur Young praised Herrenschwand's works highly, and Blanqui mentions him as a connecting link between Quesnay and Smith. - Very fine and nice copy, with large margins. ‎

Reference : 15639

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