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Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow 97.: malthus to ricardo1 - The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, Vol. 6 Letters 1810-1815

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97.: malthus to ricardo1 - David Ricardo, The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, Vol. 6 Letters 1810-1815 [1810]

Edition used:

The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, ed. Piero Sraffa with the Collaboration of M.H. Dobb (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2005). Vol. 6 Letters 1810-1815.

Part of: The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, 11 vols (Sraffa ed.)

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


97.

malthus to ricardo1

My dear Sir,

The Champ de Mai2 has passed off so well for Buonaparte, and I am so much inclined to think that he will make a formidable resistance, that I expect the Stocks will be rather lower than higher some months hence. I may very likely be quite mistaken; but under this impression I should naturally be disposed to take an early opportunity of realising a small profit on the share you have been so good as to promise me.3 I will not however do this if it is either wrong, or inconvenient to you, and whatever may occur, you may depend upon it, that I shall always, be sensible of your kindness, and not disposed to repine.

We expect to stay here about a week longer. Supposing two nations with the same population and wealth, and the same rate of profits; and one of them to be merely manufacturing and commercial, and the other mainly agricultural, would you not say, that the agricultural country would produce the given quantity of wealth and population with less labour, and would therefore have a greater mass of disposeable wealth, and could maintain larger fleets and armies?

The postman is here

Ever truly Yours

T Robt. Malthus.

If this be not allowed, it is saying, that the possession of such an instrument as the land, is of little or no use.

[1 ]Addressed: ‘D. Ricardo Esqr / Upper Brook Street / Gosvenor Square’.

MS in R.P.

[2 ]The ceremony on 1 June at which Napoleon proclaimed the new Constitution.

[3 ]See above, p. 122.