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153.: ricardo to malthus1[Reply to 152] - David Ricardo, The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, Vol. 7 Letters 1816-1818 [1816]

Edition used:

The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, ed. Piero Sraffa with the Collaboration of M.H. Dobb (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2005). Vol. 7 Letters 1816-1818.

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.


153.

ricardo to malthus1
[Reply to 152]

My dear Sir

I arrived in town yesterday and found your letter at the Stock Exchange. It is very uncertain whether I shall leave London to-morrow evening or monday evening. I am desirous of getting home on many accounts, but I may not be able to accomplish the business for which I came so soon as I expected and if I do not get it done by to-morrow it will in all probability detain me till monday. Thus then it is still uncertain whether we are to meet, and I do not exactly know how to make you acquainted with my movements. I will however let Mr. Murray know if I leave town to-morrow,— and if you are in the neighbourhood of Russell Square by sending to No. 8 Montague Street (Mr. Basevis1 ) you will be sure to know. In the city at the Stock Exchange any of my brothers will inform you about me.

If I should not be gone will you do me the favor of dining with me on friday at Mr. Basevis,—his dinner hour is 6 oClock, and he begs me to say that he shall be much flattered by your favoring him with your company.

I was in hopes of finding you in London and of having the benefit of your opinion of my book2 in its present state before I sent it to be printed. That advantage I must now forego, because I am desirous of getting it out before the meeting of Parliament, and have before experienced the inconvenience of too much hurry.

I cannot think it inconsistent to suppose that the money price of labour may rise when it is necessary to cultivate poorer land, whilst the real price may at the same time fall. Two opposite causes are influencing the price of labour one the enhanced price of some of the things on which wages are expended,—the other the fewer enjoyments which the labourer will have the power to command,—you think these may balance each other, or rather that the latter will prevail, I on the contrary think the former the most powerful in its effects. I must write a book to convince you.

I am glad you are not going to cut your next edition short.

Very truly Yrs.

David Ricardo

[1 ]Addressed: ‘To / The Revd. T R Malthus / East India College / Hertford’.

MS at Albury.—Letters to Malthus, XLII.

[1 ]George Basevi, sen. (1771–1851), a stockbroker, two sons of whom have been mentioned above (VI, 245, 250). In 1817, following his brother-in-law Isaac D’Israeli, he withdrew from the Jewish congregation of Bevis Marks, from which Ricardo had seceded many years before.

[2 ]Economical and Secure Currency.