separately, so that their increase, decrease, influence, &c., may appear; for every part must be distinctly known or the whole cannot be well understood.'[1] Even with the pains and attention which he had given to the matter, he had found it impossible to carry on his researches in the thorough fashion which he deemed desirable, though he was by no means inclined to pursue a subject with pedantic curiosity beyond the limits that were needed for bringing out points of lasting importance. 'So that facts, circumstances, and controversies, which either never were nationally interesting in themselves, or have been rendered useless in that respect by length of time, should not be inserted in a general work that is intended to promote commercial knowledge; for there ought to be a keeping of proportion in books as well as in pictures; and the several parts of a subject should be so treated of, that the mind may discover which are the principal objects therein, as the eye is enabled to distinguish the principal figures in an historical picture.'[2] But though he was so discriminating, his scheme of studying each branch was extraordinarily thorough; he proposed to divide his historical account of every branch of manufacture into sixteen heads, under one or other of which, fragments of information might be classified, in the hope that the whole account would sooner or later be made sufficiently complete.
The mere fact that Massie regarded such an investigation as necessary in order to discriminate what was really of national concern, shows that he was by no means satisfied with the rough and ready schemes of national success or decay which were based on some particular set of figures. His whole appeal for investigation is an implied confession that his contemporaries had no satisfactory means of determining where the national interest really lay. His very attitude is a condemnation of the methods of reasoning which satisfied the ordinary writer, or were bandied in the House of Commons. But despite this, he is still on the standpoint of the Mercantile System. He believed that it was possible to attain to a knowledge of principles which should tend to increase the prosperity and power of the country, and that when these principles were detected it was necessary to carry them out, and to take active measures to check the private interest which conflicted with them. His attitude comes out curiously in his criticism of Sir Matthew Decker's scheme of taxation. He shows that the abolition of customs, which might
- ↑ A Representation concerning the Knowledge of Commerce, p. 10.
- ↑ Ibid. p. 16.
