CH. 23

NOTES ON MERCANTILISM, ETC.

37i

of his destructive criticism. On the other hand, thedetail of his diagnosis, in particular the so-called A + Btheorem, includes much mere mystification. If MajorDouglas had limited his B-items to the financial pro-visions made by entrepreneurs to which no currentexpenditure on replacements and renewals corresponds,he would be nearer the truth. But even in that case it isnecessary to allow for the possibility of these provisionsbeing offset by new investment in other directions aswell as by increased expenditure on consumption.Major Douglas is entitled to claim, as against some ofhis orthodox adversaries, that he at least has not beenwholly oblivious of the outstanding problem of oureconomic system. Yet he has scarcely established anequal claim to rank—a private, perhaps, but not amajor in the brave army of heretics—with Mandeville,Malthus , Gesell and Hobson, who, following theirintuitions, have preferred to see the truth obscurely andimperfectly rather than to maintain error, reached indeedwith clearness and consistency and by easy logic, buton hypotheses inappropriate to the facts.