Bastiat, Frederic

Bastiat, Frederic. Economic Sophisms. 1843-1850. Many editions. 2 vols. 548 pp. 564 pp.

"Bastiat, a friend of Cobden, was opposed to all descriptions of public waste and government interference. Both by his writings and by his action as a politician, he waged inceasing war against Bureaucracy, Protection and Socialism. The book cited above gained a great reputation; it is very witty and written in an attractive style. The Petition of the Candlemakers against the sun, which interfered with their industry, is well known. Each short study attacks some economic error, or pleads for the removal of some restrictions. The truth to be brought out is often enforced by dialogue or some other lively method. Bastiat was an optimist. His view was that the various human impulses and activities would, under free competition in an honest and peaceful government, result in steady progress and increasing prosperity and happiness. This was the theme of his Harmonies Economiques, of which only the first volume appeared owing to his untimely death.
"His complete works with introductory biography were published in France in 1855 shortly after his death. They include many brilliant pamphlets and articles against the fallacies of State Socialism and Communism, which were rampart in Paris in the last years of Bastiat's life." - PI.
"In Sophismes Economiques we have the completest and most effective, the wisest and wittiest exposure of protectionism and its principles, reasonings, consequences which exists in any language. Bastiat was the opponent of socialism. In this respect also he had no equal among the economists of France." - Encyclopedia Americana.


BK: I have this two volume set and it is a joy to read.