MONEY AND MORALS:

A BOOK FOR THE TIMES.

BY JOHN LALOR.

OCTAVO, CLOTH, TEN SHILLINGS.

"THIS work is distinguished by vigorous and vivid literary power, by a high and generous spirit engaged on matters of vital concern to the British public, and by a political economy searching and striking, though frequently questionable.

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It is less a treatise, or series of treatises, than a number of papers of great power, warmth, vitality, and eloquence, on many of the glaring moral deficiencies of the day, in public men and the public mind. To these are added many vigorous sketches of our moneyed and commercial system, the result of observation and reflection, animated by rhetorical if not poetical genius; some life-like pictures of the errors of the abstract school of economists; and many expositions of more abstruse subjects, which are worth reading for the arguments, or for the manner in which they are presented."-Spectator.

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Money and Morals' is a comprehensive title: and one who turned over Mr. Lalor's pages, unaware of the thread of argumentative connection, might imagine that they treated de omnibus rebus, et quibusdam aliis.' Yet, though we pass from the elementary principles of Political Economy in the first page to the Reconciliation of the Churches in the last, and encounter by the way Australian Gold, Lancashire Society, Agricultural Distress, Sanitary Reform, Socialistic Theories, National Defences, and the chances of Imperial Decay, a

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thread of argumentative connection there undoubtedly is."-Christian Reformer.

"Under the above title Mr. Lalor has published the ripe accumulations of many years of thought and study, upon the comparatively limited subject of the money market, and the influence likely to be produced on it by the new gold, and upon the infinitely wider subject of the Condition of England question, in all its more prominent bearings. A more thoughtful, scholar-like, and suggestive work it has not been, for years, our privilege to peruse. Its grand characteristic is its comprehensive liberality. A certain free-hearted genial breadth of treatment is conspicuous everywhere. * * * He (the author) brings to the consideration of the most difficult and complicated social questions, a power of analysis keen, calm, and profound; a beauty of style which throws around the discussion of questions generally deemed susceptible of only the most prosaic treatment, an affluence of imagery and an aptness of poetical illustration which is no less instructive than attractive. The impression everywhere produced is, that the writer has mastered his subject. * * * One great difficulty in dealing with this book is caused by the very rare fault of its extreme pregnancy and comprehensiveness. Nihil non tetigit. Mr. Lalor has touched, in the brief compass of this thin octavo, on almost all the higher questions of social policy which have moved the minds of the existing generation."-Weekly News.

"These essays possess great merit, both of style and of matter. They are written with address and persuasion, and are not less remarkable for profound philosophic judgment and extreme metaphysical refinement than for a delicate play of poetic fancy, which, at the same time that his mind is strengthened and enriched, allures, surprises, and beguiles the imagination of the reader. It is, in a word, an attractive and quickening work, in which the practical precepts of a benign and elevated philosophy are united in the happiest combination with the graces of elegant and harmonious composition."-Morning Post.

Mr. Lalor may be compared to one of those early voyagers whogifted with great acuteness and powers of observation, with an eye ever watchful to discover objects of beauty or interest, with a fancy instructed, but not overladen, and with a varied learning-have connected their names with the description of a new region, or the polity of a new race. No subsequent traveller goes over the same ground, and no second inquirer explores the same field, without feeling his obligation to the progress which has been already made; and it is no detraction from the value and reality of that progress, if it falls to the lot of others to correct errors of distance, or miscalculations of lati

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tude, which become manifest only on the minutest survey. Mr. Lalor has drawn the outlines of the chart with a bold and steady hand, and he can well afford to let others fill in a few of the measurements."-Morning Chronicle.

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"A very able and luminous treatise on the important questions of capital, currency, credit, and the monetary system generally. The author is singularly clear and accurate in his definitions of the various branches of what is commonly called money, or, as he more precisely defines it, purchasing power;' and places before the reader, in as simple terms as the subject will permit, a picture of the mode in which income and capital reciprocally create and augment each other. A person with a very elementary notion of the principles of political economy and monetary science may readily follow and comprehend his arguments, and as he goes on will be enabled to appreciate the merits of the author's deductions."-Morning Advertiser.

"Neither a party nor a superficial production. Mr. Lalor is well versed in all the writings of the economists, and not only in them, but in much other literature; and he pours out his stores with great facility and in a very graceful manner. Essentially the book is politico-economical, but it is also social, moral, and literary, treating many of the topics of the day, but treating them on scientific principles. If a temporary circumstance have given birth to the book, the materials for it have been gathered through years of study, by much reading and reflection."-Economist.

"At such a period, this treatise on Money and Morals' is well timed, and we hope it will be well and widely read. It is not an ephemeral work vamped up to meet the occasion, but a masterpiece of sound philosophy, embodying much true wisdom, and such a profound and practical knowledge of the subject, as could only be acquired by the careful observation and study of years. The volume is written throughout with elegance and ease-often with an eloquence and pathos not to be surpassed, and rarely to be met with in dissertations on political economy."-Tait's Magazine.

"We ourselves hold the faith that the Christian gospel must be the root of all better growths in human life, and the instrument of social and national regeneration. We are glad to find a scientific economist having that faith too; and although the details of his modes for bringing practical Christianity more fully and powerfully to bear on our English society do not altogether commend themselves to our judgment, we have been profited and stimulated by Mr. Lalor's sug gestions, and believe that others will be so in no unimportant degree. We heartily commend his thoughtful and cleverly-written work to our readers; and lest our partial analysis of the least popular portions of