And we find accordingly in his great work a combination of these two methods --inductive inquiry on the one hand,and,onthe other a priori speculation founded on the "Nature"hypothesis.The latter vicious proceeding has in some of his followersbeen greatly aggravated,while the countervailing spirit of inductive investigation has fallen into the background,and indeedthe necessity or utility of any such investigation in the economic field has been sometimes altogether denied.
Some have represented Smith's work as of so loose a texture and so defective an arrangement that it may be justly describedas consisting of a series of monographs.But this is certainly an exaggeration.The book,it is true,is not framed on a rigidmould,nor is there any parade of systematic divisions and subdivisions;and this doubtless recommended it to men of theworld and of business,for whose instruction it was,at least primarily intended.But it has the real and pervading unity whichresults from a set of principles and a mode of thinking identical throughout and the general absence of such contradictions aswould arise from an imperfect digestion of the subject.
