retained in Ireland or exported."[317] It may be said with equal truth, that to assume, as Mr. M’Culloch assumes, the Irish absentee’s residence in England to be of no advantage to the people there, is assuming that “himself personally” devours all the cattle and corn sent to him in the shape of rent.  But the landlord does not in either case devour all the beef and all the corn; by far the greater portion of those products go to house, and clothe, and feed the persons who minister to his various wants.

In the beginning of his Essay on Absenteeism Mr. M’Culloch, referring with apparent satisfaction to his evidence before the Committee, says, “it had been previously established, and is now universally conceded that the gentlemen who consume nothing in their families but what is brought from abroad are quite as good, as useful, and as meritorious subjects as they could be, if, they consume nothing but what is produced at home; and such being the case, it will require a sharper eye than has yet looked at this subject, to discover the great injury which is said to be done by their going abroad."[318]

With the greatest respect for Mr. M’Culloch’s skill as a political economist, this proposition has neither been established nor conceded in the unlimited sense in which he here puts it forward.  Enthusiastic men, who become enamoured of some favourite theory, are apt to attach too much importance to it—­push it too far, and try to fit things into it which it will not contain, without being modified or enlarged.  This has been the case with political economists to a remarkable extent; a fact which John Stuart Mill notices and complains of as injurious to the science.[319] The chief flaw in Mr. M’Culloch’s apology for Absenteeism (as his essay may well be called) is, that he entirely overlooks the peculiar nature of Irish exports.  Those exports consist almost exclusively of raw, or, to use Adam Smith’s word, of rude produce; and where this is the case Mr. M’Culloch’s principle will not hold without large modifications.  Mr. Senior saw this, and, in dealing with Irish Absenteeism he modifies the principle accordingly.  In discussing the proximate cause deciding the rate of wages, he lays down as his third proposition, that “It is inconsistent with the prevalent opinion,[320] that the non-residence of landlords, funded proprietors, mortgagees, and other unproductive consumers can be detrimental to the labouring inhabitants of a country which does not export raw produce.”

Mr. Senior here affirms Mr. M’Culloch’s proposition, quoted above, but with the qualifying clause—­“which does not export raw produce.”  I have italicised this clause because it contains the very exception which makes the general proposition inapplicable to Ireland, and to every country whose chief exports are, like Ireland’s, raw produce.