Background
John Cairnes was born at Castlebellingham, County Louth on December 26, 1823.
(The work on the Character and Logical Method of Politica...)
The work on the Character and Logical Method of Political Economy may be recommended to students as a safe guide to help them through the mazy labyrinths which the earlier stages of the study present. The purpose of the work is to ascertain the true relation of Political Economy to the Physical Sciences on the one hand, and to the Moral Sciences on the other, both as regards method and compass. The supporters and opponents of Political Economy have each done it injustice by misapprehending its aims and limits. The study, as Professor Cairnes points out and explains with inimitable clearness, does not consist in an investigation into the causes of physical facts or the evolution of psychological processes. Political Economy begins at the point at which physical science and psychological science each end.
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John Cairnes was born at Castlebellingham, County Louth on December 26, 1823.
John Cairnes was permitted to enter Trinity College, Dublin, where he took the degree of B. A. in 1848, and six years later that of M. A. After passing through the curriculum of arts he engaged in the study of law and was called to the Irish bar.
John Cairnes felt no very strong inclination for the legal profession, and during some years he occupied himself to a large extent with contributions to the daily press, treating of the social and economical questions that affected Ireland. He devoted most attention to political economy, which he studied with great thoroughness and care. While residing in Dublin he made the acquaintance of Archbishop Whately, who conceived a very high respect for his character and abilities. In 1856 a vacancy occurred in the chair of political economy at Dublin founded by Whately, and Caimes received the appointment. In accordance with the regulations of the foundation, the lectures of his first year's course were published. The book appeared in 1857 with the title Character and Logical Method of Political Economy. It follows up and expands J. S. Mill's treatment in the Essays on some Unsettled Questions in Political Economy, and forms an admirable introduction to the study of economics as a science. In it the author's peculiar powers of thought and expression are displayed to the best advantage. Logical exactness, precision of language, and firm grasp of the true nature of economic facts, are the qualities characteristic of this as of all his other works. If the book had done nothing more, it would still have conferred inestimable benefit on political economists by its clear exposition of the true nature and meaning of the ambiguous term " law. " To the view of the province and method of political economy expounded in this early work the author always remained true, and several of his later essays, such as those on Political Economy and Land, Political Economy and Laissez-Faire, are but reiterations of the same doctrine. His next contribution to economical science was a series of articles on the gold question, published partly in Fraser's Magazine, in which the probable consequences of the increased supply of gold attendant on the Australian and Californian gold discoveries were analysed with great skill and ability. And a critical article on M. Chevalier's work On the Probable Fall in the Value of Gold appeared in the Edinburgh Review for July 1860. In 1861 Caimes was appointed to the professorship of political economy and jurisprudence in Queen's College, Galway, and in the following year he published his admirable work The Slave Power, one of the finest specimens of. applied economical philosophy. The inherent disadvantages of the employment of slave labour were exposed with great fulness and ability, and the conclusions arrived at have taken their place among the recognized doctrines of political economy. The opinions expressed by Caimes as to the probable issue of the war in America were largely verified by the actual course of events, and the appearance of the book had a marked influence on the attitude taken by serious political thinkers in England towards the southern states. During the remainder of his residence at Galway Professor Cairnes published nothing beyond some fragments and pamphlets mainly upon Irish questions.
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Cairnes had married Elizabeth Charlotte. They were the parents of two sons and a daughter, including the officer and writer William Elliot Cairnes (1862-1902).