Piercy Ravenstone: Tory democrat and physiocratic anti-capitalist

Abstract

Joseph Dorfman in his introduction to the 1966 edition of Ravenstone's A Few Doubts on the Subjects of Population and Political Economy argued that Ravenstone was Rev. Edward Edwards, a major contributor on political economy to the Quarterly Review and Blackwood's Magazine. The case Dorfman made was circumstantial but nonetheless a strong one. First there was the fact that ‘articles in these Tory organs [were] roughly speaking in accordance with the views of “Ravenstone”’ (Dorfman, 1966). Both Ravenstone and Edwards were, for example, strongly critical of Malthusian population theory and its implications. Furthermore, on the basis of a reading of the 1821 work, Dorfman opined that Ravenstone was a trained theologian, something consistent with Edwards' clerical status, and that both had a predilection for historical reflection. Dorfman also believed he had found evidence in the files of John Murray, the publisher of the Quarterly Review, to substantiate his identification. Thus he cites a letter from Murray to William Gifford, a member of the publishing house, dated 3 November 1820, which makes reference to a manuscript sent to Murray shortly before A Few Doubts was published by another house. Moreover, Murray's correspondence files show that Edwards thought highly of Henry Brougham, and there is a copy of A Few Doubts in the Goldsmiths' Library in London, which is inscribed from the author to him (Dorfman, 1966, p. 20).

Citation

Thompson, N.W. (2010), "Piercy Ravenstone: Tory democrat and physiocratic anti-capitalist", Allington, N.F.B. and Thompson, N.W. (Ed.) English, Irish and Subversives among the Dismal Scientists (Research in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology, Vol. 28 Part 2), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 303-327. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0743-4154(2010)000028B013