In this and the following chapter, I trace the evolution of Ricardo's treatment of value from 1815 to 1823. The present chapter proceeds as follows.

In the first section I reconstruct the stages in Ricardo's thinking on ‘value’ – encompassing his adoption of the ‘pure’ labour theory and his subsequent development of the ‘curious effect’ – as he struggled to compose the Principles. Then, in the second section, I critically evaluate the published outcome of his deliberations. In the third section I consider, in turn, Ricardo's correspondence on ‘value’ in the interval between the first two editions of the Principles, his debate with Robert Torrens, which ultimately led to the adoption of a ‘dated labour’ analysis, and the significance of the revisions to the chapter ‘On Value’ in the second edition of his major work. An interim conclusion completes the chapter.

BEFORE THE PRINCIPLES

In August 1815, James Mill genially threatened Ricardo with ‘no rest, till you are plunged over head and ears in political economy’ (vi, p. 252). Two years later the Principles was published but, for Ricardo, authorship was to be an uphill struggle. Some of his difficulties were immediately communicated to Mill. There was his ‘disinclination to write’, the ‘visits of friends [which] make great encroachments on my time’, and ‘the temptation of being out in the air in fine weather’ (30 August 1815, vi, pp. 262–3). Mill was unimpressed. In October, he requested ‘some account of the progress you have been making in your book’ (10 October 1815, vi, p. 309).