This book contains the five important pamphlets published by Ricardo, as selected by E. C. K. Gonner. The five pamphlets are writings of great importance, because both of the subjects with which they deal and of the principles laid down in their treatment of those subjects. ..".I feel that the trend of economic thought and the new importance attached to economic inquiry make more valuable than ever the study of a writer whose attitude was so disinterested and who, despite his shortcomings, sought in all he wrote, on the one hand to elucidate facts by reference to principles and on the other hand to build up out of the data at his command a system of coherent thought." - E. C. K. Gonner