ABSTRACT
In the recently recovered Preface to the French edition of The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money Keynes refers to Baron de Montesquieu as the greatest French economist. Montesquieu was not an economist per se, and his reflections on economic problems, though penetrating, were often a collection of fortuitous explanations and observations regarding the wealth of nations in practice. For Montesquieu agriculture, industry, and commerce are all equally significant fountains of wealth. Agriculture produces "essentialities", and is featured prominently in Montesquieu's view of the crux of economic pragmatism. Montesquieu was so convinced that in the absence of free entrepreneurial activity economic welfare comes very near to being impossible that he came to put greater emphasis on entrepreneurial açtivity than on saving per se. The chapter focuses on some of Montesquieu's observations on the rate of interest which so delighted Keynes–a delight most evident in the French Preface.
