ABSTRACT
T HE object of the preceding chapter was to place the organization with which this book is concerned in its general relations with the industrial system and to indicate the indirect economies to which it gives rise by
its influence on the organic growth of the system. We have now to come to closer quarters with the subject in order to show what agencies and institutions are included in this organization; to express more definitely the nature of those direct economies which it produces, and with which alone we are henceforward concerned; and, finally, to establish leading ideas in the light of which these economies are to be examined.
