Inquiry into the Principles of National Wealth (Reprints of economic classics)

Rooke was the first writer to lay down the rules of marginal cost as a universal principle, came closer than other writers to the correct distinction between profits and interest, and pointed out the mistake of speaking of a general rate of profits as a return for capital. Rooke also provided acute criticism of of the historical portion of the Ricardian theory of rent as well as of Ricardo's neglect of temporary and incidental (as opposed to permanent and abstract) causes in the settlement of the money problem. Rooke's entire work is based on the "fundamental proposition that the formation of capital is continually accumulating new stores of wealth, and thereby, cheapening the means of living." E.R.A. Seligman "On Some Neglected British Economists"