But these fallacies have lived longer and have spread over more of the earth's surface than any one _a priori_ could have believed possible.

It is sometimes useful, in opposing doctrines which people have been taught to believe are peculiar to their own country and time, to show that the same doctrines have been maintained in other countries and times, and have been exploded in other languages.
By what misuse of words the doctrine of Protection came to be denominated the "American System," I could never understand.

It prevailed in England nearly two hundred years before our separation from the mother country.

Adam Smith directed the first formidable attack against it in the very year that our independence was declared.

It held its ground in England until it had starved and ruined almost every branch of industry--agriculture, manufactures, and commerce alike.[4] It was not wholly overthrown until 1846, the same year that witnessed its discomfiture in the United States, as already shown.