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First edition of both parts, bound up with four additional offprints (see below), with Jevons's ownership inscription "W. Stanley Jevons, Hampstead October 1877" written in black ink on a binder's blank bound before the half-title (neatly crossed through in blue ballpoint by a later owner), and with Walras's engraved carte de visite tipped in at the back of the volume, with a note in ink in his hand. Léon Walras "très souffrant d'une névrose cérébro-cardiaque qui a pris depuis neuf ou dix mois un caractère plus accentué, ne peut que remercier Monsieur Jevons de l'envoi de son dernier volume en l'assurant de son bon souvenir. Ouchy s/ Lausanne 24 juin 1882" (Léon Walras, "suffering from a cerebro-cardiac neurosis which has taken on a more accentuated character during the last nine or ten months, can only thank Mr. Jevons for sending him his latest volume, assuring him of his happy memories.") The half-title to the first item in the volume further bears the pencil note "Jevons" in another hand, suggesting that it was marked to be sent to him. In 1874, three years after Jevons and Menger but independently of them, Walras enunciated the theory of marginal utility in his Éléments d'économie politique pure. In this book he continued and refined the work inherited from his father and was successful in developing the law of general equilibrium that made him famous. The work falls into two parts: one dealing with the theory of exchange (pp. 1-208), the other (pp. 209-377) with the theory of production. "The book regards exchange as the central economic phenomenon and treats all other branches of economic study in relation to this central fact" (Batson). Walras operates with essentially the same concepts as Jevons, but he searches continuously for solutions of the most general character. Like Jevons and Menger, he bases exchange-value on utility and limitation of quantity. Following his father, he uses the term rareté, which he defines as the "dérivée de l'utilité effective par rapport à la quantité possédée". In other words, rareté is the same as marginal utility. The desire to equalize marginal utilities (according to Gossen's second law) will lead to exchange, and this desire, together with the stocks of goods possessed by each individual, will give a determinate demand or supply for each individual. This can be represented by a functional equation or by a curve. Walras was influenced by Cournot and it was probably this influence which enabled him to combine a utility theory of value with a mathematically precise theory of market equilibrium. In spite, or because, of the difficulties which he experienced in this task, Walras was increasingly led to enunciate a general, non-utilitarian theory of economic equilibrium, expressed in terms of functional equations. He is, therefore, essentially the economist's economist, rather than of the general reader or the politician. Bound after the Éléments are the following additional items, which were published together in 1877 under the collective title of Théorie mathématique de la richesse sociale. Quatre mémoires lus à l'Académie des sciences morales et politiques, à Paris, et à la Société Vaudoise des Sciences Naturelles, à Lausanne, comprising: a). Principe d'une théorie mathématique de l'échange. Mémoire lu à l'académie des sciences morales et politiques (séances des 16 et 23 août 1873)... Orléans: Ernest Colas, 1874. 24 pages & 1 folding plate. Walker 103 (separately paginated offprint). b). Correspondence. Extrait du Journal des Économistes (Numéro du 15 juin 1874). Paris: Guillaumin et Cie, Éditeurs, 1874. 8 pages. Walker 105. c). Équations de l'échange. Équations de la production. Mémoires lus à la Société Vaudoise des sciences naturelles (Séances des 1er et 15 décembre 1875, 19 janvier et 16 février 1876.) Extrait du Bulletin de la Société Vaudoise des Sciences naturelles - 2e S. Vol. XV. No. 76. Lausanne: Éd. Allenspach fils. [2], 365-430 pages. Walker 118 & 119. d). Équations de la capitalisation.[With:] "Observation". Mémoire lu à la Société Vaudoise des Sciences naturelles (Séance du 5 juillet 1876.) Extrait du Bulletin de la Soc. Vaud. des Sciences naturelles - 2e S. Vol. XV. No 77. Lausanne: L. Corbaz et Comp., 1876. [4], 525-564 pages. Walker 122. An early issue of Walras's s important four memoirs on general equilibrium theory, written in the period between the publication of parts I and II of his Éléments d'économie politique pure (1874-77), here bound together without a title page, as described by Walker (124.) "Walras insisted to his publisher that the first part [of the Éléments] appear in 1874, before the second part was completed, because he learned in May of that year that W. S. Jevons had published a mathematical theory of utility and exchange that was similar to his own... and he was anxious to establish the independence of his discoveries and his priority in regard to most of them. For these same reasons, he published four brilliantly original memoirs containing the heart of his theory of general equilibrium during 1874, 1875 and 1876, paid for the costs of publication of his books, and sent copies of them and of his articles to his many correspondents... For sheer genius and intuitive power in penetrating the veil of the chaos of immediately perceived experience and divining the underlying structure of fundamental economic relationships and their extensive interdependencies and consequences, Walras has been surpassed by no one" (New Palgrave). Provenance: From the Library of W. S. Jevons, subsequently in the collections of Lionel Robbins and Arnold Heertje. READ MORE 2 parts in one octavo volume (206 x 135 mm). Contemporary blue half calf and marbled boards, rebacked preserving the original spine, labels renewed, marbled edges. With 3 folding plates comprising 15 figures. Corners restored. Last three offprints lightly toned around edges, scattered pencil side-ruling throughout; very good copies. Batson, p. 34; Cossa 279 (171); Einaudi 5965; Mattioli 3796; Walker 106, 123, 103, 105, 118, 119, 122.

Éléments d'économie politique pure is one of Léon Walras' most significant works, serving as a foundational text in the field of economics, particularly known for its presentation of the concept of general equilibrium.