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First edition of the great economist's major contribution to economic thought, arguably his single most influential work, and the first complete presentation of the marginal utility theory of value. This copy belonged to Joseph Shield Nicholson (1850-1927), an Edinburgh economist who decisively rejected Jevons's theories. It later passed to Nicholson's pioneering student Mary Theresa Rankin (1882-1962), who taught at Edinburgh for over 30 years. Rankin continued Nicholson's work on monetary economics, a role which often put her in conflict with Keynesian theories. The University of Edinburgh awards the Mary Theresa Rankin Prize to its Honours Class in Political Economy. Jevons's Theory "sharply attacked the classical theory of value of the 'Ricardo-Mill school', and offered in its place the challenging view that 'value depends entirely upon utility', asserting boldly that 'Economy, if it is to be a science at all must be a mathematical science'... from it Jevons gained international recognition as an economic theorist" (ODNB). For Hazlitt, the Theory was "A work of epoch-making importance. John Maynard Keynes writes of it: 'The first modern book on economics, it has proved singularly attractive to all bright minds newly attacking the subject; - simple, lucid, unfaltering, chiselled in stone where Marshall knits in wool'" (p. 96). Provenance: a) Joseph Shield Nicholson, with his signature (marked "Trin. Coll, Cambridge", dating the First edition of the great economist's major contribution to economic thought, arguably his single most influential work, and the first complete presentation of the marginal utility theory of value. This copy belonged to Joseph Shield Nicholson (1850-1927), an Edinburgh economist who decisively rejected Jevons's theories. It later passed to Nicholson's pioneering student Mary Theresa Rankin (1882-1962), who taught at Edinburgh for over 30 years. Rankin continued Nicholson's work on monetary economics, a role which often put her in conflict with Keynesian theories. The University of Edinburgh awards the Mary Theresa Rankin Prize to its Honours Class in Political Economy. Jevons's Theory "sharply attacked the classical theory of value of the 'Ricardo-Mill school', and offered in its place the challenging view that 'value depends entirely upon utility', asserting boldly that 'Economy, if it is to be a science at all must be a mathematical science'... from it Jevons gained international recognition as an economic theorist" (ODNB). For Hazlitt, the Theory was "A work of epoch-making importance. John Maynard Keynes writes of it: 'The first modern book on economics, it has proved singularly attractive to all bright minds newly attacking the subject; - simple, lucid, unfaltering, chiselled in stone where Marshall knits in wool'" (p. 96). Provenance: a) Joseph Shield Nicholson, with his signature (marked "Trin. Coll, Cambridge", dating the acquisition to 1873-6, when Nicholson was a student there), on the title page. b) Mary Theresa Rankin, with her signature on the title page. READ MORE Octavo. Original brown pebble-grain cloth, spine lettered, ruled, and with publisher's device in gilt, covers panelled in blind, dark green coated endpapers. Graphs, diagrams, and formulae in the text. Infrequent pencil sidelining and annotations to contents. Minor bumping and wear, slight loss to spine head, faint toning to spine, light browning and foxing to contents, small ink stain to gutter of pp. 222-3 and 224-5: a very good copy. Batson, p. 141; Cossa, p. 254 (78); Einaudi 3070; Hazlitt, The Free Man's Library, p. 96; Menger, col. 468.