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According to Alfred Marshall, the element of time is the most important and difficult aspect to deal with in the economic analysis. Accordingly, he has placed the concept of time at the core of his economic reasoning, and he has developed a number of analytical tools that allow including time in his analytical framework: most notably, the cœteris paribus pound, the representative firm, and the distinction between short and long periods. However, he encountered an insurmountable impasse when dealing with the real elapsing of time in his static framework: the solution proposed in his Principles of Economics remained, for him, highly unsatisfactory, problematic, and incomplete. The real elapsing of time—unavoidable in his reflections—copes very badly indeed with his analytical construction based on equilibrium. The continuity of time is the element of the Marshallian analysis most quickly criticized and rejected. After him, in the economic analysis, time gradation was rigorously divided into "short" and "long" periods, whereas Marshall's concerns for the continuity of real time were banished from what was considered a "rigorous" analysis. The main aims of this paper are to frame Marshall's distinction between short and long periods and to underline those aspects of his contribution that were lost or were substantially simplified in later literature.

For a long time, Marshall's chief contribution to economic science was considered to be Book V ofPrinciples of Economics, which is the "analytic core" of his thought. Book V, "General Relations of Demand, Supply and Value," deals with the important theme of economic equilibrium thatipso factorules out any possibility of coping with economic development. When Alfred Marshall describes Book V, he points out that "it is not descriptive, nor does it deal constructively with real problems. But it sets out the theoreticalbackboneof our knowledge of the causes that govern value" (1961, vol. 1, p. 324); in short, it "deals with abstractions" (1898, p. 52). The existence of Book V has been supposed by some scholars to be sound enough proof that Alfred Marshall was not interested in the question of economic development. More recently, however, it has been suggested that one of the main Marshallian concerns was economic development,—"the high theme of economic progress," as he called it (Marshall 1961, vol. 1, p. 461).

This text presents Alfred Marshalls final, unfinished, and unpublished book. His main volume, Principles of Economics, was first published in 1890, and was, for a long period of time, the textbook par excellence on which generations of economists were trained. Despite its success and its importance, the book, in its eight editions, testifies to some extent to the failure of Marshalls original editorial project which should have consisted of multiple volumes and culminated with the publication of a final work on economic progress. Marshalls death in 1924 made it impossible to realize his project, but many notes written for it have survived. These notes, collected here, constitute a fundamental element in fully understanding the thought and perspectives of this great economist and in appreciating his great modernity and wisdom. --

Foreword -- Part One: Revisiting Marshall's Economics -- 1. Alfred Marshall in the Lower Valdarno -- 2. The organization of knowledge and knowledge as organization -- 3.Raffaelli on historical progress in Smith and in Marshall -- 4. Marshall's external economies. Economic evolution and patterns of development -- 5.Economic, Ethical and Political Aspects of Wellbeing. Marshallian Insights from his Book on Progress -- 6. Jevons and Marshall as Humboldtian scientists -- 7. Utilitarianism, the Moral Sciences, and Political Economy -- Part Two: Marshall's Influence Through the 20th Century -- 8. Destabilizing speculation on organized markets. Early perspectives in the spirit of Marshall -- 9. Industrial leadership, market power and long-term performance. Marshall's and Keynes's appreciation of American trusts -- 10. Between LSE and Cambridge. Accounting for Ronald Coase's fascination with Alfred Marshall -- 11. "A great economist" and "a careful empiricist". Paul Samuelson's attitude towards Alfred Marshall.