It is as if Arago attempted to show the harmony of planetary movements to people who had no clue about numeracy.

Frédéric Bastiat
Complete Works, Volume 7, pages 436 to 437 (in French)
July 14th, 1849

The Complete Works end with eight letters to Prosper Paillotet, of which here is the first one. He was then working on the Economic Harmonies and was struggling to move on satisfactorily.

Today’s quote conveys his frustration. Indeed, if Frédéric Bastiat is famous for his Economic Sophisms, it is because ignorance, or even worse, misunderstanding towards economics were as important in the first half of the 19th century as they are nowadays. Frédéric Bastiat adressed the Economic Harmonies to the youth of France – he was not attempting to convince economists but the general population indeed. The issue is that when one attempts to reach the general public, it is necessary to convey complex concepts in a simple language – this is the difficulty he is lamenting about to his friend here.