nature for the political conduct of states and the private conduct of individuals. Now with respect to the works of others; Plato, Aristotle, Montesquieu, Mr. Townshend, and other writers, who seem to have believed in the natural tendency of population towards a too rapid increase, either state the fact incidentally, to illustrate some partial phenomena in society, or draw their conclusions from a very confined view of it under an imperfect administration, where slavery, ignorance, or tyranny, evidently checked the industry of the people, and forcibly diverted the progress of society from its natural course. Even the state of society in the boasted republics of ancient Greece cannot be exonerated from some part of this imputation; and those of Spain and France were too palpably open to it. Observations, therefore, with respect to the vice and misery arising from the difficulty of procuring subsistence, drawn from the view of those countries, seem only to prove that they had not yet adopted that system of polity for the government of the mass of their inhabitants, which is consistent with the views and ordinations of Providence. With respect to the philosophical statement of the subject it appears to be defective in one of its main branches -the statement of the natural tendency of population to increase. The historical references appear to have been made (as Mr. Malthus indeed in his preface seems partly to admit) with a mind predisposed to the theory with which it was impressed, and professedly in search of facts to corroborate it: and the practical inferences (as far as they rest upon the peculiar arguments arising out of the principle of population) seem not to be borne out by the premises;

can in no case be justifiably acted upon; and are very evidently inapplicable to the advanced stages of society in a free and extensive Christian country, being calculated rather to check it's progress in wealth and happiness than to promote it.

If any success attend my efforts to establish the principles laid down at the commencement of the following chapter, it is probable that each of the preceding propositions will also be made out in the course of the argument. In the mean time I venture to suggest, as a further preparation of the reader's mind for the fair discussion of them, that the origin of what are conceived to be the mistakes and false reasonings, with respect to the principle of population, appears to be the assumption of a tendency to increase in the human species, the quickest that can be proved possible in any particular state of society, as that which is natural and theoretically possible in all; and the characterising of every cause which tends to prevent such quickest possible rate, as checks to the natural and spontaneous tendency of population to increase; but as checks evidently insufficient to stem the progress of an overwhelming torrent. This seems as eligible a mode of reasoning, as if one were to assume the height of the Irish giant as the natural standard of the stature of man, and to call every reason which may be suggested as likely to prevent the generality of men from reaching it, checks upon their growth. The natural and spontaneous tendency of the principle of population in distinct states of society varies its rate with every difference in their political condition; it is no more the same in the manufacturing, as it is in the agricultural, or in this as in the pastoral states of society, than the natural

C

growth of an oak on a mountain top in Scotland is the same as it would be in the rich valleys of the New Forest. But the term check of course implies the prevention of that which would otherwise naturally take place; it is, therefore, very incorrectly applied to denote a relative difference, invariably fixed by the primary laws of nature, and the immutable decrees of Providence. From the deception caused by the wrong use of this term, we find writers supporting such positions as the following: "civilization does not weaken the principle of population;" (Monthly Review, June 1807, p. 137:) again, "assuming a peopled portion of the earth, there is a point at which it's produce would be a maximum ; there is no point, however, at which the people upon it, however numerous, might not under advantageous circumstances go on increasing without number. Besides, while the soil is still capable of increasing its produce, yet if it be approaching somewhere near the limit of its capacity, the increase of its produce cannot possibly keep pace with the natural, or rather the possible, increase of the population upon it." (Christian Observer, July 1807, p. 452.)

These are, in truth, but natural corollaries from Mr. Malthus's premises, who asserts of population, "that a thousand millions are just as easily doubled EVERY twenty-five years as a thousand," and "population, could it be supplied with food, would go on with unexhausted vigour; and the increase of one period would furnish the power of a greater increase the next, and this without any limit." (Malthus, vol. i. p. 8.) And again, "it is not the question in England, whether by cultivating all our commons

we could raise considerably more corn than at present, but whether we could raise sufficient for a population of twenty millions in the next twentyfive years, and forty millions in the next fifty years; as if it were possible, that the people of England, one third of whom are asserted by this very writer to live in towns, and consequently not generally to keep up their own numbers,† could by any possible means increase so fast as to double their total amount in twenty-five years; which is assumed as the quickest possible rate in the agricultural state of society, where the employment and situation of the people is most favourable to population. After these passages, however, we cannot be surprised at the opinions which they have engendered, or that another writer‡ should state, that "the greater part of those reasoners, who are in the habit of misunderstanding and misrepresenting Mr. Malthus, would have some chance of attaining clearer views on the subject of population, if they would attend to the very simple proposition from which his doctrines are deduced; namely, that the human race have a tendency to increase faster than food can be provided for them." Mr. Malthus, in his Essay, does certainly intend to convey that idea. I cannot but think, however, that those reasoners who wish clearly to under

* See Malthus, book iii. c. 11. p. 222. vol. ii.

+ See Malthus, book ii. c. 7. The passage is as follows: "to fill up the void occasioned by this mortality in towns, and to answer all further demands for population, it is evident that a constant supply of recruits from the country is necessary; and this supply appears, in fact, to be always flowing in from the redundant births of the country." (Vol. i. p. 464.)

Edinburgh Review, vol. xi. p. 102.

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stand, and fairly to represent, the principle of population, would have a better chance of obtaining their end, if, instead of blindly acquiescing in these assumed data, they proceed to inquire into the degree in which the principle of population naturally and really operates in the several stages of society. They will find this to be very distinct from its assumed possible" operation, and in most cases to be very far from having a necessary tendency "to push the number of people beyond the point at which food can be acquired for them." This is a broad and distinct difference in principle, which it is the object of this first book to make out to the satisfaction of my readers. It is hoped that the proof of the propositions assumed in the following chapter will lead to a full and fair establishment of the truth. The object of the following books will then be to show the conse quences which may fairly be deduced from the propositions thus established.