they should practise them, is as certain as that many members of society do actually so regulate their conduct as far as their limited means allow. The general effects of commerce and civilization, however, are in a great measure such as are here stated; and these effects will become more universal with every spread of morality, and of that religion which has made commerce and wealth the instruments of improving and converting, instead of degrading and corrupting, mankind.

The whole amount then of the arguments of both sides, with respect to the relative virtue and happiness of the commercial and less advanced states of society, may perhaps be reduced to this-that each has its respective tempations, differing from those of the others in quality though not in quantity or degree, considering the means bestowed for resisting them. The practice of virtue, therefore, all things considered, is equally easy or difficult in all, according to the attention which is paid to the morals of the people; and happiness being dependant upon the degree in which virtue is practised, their several chances of attaining it are equal likewise. But (as Dr. Paley, Mor. Phil. b. vi. c. ii. p. 345., finely observes) "The final view of all rational politics is to produce the greatest quantity of happiness in a given tract of country;" and we may fairly conclude that the intention of Providence is the same with respect to the world in general. It follows therefore that, with an equal proportion of happiness in the possession of individuals, the more of them there are, the nearer will that intention be to complete its fulfilment. I trust therefore that,

if it has been proved that the means ordained for replenishing the world with people are not generally attended with an increase of vice and misery, but that a moderate attention to the laws of religion and morality will prevent such an effect, it will go far towards rescuing the Divine Justice from imputations to which a contrary conclusion could scarcely fail to give rise.

It

Before we quit the third fundamental proposition, which has hitherto been the subject of discussion in this book, it may perhaps be necessary to make a short reference to the topics of liberty and security of property, which are included as conditions of that proposition. It is not my intention in any part of this treatise to enter into a minute investigation of those political blessings: they have frequently been discussed in separate treatises, and are sufficiently understood and appreciated wherever a capacity for enjoying them is found to exist; and as that capacity is of a moral nature, the enjoyment of the blessings depends more upon moral than political causes. is evident however that, as the force of my whole argument depends upon the spontaneous operations of the people, arranging themselves, selecting their occupations, and forming their habits with a view to their real interests, a reasonable degree of freedom from those restraints which are not commanded by the moral law, is absolutely necessary to the successful pursuit of their objects. Their exertions would be cramped, and their spirit broken, by any interference with individual liberty and property which is not compensated by some superior advantage to the whole community. If I were asked

what is the lowest degree of these political blessings which would prevent a community from actually receding in the career of public prosperity, I should perhaps cite the condition of the prótestant monarchies on the Continent; and I should certainly place the point far below that at which we are arrived in our own country

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CHAPTER VIII.

Application of the Fourth Principle, viz. that the salutary Tendency of Population will have its complete Operation, in proportion as Religion, Morality, rational Liberty, and Security of Property approach to the Attainment of a perfect Influence.

AN ingenious and popular French writer, who had many and peculiarly favourable opportunities of observing human nature in various ranks among the nations of Europe, has a passage to the following effect. "In argument upon political if not upon moral questions, the difficulty with men is not to combat their sincere and unbiassed opinions, which would soon be settled by reason on one side or the other. But the real difficulty is to combat with success the opinions which men pretend to hold, which they have adopted from vanity, or self-interest, or ambition; and which they have so amalgamated with their minds, as at length to be led by self-deceit into the belief that they are the sincere and honest results of their judgment.

"There is, therefore, no greater enemy to sincere and honest reasoning than self-love, and its several modifications; no greater friend to it than a gene rous enthusiasm of sentiment which is prepared to sacrifice time, talent, personal gratification, or even life itself for the good of others. But self-love is greatly interested to laugh all such self-devotion, and

therefore all true and honest reasoning, out of doors. When a gentleman says he is of such an opinion, one takes it for a delicate way of expressing that such is his interest."

Now it is much to be feared that this is but too faithful a picture of the minds of the largest portion of practical debaters on questions of politics; and the reason appears very obvious. Political questions have from the beginning of civilized society been argued exclusively upon the principle of self-interest, somewhat enlarged perhaps from its bearing upon the mere individual, but still very much disjoined from moral considerations, and from those sanctions which refer the tendency of our thoughts and actions to their effects on the whole scheme of our social and individual existence. In education especially the science of politics is carefully insulated and kept apart from that of morals. We are taught to weigh all its propositions in the mere scale of worldly interest, and a powerful association is thus formed in our minds, which it is to be feared so far from realizing the beautiful hypothesis of the poet. concerning the expansive power of self-love, is but too apt to reverse it. Self-love, instead of rising from individual to the whole, is too apt to sink from the whole to the individual.

Political economy is in an especial manner liable to this observation; for as it consists of a set of general principles, in conformity to which it is presumed to be the temporal interest of all parties to conduct themselves; it applies itself of course principally to the selfish feelings of mankind. But as no two philosophers ever agreed as to what really constitutes the temporal interest of men in the ge