122 THE TREND OF THE RACE 



a quarter of a century ago, owing to the fact that the birth rate 

 has not decreased so rapidly as the death rate. 



In all countries increase of population has sooner or later to 

 come to a standstill. For a while the surplus humanity may find 

 an outlet by emigrating into new territory. Increased means of 

 production may for a while keep pace with the growing numbers 

 of inhabitants. But in time, growth of population must bring 

 about its own check. 



While we must all recognize this fact, the "population ques- 

 tion" does not seem so portentous as it did several years ago. 

 The Malthusian doctrine, with its inevitable tendency of human- 

 ity to increase beyond the means of sustenance and its various 

 checks to increase, such as war, pestilence and famine, seemed to 

 promise little but a gloomy future of struggle and hardship for 

 the majority of mankind. It is now becoming probable, however, 

 that the automatic checks will not depend so much upon the 

 increase of the death rate as the decrease of the birth rate. There 

 is no longer ground for fearing the scourges that seemed to be the 

 inevitable consequence of a natural law of propagation. There is 

 perhaps more reason to be apprehensive lest the race should fail 

 to reproduce itself. 



For most countries there is no immediate danger of race suicide, 

 although it may very well happen that we shall need to be 

 seriously concerned in the future over this possibility. The 

 birth rate in some countries has shown a continually accelerating 

 descent. In Germany during the first ten years of the 2oth cen- 

 tury the birth rate fell more than in the preceding thirty. The 

 decline has been especially rapid in the cities, the fall in Berlin 

 being more rapid than the fall of the death rate. 



Notwithstanding the rapid increase in the population of 

 Germany, there are several German writers who have already 

 sounded the note of alarm lest the rapidly falling birth rate prove 

 a serious menace to the welfare of the empire. As Borntrager has 

 remarked, "The ever more rapid and more intensive an4 exten- 

 sive decline in the birth rate which has been deliberately brought 

 about in Germany, is one of the most threatening occurrences of 



