Actual State of the British Empire, 153 



Providence ? Do we not wilfully retard, if we do not studiously 

 promote the great scheme of creation, if we omit to furnish 

 inhabitants wherever the means of sustenance are found ? 

 Does it not indicate some gross defects in human contrivance, 

 when we contentedly labour under the dreadful ills of a redun- 

 dant population, at the time when the greatest part of the 

 habitable globe is wasting its annual produce in the desert air? 



But projects of emigration on a large scale, it will be said, 

 would entail on governments such an intolerable expense, that 

 no nation would be willing to endure it. It is lamentable that 

 the imbecilities of human management should thus encounter 

 us at every turn. What an inconsiderable part of the sums 

 habitually wasted in the pursuits of national ambition or resent- 

 ment, would gradually people all the wilds of America and 

 Africa ! But as these diseases of our nature are, perhaps, to 

 be reckoned amongst those which are the most desperate and 

 incurable, it would not be wise to found any scheme of exten- 

 sive good on the prospect of their removal. There is no need 

 to reckon on any such chance of improvement in public affairs. 

 Under the actual circumstances of the European nations, the 

 means of carrying off their superfluous population might be 

 provided without any sensible addition to their public burthens. 



But the horns of Mr. Malthus's dilemma encounter us on 

 every side. Supposing, what he is far from admitting, that all 

 the herculean difficulties of this scheme of emigration could be 

 finally surmounted, you only remove the evil for a century or 

 two. It then returns upon you with more force than ever, 

 because it is universal and illimitable. It is undoubtedly true^ 

 that the enemy, though defeated, is not destroyed : though 

 driven from the field at present, it is only to recover strength 

 for another struggle. But admitting this, we obtain, at all 

 events, an indefinite postponement of the mischief; and when 

 at last it actually approaches, and the world is completely filled, 

 it will then be time enough to debate on the application of 

 hazardous or desperate remedies. May we not hope that the 

 same Providence, which gave to the fructifying power of man 

 its superabundant energy, will provide in the progress of human 

 civilization some remedy for its excesses. As this progress, 

 when once in activity, proceeds with an accelerated motion, we 



