FERTILITY 149 



because a practice can be so described, therefore it is to be 

 condemned as being ethically wrong. A very little consideration 

 should be sufficient to convince one of the error of this view. We 

 have only to remember the fundamental antagonism between the 

 ethical process and the cosmic process, as Huxley called them — 

 an antagonism which has been the theme of some of the world's 

 greatest writers. Moreover, as Huxley observed, it is the duty 

 of man to struggle constantly " to maintain and improve, in 

 opposition to the state of Natm'e, the state of Art of an 

 organised polity," and in order successfully to accomplish this 

 it may be necessary for him to forego the right to multiply even 

 as he has already foregone the right to murder or to steal. 



The problem of population which Malthus first revealed is 

 still far from being solved. For although Malthus obtained many 

 adherents, and political economists have never quite lost sight 

 of the essential truths which he expounded with such relentless 

 logic, the great scientific discoveries of the Victorian period 

 and their practical application, and the remarkable industrial 

 development which consequently ensued, led to his views being 

 neglected or discredited both by men of learning and by the 

 public at large. It is improbable, however, that in a f idler world 

 a period of industrial expansion like that of the nineteenth 

 century can ever occur again, and in any case the available means 

 of subsistence must eventually set a limit to map's increase upon 

 the earth. 



The problem is full of difficulty, but it has to be faced, even 

 though it arouse acute social prejudices and involve serious 

 international complications. Within a particular country it is 

 sometimes regarded as a national question, and the raising of the 

 birth-rate is enjoined as a duty in order that that country may 

 take its proper place in the woHd. This view, if carried to its 

 logical conclusion, can only lead to discord and disaster, as 

 indeed it has already done in the past, and in our opinion a 

 race for population between the nations is as deplorable as a 

 race for armaments. 



The solution of the difficulty is sometimes sought in emigra- 

 tion, but this, as Keynes says, " is only an expensive palliative. 

 Indeed, the problem of population is going to be not merely an 

 economist's problem, but in the near future the greatest of all 



