1824.] 



On Mr. Malthus'8 Pr 



TliG quantity of contraction near the 

 fire should (Mr, T. says,) be about the 

 same as at the chimney- top ; that is, they 

 should nearly correspond in area, butall 

 abrupt changes of form in the chimney 

 itself should be avuided : tlic chimney 

 throat, or part near above the grate, 

 sh<ial(l not be of greater width than the 

 length of the grale-bars, and so situated, 

 that the smoke may rise nearly in a per- 

 pendicular direction. 



In assigning proportions for the grates 

 of difi'crent sized rooms, Mr. Tredgold 

 Il-js not been able to avail himself of 

 general principles, such as arc applied 

 with ingeimily and effect in every other 

 part of his Treatise ; but, proccctling 

 entirely bom observation, he has given 

 ancmpyrical Rule, which lam anxious 

 to submit to your readers,, in order to 

 request, that any of tliose who may take 

 the trouble to measure several rooms 

 and their fire-grates, where such are 

 found to afford agreeable warmth, would 

 send you their average and extreme 

 dimensions, and the number of such, in 

 onler to a confirmation, or else a cor- 

 rection, of Mr. T.'s Rule, which is as 

 follows, p. 228, viz. 



If the length of the front of the grate be 

 made one inch for each toot in length of 

 the room ; and the depth (height) of the 

 front be lialf an inch, for each foot in 

 breadtli of the room, the proportions will be 

 found tolerably near the truth, in the 

 cases usually occurring in practice. If 

 the length of the room be such, as requires 

 the grate to be longer than 2| feet, two 

 fire-places will be necessary: and, in that 

 case, the same proportions may be 

 adopted, divided into two grates: unless 

 the room be very wide, when a greater 

 length should be given and less depth, so 

 as to preserve an equivalent area. 



In your 40th volume, p. 428, you 

 gave an account of a great improvement 

 likely to be effected, as to diminishing 

 llie smoke of London by the general in- 

 troduction of Cutler's patent grates: 

 that, alas, was frustrated, by the grate- 

 makers having combined and made a 

 common purse, by the weight of which, 

 rather than by fair legal proceedings, as 

 is said, Mr. C.'s patent was declaied to 

 have been, in part, for an old iiivenlioti, 

 or else was insulficiently described, I 

 have forgot which, anil was repealed ; 

 since which Mr. C. has, iu disgust, 

 ceased to make them, and I cannot learn 

 that any of those who caused tlie repeal 

 of the patent have made them, as they 

 pretended was their object ; which cir- 

 cumstances I much regret, from having 

 conslanllj/ used one of llicse grates ever 



inciple of Population. 485 



since they came out in 1815, and found 

 it almost entirely to prevent smoke, or 

 the accumulation of soot in the chimney ; 

 affording us, after an early hour in the 

 forenoon, a ciieerful fire, which is always 

 red and glowing on the top, because 

 requiring no fresh coals to be lieapeil 

 upon it during the whole length of a 

 winter's day and evening. O. H..', 



To the Editor of the Mmithly Magazine. 



SIR, 



ITHOUT adverting to the ex- 

 cessive extravagance of Mr. 

 Malthus's first " Essay on the Principle 

 of Pof)ulation," which tiie author has 

 acknowledged by his subsequent eva- 

 sions, additions, and subtractions, — still 

 the Essay is a medley of error, for he 

 holds that population is universally 

 pressing against the means of subsist- 

 ence, when the means of subsistence, 

 directly and indirectly, by the com- 

 mercial code and by corn laws, arc 

 removed from, or prohibited to, the peo- 

 ple. Nor is he less hostile to himself, 

 theologically; for he has adventured to 

 justify Providence in his scheme of phi- 

 losophy, though he asserts that moral 

 restraint has had hitherto little effect in 

 checking population, and that he has 

 little hope of its being more operative 

 hereafter. This is to preach sin without 

 the redeeming sacrifice, and to justify 

 God by showing that man is, lias been, 

 and must be, miserable, breeding and 

 famishing through endless duration. 



How devout men could entertain this 

 doctrine, is extraordinary. No doubt 

 many of them delight in hearing and 

 brooding over denunciations, that, to 

 others, are least pleasing; no doubt 

 many enjoy a tale of terror, (which I 

 believe Mr. Ensor lias omitted in enu- 

 merating the causes for Mr. Malthus's 

 reception,) which discomforts them 

 w aking and sleeping ; but how any man, 

 believing that God is as he is repre- 

 sented, and yet that he should create an 

 animal the paragon of all living beings, 

 wlio ever has, and ever will be, pressing 

 against the means of subsistence; that 

 is, breeding and starving, — mocks all 

 supposition. Can it bo said that God is 

 good, or man rational, and credit this 

 doctrine ? Why, under such a dispensa- 

 tion, man suffers Priuli's curse, — " Get 

 brats and starve." 



Neither is it much less intelligible by 

 what perversion of intellect, men, who 

 adopt the popular side in politics, can 

 countenance such a theory. The aristo- 

 cracy, who call all those not of their 

 I class — 



