■Annual Report. 329 



copulation, or tlie medium duration of life in it, so as to mark 

 and determine the influence exercised upon these by the cir- 

 cumstances of the people and by the variations which their 

 condition is rapidly undergoing. It should surely be kept in 

 mind that no statistical experiment of a character more ma- 

 jestic and extensive has perhaps ever been made, than that 

 now proceeding in the British colonies, by the abolition of 

 slavery. It is an effort of political strength, which, for its 

 magnitude and promise of great results, is worthy to consoli- 

 date such an empire. It brings all within the compass of one 

 peculiar distinction of lofty moral character and abounding 

 resources ; and, as to its many economic results, ought to be 

 studied every where with close and uninterrupted attention. 

 It seems likely to afford an instantia cruets, as to some interest- 

 ing controversies in political economy. No country, perhaps, 

 ever received in so short a period so great an extension of 

 Capital as this Colony is about to experience, and the result 

 therefore cannot fail to have some effect in deciding the cele- 

 brated question — whether the profits of capital vary only with 

 its abundance, or have their measure determined by the quality 

 of the lg,nd which the circumstances of society retains in cul- 

 tivation. 



It should then throw some light on the influence exercised by 

 change of circumstances, upon the condition and duration of 

 life, upon our knowledge of which, it is now seen, every 

 estimate of the prosperity and strength of a people ought to 

 depend. A nation's resources ought to be estimated not 

 according to the number of people it can muster, but accord- 

 ing to the strength of its united mass ; and the efficiency of a 

 population arises not from the number of human beings in it, 

 but from the number of beings of matured strength; or their 

 comparative power should be reckoned in some ratio, com- 

 pounded of their number and the duration of their life ; hence 

 the necessity and advantage of accuracy and minuteness in re- 

 cording the changes which time produces on the numbers 

 ushered into life, and hence is it seen, that a country may ad- 

 vance in population, though the annual number introduced into 

 it be stationary, by the increase of the life of each ; and the 

 wealth and comfort of a society may be estimated from the 

 number which remain alive at the maturer years of life. 



The result of the great introduction of capital will be also an 

 interesting object of observation ; but it is not easy to estimate 

 either the exact kind or amount of its influence. It will affect 

 considerably trade, property, and population. Wealth cannot 

 leave a country except in the shape of the things it contains or 

 produces, and though there may be intermediate exchanges be- 

 twixt its transaction of bestowing and the transaction of an- 

 other in receiving, the end is simply the deposition of property 

 pf some sort or other in the object of its bounty. It must be 



