POPULATION POOR-LAWS LIFE-ASSURANCE. 



preventive check to population.' The countries 

 * most distinguished for the smallness of their 

 mortality, and the operation of the prudential 

 restraint on marriage, may be compared to advan- 

 tage with other countries, not only with regard to 

 the general moral worth and respectability of their 

 inhabitants, but with regard to the virtues which 

 relate to the intercourse of the sexes. We cannot,' 

 as Malthus justly observes, ' estimate with toler- 

 able accuracy the degree in which chastity in the 

 single state prevails : our general conclusions 

 must be founded on general results ; and these 

 are clearly in our favour. 



'We appear, therefore, to be all along borne 

 out by experience and observation, both in our 

 premises dnd conclusions. From what we see 

 and know, indeed, we cannot rationally expect 

 that the passions of man will ever be so com- 

 pletely subjected to his reason, as to enable him 

 to avoid all the moral and physical evils which 

 depend upon his own conduct. But this is merely 

 saying that perfect virtue is not to be expected 

 on earth, an assertion by no means new, or pecu- 

 liarly applicable to the present discussion. The 

 differences observable in different nations, in the 

 pressure of the evils resulting from the tendency 

 of the human race to increase faster than the 

 means of subsistence, entitle us fairly to conclude, 

 that those which are in the best state are still 

 susceptible of considerable improvement, and 

 that the worst may at least be made equal to the 

 best. This is surely sufficient both to animate 

 and to direct our exertions in the cause of human 

 happiness ; and the direction which our efforts 

 will receive, from thus turning our attention to 

 the laws that relate to the increase and decrease 

 of mankind, and seeing their effects exemplified 

 in the state of the different nations around us, 

 will not be into any new and suspicious path, but 

 into the plain beaten track of morality. It will 

 be our duty to exert ourselves to procure the 

 establishment of just and equal laws, which 

 protect and give respectability to the lowest 

 subject, and secure to each member of the com- 

 munity the fruits of his industry ; to extend the 

 benefits of education as widely as possible, that 

 to the long list of errors from passion, may not 

 be added the still longer list of errors from ignor- 

 ance ; and in general, to discourage indolence, 

 improvidence, and a blind indulgence of appetite 

 without regard to consequences ; and to encourage 

 industry, prudence, and the subjection of the 

 passions to the dictates of reason. The only 

 change, if change it can be called, which the 

 study of the laws of population can make in our 

 duties is, that it will lead us to apply, more 

 steadily than we have hitherto done, the great 

 rules of morality to the case of marriage and 

 the direction of our charity ; but the rules them- 

 selves, and the foundations on which they rest, 

 of course remain exactly where they were 

 before.' 



This must be considered as the mildest possible 

 exposition of the application of Malthus's doc- 

 trines : his theory almost necessarily led to some 

 other practical inferences, of a kind to which 

 it is not so easy for a humane mind to assent. It 

 came to be held, for instance, that where the 

 preventive check had not operated, it was quite 

 legitimate to allow the positive to come into 

 operation, even when in the power of society 



to arrest it. A . human being, who had come 

 into existence undemanded by the state of the 

 funds for subsistence, was to be told that the 

 places at Nature's table were all occupied, and 

 there was no cover for him. To the man who 

 married when there was a redundancy of popula- 

 tion, ' all parish assistance,' said Malthus, ' should 

 be most rigidly denied; and if the hand of 

 private charity be stretched forth for his relief, 

 the interests of humanity imperiously require that 

 it should be administered very sparingly.' These 

 stern principles were adopted very generally by 

 a class of political economists, and for twenty 

 years they exercised no small influence in 

 England, where the notorious abuses of the old 

 poor-law had prepared the minds of many for 

 extreme views with regard to public charity. 



OBJECTIONS TO THE MALTHUSIAN THEORY. 



A reaction at length took place against the 

 Malthusian theory, and views having an opposite 

 tendency were presented by various writers, the 

 most distinguished of whom was Mr M. T. Sadler, 

 whose work, entitled The Law of Population, 

 appeared in 1830. By these writers, it was repre- 

 sented that in America and the Australian colonies 

 there is an evident tendency in subsistence to 

 increase in a more rapid ratio than population, 

 insomuch that flocks and herds become a drug. 

 The only difficulty experienced in those regions 

 is in obtaining a market for the vast amotint of 

 produce not needed by the native population. 

 Here, it was said, is a clear case in disproof of 

 the proposition, that population always tends to 

 increase more rapidly than food. 



As for the geometric ratio of human increase, it 

 was said that, if the human family follows this 

 ratio of increase, so do all the orders of organic 

 beings, animal and vegetable; sheep and oxen 

 increase at the geometric ratio as well as man- 

 kind, and what is more, they begin to multiply at 

 a much earlier period of life. Poultry, for instance, 

 could probably multiply themselves a million of 

 times before a couple of the human race could do 

 so once. The vegetable food of man is capable 

 of a still more rapid increase. Wheat generally 

 returns from ten to twenty fold in one year. The 

 produce of a single acre of this grain, increased 

 year after year in the ordinary way, would require 

 only fourteen years to reach an amount which 

 would occupy the whole cultivable surface of the 

 globe. And as it is with wheat, so is it with most 

 of the other plants on which we depend for food, 

 either for ourselves or for the animals which 

 become food to us. So that, instead of their 

 being any such disagreement between the natural 

 possibilities of increase in human beings and sub- 

 sistence, as Malthus and his disciples insist on, 

 there would appear to be a discrepancy in exactly 

 the contrary way ; that is to say, the means of 

 subsistence appear to be capable of a much more 

 rapid increase than human beings. (In this argu- 

 ment, the anti-Malthusians overlook the fact that 

 only a tithe of each crop of grain or brood of 

 poultry is left to breed, the rest being in the mean- 

 time used as food.) 



But the Malthusians object when the best 

 soils are all under cultivation, it is necessary to 

 resort to the inferior. These require more labour, 

 and afford less return. There is, therefore, a 



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