70 



POLITICAL ECONOMY. 



Political should not even be hastened, that the salvation of the 

 Economy. state may yet be attempted. There remains no chance 

 ^~~Y~~*' to shield the whole subjects of the state from ruin; but 

 if the creditors are allowed to perish first, perhaps the 

 debtors will escape ; if the debtors perish from penury, 

 with them will be extinguished the last hope of the cre- 

 ditors, who must soon perish in their turn. 



CHAP. VII. 

 OF POPULATION. 



Population. WE have defined political economy, as being the in- 

 vestigation of the means, by which the greatest number 

 of men in a given state may participate in the highest 

 degree of physical happiness, so far as it depends on 

 government. Two elements, indeed, must always be 

 received in connexion by the legislature ; the increase 

 of happiness in intensity, and the diffusion of it 

 among all classes of subjects. It is thus that political 

 economy, on a great scale, becomes. the theory of bene- 

 ficence ; and that every thing which does not in the 

 long run concern the happiness of men belongs not to 

 this science. 



The human race, originating in a single family, has 

 multiplied, and spread itself by degrees over the globe ; 

 and much time was of course required, before it could 

 be adjusted to the means of subsistence, which differ- 

 ent parts of this globe are capable of supplying. We 

 see this work of nature repeated in new countries, or in 

 a colony established in a desert region. A state which 

 passes from barbarism to a higher stage of civiliza- 

 tion, cannot all on a sudden become covered with as 

 many inhabitants as it may comfortably support : as 

 the earth has been wasted several times ; as the greater 

 part of its provinces have been by turns plunged into 

 a state of desolation, to arise from it slowly afterwards, 

 we have often had the opportunity of witnessing this 

 spectacle of a growing population. We are accustomed 

 to consider it as the mark of prosperity and good go- 

 vernment ; and hence our law and constitution all tend 

 to favour this increase, though to increase the symptoms 

 of prosperity is very different from increasing prospe- 

 rity itself. 



Nature has attended to the multiplication of races 

 with a kind of profusion. Although that of man is 

 among the slowest in its progress, it may increase 

 when all circumstances are favourable, far more quick- 

 ly than any of our observations indicate. When every 

 man has a great interest in bringing up a family, and 

 has the means of doing so ; when all marry, and all 

 as young as nature permits ; when they continue to 

 have children till the approaches of old age, their pos- 

 terity increases so as very quickly to occupy all the al- 

 lotted space. In several countries, in consequence of 

 the social organization, not above a fourth part of the 

 individuals marry ; the rest grow old in celibacy. Yet 

 this fourth is of itself sufficient to keep up the popula- 

 tion at the same level. If their brothers and sisters 

 could also marry with the same advantage, the popu- 

 lation would be quadrupled in a single generation. 



Thus, every nation very soon arrives at the degree of 

 population which it can attain without changing its so- 

 cial institutions. It soon arrives at counting as many 

 individuals as it can maintain with a revenue s'o limit- 

 ed, and so distributed. If a great transient calamity, a 

 war, a pestilence, a famine, have left a great void in 

 the population, should those events be followed by a 

 period of general security and comfort, this renewing 



power of human generation is speedily developed ; and Political 

 an observer is astonished to see how few years are re- Economy, 

 quired to obliterate all traces of a scourge, which seemed N<p "Y""" 1 ' 

 to have unpeopled the earth. But, on the other hand, 

 so soon as this term has been reached, a greater increase 

 of the population is a national calamity; the earth 

 soon consumes those whom it cannot feed. The more 

 numerous births are, the more will mortality display its 

 ravages, to maintain constantly the same level; and this 

 mortality, the effect of misery and suffering, is preceded 

 by the lengthened punishment, not of those who perish 

 only, but of those who have struggled with them for 

 existence. 



In every country, it is essential to know well those 

 different periods of increase, of stagnation and decline, 

 in order to adapt the laws, and all social institutions, 

 to the circumstances ; and not, as has too frequently 

 been done, to hasten, with all our efforts, the destruction 

 we ought most to fear. 



So long as a great part of the country is uncultivated; 

 as land proper for liberally rewarding rural labour is 

 covered only with spontaneous production ; as even the 

 part under tillage is imperfectly worked ; as the soil is 

 not rendered healthy, the marshes drained, the hills 

 protected against precipitations, the fields defended 

 against the ruinous force of nature ; so long as all this 

 is not done merely for want of hands, -it is desirable 

 for the happiness of agriculturists, and for that of the 

 nation living on their labour, that the class of cultivators 

 should be increased, and enabled to accomplish the task 

 reserved for them. 



So long as the objects produced by the industrious arts 

 are imperfectly supplied to the consumer, or at least as 

 he cannot procure them except by a sacrifice quite dis- 

 proportionate to their value ; so long as he is constrained 

 to furnish himself coarsely by domestic industry, for 

 want of opportunity to buy furniture, effects, clothes, 

 proper for his use ; so long as his enjoyments are re- 

 stricted by the inconveniences of all the utensils with 

 which he is obliged to content himself, it is desirable 

 that the manufacturing population increase; since, 

 from the need there is of such a population, it might 

 evidently live in comfort, and contribute to the en- 

 joyment of other classes. 



So long as all hands are in such a degree necessary 

 for agriculture, and manufactures, or trade which serves 

 them, that the guardian professions, equally useful to 

 society, are badly filled up,' it is desirable that popu- 

 lation continue to increase, that so interior order, secu- 

 rity of person and property, may be better protected, 

 health better attended to, the soul better nourished, the 

 mind more enlightened ; and that society may be ex- 

 ternally defended with sufficient force, comprehending 

 even the rapid recruitment of a sea or land army, 

 which consume population. 



This population, indeed, whenever it is required, 

 will quickly be replaced. But it is not enough that it 

 be replaced, if it cannot find the niche, to which it is 

 destined. Sometimes a fertile soil is in vain abundant, 

 and remains uncultivated. There is no chance of the 

 most numerous population assembled in its neighbour- 

 hood coming to profit by its resources. This soil has 

 become the property of a few families ; it is declared 

 indivisible and unalienable; it will always pass to a 

 single proprietor, according to the order of primoge- 

 niture, without the capacity either to be subjected 

 to an emphyteutic lease, or burdened with a mortgage. 

 The proprietor has not the capital necessary for its cul- 

 tivation ; he can give no security to such as have this 

 capital, that will engage them to employ it in his land. 



