n8 NO STRUGGLE NO SELECTION 



concept that such is the inevitable tendency of popu- 

 lation, I confine myself to the historical argument 

 that it has never in any part of the world manifested 

 this tendency, and that no country has experienced 

 calamity or suffering from the increase of its popu- 

 lation being greater than the increase of its food 

 supply. 



If one takes a map of the world and casts his eye 

 upon the different quarters of the globe, he will find 

 many regions which were once inhabited by great and 

 prosperous nations, seats of empire, and centres of 

 industry that are now abandoned to a scanty popu- 

 lation of barbarians, when, indeed, they have not 

 become the undisputed haunts of wild beasts. 



Can it be alleged in regard to the decay and down- 

 fall of any of the old civilisations, that they had their 

 origin in the tendency of population to outstrip the 

 growth of the means of subsistence ? 



Foreign conquest entailed the ruin of one civilisa- 

 tion, internal insurrections or tyrannous misrule the 

 decadence of another. 



In every case the means of subsistence were 

 curtailed or destroyed by the rapid decline and ruin 

 of the various industries from which the people drew 

 their livelihood. These industries perished in the 

 insecurity which had fallen upon the right of 

 property, in the deprivation of the freedom of in- 

 dividual action, in the plunder and spoliation of the 

 wealth that had heretofore maintained them. 



The sapping of the springs of industry by such 



