THE MALTHUSIAN THEORY OF POPULATION 427 



Population when unchecked goes on doubling itself every twenty- 

 five years that is, it increases in a geometrical ratio. The food 

 supply, under circumstances the most favorable to human industry 

 could not possibly be made to increase, says Malthus, faster than 

 in an arithmetical ratio. That is, population increases as the 

 numbers 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, and so on, while the food supply increases 

 as the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Thus at the end of 100 years the 

 population would tend to be more than 3 times the food supply. 

 The Malthusian theory, of population consists of two parts the 

 first part, just stated, of the geometric increases of population 

 when unchecked; the second part, of the "checks on population." 

 The ultimate check is want of food. But the immediate checks are 

 two, namely, (1) preventive that is, voluntary restraint; (2) posi- 

 tive that is, vice and misery in every form which causes a short- 

 ening of human life. Vice and misery include unwholesome labor, 

 exposure, poverty, disease, war, plague, famine. Delay of mar- 

 riage, from prudential considerations, said Malthus, is the most 

 powerful check in modern Europe in keeping down the population 

 to the level of subsistence. A lower birth-rate would lead to a 

 lower death-rate, said Malthus, that is, to fewer and better chil- 

 dren. The apparent paradox that better wages would lead to 

 earlier marriage and more children and lower wages, Malthus met 

 by laying stress on a more general system of education and a higher 

 standard of living for the workers. 



He stated that the population of the United States had doubled 

 every 25 years during the first 150 years, and he estimated a similar 

 rate of increase for the future as long as abundance of cheap food 

 lasted. This table compares his prediction with the facts. 



Population of the United States. 



The actual population of the United States in 1890, by the 

 federal census, was 62,622,250, or less than one-half of one per 

 cent under the estimate made by Malthus some ninety^ years before. 

 Following the year 1890, however, for the first time the "geo- 

 metrical increase" failed to occur. On the basis of doubling every 



