THE EEGULATION OF NUMBEES 271 



population in any one class. This, however, may not always be 

 so, and in particular at the present day it may be that in the 

 lowest social class there is over-population though not in the 

 nation as a whole. It may be that in this class there is a failure 

 to attain to such a standard of living as is within reach owing to 

 over-population, and whether this does in fact happen will have 

 to be discussed later. 



In the Ninth Chapter, when discussing the data of the first 

 and second groups, we showed how approximation to the desirable 

 number might be brought about and we further came to the 

 conclusion that normally there was such an approximation. It 

 is proposed here to treat the data for the third group in the same 

 fashion, though the treatment will be even slighter than in the 

 case of the other groups. Subsequently we shall discuss the chief 

 causes of failure of adjustment in this and in the preceding groups. 

 Lastly we shall touch upon the questions of migration and war 

 which have often been held to be caused by over-population. 



2. The difficulties in dealing with the first sub-group are so 

 great that we shall only devote a very few words to the con- 

 sideration of the problems that arise. The facts regarding the 

 social conditions in Egypt, Assyria, and other great empires are 

 very scanty. It is only with regard to Greece and Eome that we 

 have any considerable amount of information. Our conclusions 

 as to what was in the main the position with regard to the ancient 

 empires will be rather in the nature of a deduction when we 

 have completed our sketch of all the races in the third group. 



How adjustment may be conceived to have come about in 

 these races is in the absence of knowledge of their social con- 

 ditions not possible to illustrate. We know, however, that the 

 social life of these races was based upon the cultivation of the 

 land. It is true that in addition to the cultivator we find 

 the artisan and the wage-earner.^ The question as to how the 

 increase of the artisan, merchant, and wage-earning classes may 

 be kept down to the desirable level will be discussed when dealing 

 with the third and fourth sub-groups, and, as in general the 

 conditions are probably much the same everywhere, we may 

 omit the consideration of what happens among these classes in 

 this sub-group. With regard to the cultivators we have already 



' Among these races the evolution of the capitalist system had begim and in 

 Babylonia had gone a considerable distance (Sayce, Babylonians and Assyrians, 

 p. 127). 



