THE POSSIBILITIES OE AGRICULTURE. 25 



yond 30° in America, and 85 as that of the country within 

 the parallel of 30° on each side of the equator, we have 

 about 4,000,000 square miles, each capable of supporting 

 490 persons. It follows that, if the natural resources of 

 America were fully developed, it would afford sustenance 

 to 3,600,000,000 of inhabitants, a number nearly three 

 times as great as the entire mass of human beings now 

 existing upon the globe." ' 



But, after all, the theory of Malthus, that moral re- 

 straint must be exercised for the prevention of famines, 

 only teaches that men must suffer when their supply of 

 food does not increase with the increase of their number. 

 The moral standard required is, moreover, movable, and 

 it is quite as likely to become a social condition, under 

 favorable circumstances of food supply, as when the 

 supply is low. With a true progress man's desires take 

 higher forms ; they seek expression in the exercise of his 

 better faculties ; not as a beast, he must live ; his is an 

 archetype of a grand and noble purpose. Where the na- 

 tional supply of food has dropped too low to give the peo- 

 ple a comfortable subsistence, it has always resulted from 

 a congested state, brought about through the sway of a 

 false condition in social organizations. Society is con- 

 vulsed because of some men's inability to gain the bread 

 which their associates believe their requirements demand. 

 These convulsions are becoming not far removed from 

 civil war. 



And : " What is man, the animal who builds cities, and 

 excavates docks, and lays wires under the ocean, and 

 drives ships over it ? Is he not a land animal, whose 

 very body is composed of land ? What are his produc- 

 tions but the bringing forth of land materials drawn from 



' " Encyclopasdia Britannica," vol. i., p. 717. 



