2 Statement of the Subject. Ratios of Bk. i. 



the present essay is to examine the effects of one 

 great cause intimately united with the very nature 

 of man ; which, though it has been constantly and 

 powerfully operating since the commencement of 

 society, has been little noticed by the writers who 

 have treated this subject. The facts which esta- 

 blish the existence of this cause have, indeed, been 

 repeatedly stated and acknowledged ; but its 

 natural and necessary effects have been almost, 

 totally overlooked ; though probably among these 

 effects may be reckoned a very considerable por- 

 tion of that vice and misery, and of that unequal 

 distribution of the bounties of nature, which it has 

 been the unceasing object of the enlightened phi- 

 lanthropist in all ages to correct. 



The cause to which I allude, is the constant 

 tendency in all animated life to increase beyond 

 the nourishment prepared for it. 



It is observed by Dr. Franklin, that there is no 

 bound to the prolific nature of plants or animals, 

 but what is made by their crowding and interfering 

 with each other's means of subsistence. Were 

 the face of the earth, he says, vacant of other 

 plants, it might be gradually sowed and overspread 

 with one kind only, as for instance with fennel : 

 and were it empty of other inhabitants, it might 

 in a few ages be replenished from one nation only, 

 as for instance with Englishmen.* 



This is incontrovertibly true. Through the 

 animal and vegetable kingdoms Nature has scat- 

 tered the seeds of life abroad with the most pro- 



* Franklin's Miscell. p. 9. 



